In the town of San Miguel de Allende, Guanajuato, state and federal police are the objects of rage as citizens demonstrate over the imprisonment and alleged torture of a security guard, Antonio Luna, whom authorities have accused of killing his three young sons, ages 4, 8 and 11, in a January 14 late night shootout involving police. Authorities also allege that on the same occasion Luna tried to kill his wife.
“All that is false!” declared his wife, Juana, to the media about a week after the shootout, referring to the official version of events, which stated police responded to criminals renting the remote estate that Luna guarded. “I need justice because my husband is innocent … and I saw that my boys were alright when they entered.”
Protesters say police are responsible for the killings of the three boys.
Claudia Luna, the imprisoned man’s sister and the person he is said to have phoned for help as the tragedy began, expressed similar sentiments about police claims. “How lame! As his sister, I don’t believe it. I don’t believe it because he loved his children.”
Worsening the story are claims by Luna’s lawyer that after January 14 his client was “disappeared” and beaten by police until he was finally brought to court days later, bruised, and was accused of murdering his sons and trying to murder his wife as well as five police officers.
Early reports said that drugs and guns were seized by police at the estate. There were also reports that Luna’s children visited him on weekends, that he called out to police to stop shooting because there were children in the house and that he put them in a bathtub and covered them with his body to try to protect them. Luna, 31, is said to have earned just 800 pesos ($US40) a week working as a watchman.
Protests by local citizens broke out in San Miguel de Allende after the court hearings and after the accused man’s relatives spoke out to media. Candles were lit in front of a church, San Miguel Árcangel, and protestors screamed “No more death!” and “Free Toño!”
Foreign residents in the town, a favorite spot for retirees and tourists that has recently experienced sharp growth, say they are pained by the scandal.
“I was told that at one point, the women’s march Saturday was halted by a demonstration by people who wanted the father out of jail and the police arrested for the murders,” said American and San Miguel resident Barbara Espinosa. “His wife went on TV and accused the police of killing her children,” she said, adding that the official version of events did not make sense to her.