Jalisco’s Forensic Service (Semefo) has promised to investigate and take appropriate action after images of bodies strewn on the floors of the state morgue were released by Spanish-language daily Mural.
The institution has been plagued by scandal in recent years as it attempts to process and adequately store the large numbers of unidentified corpses unearthed in clandestine grave sites in the state. In 2018, the saturation of corpses led authorities to store 157 unidentified bodies in a refrigerated truck, which was parked in a residential area, provoking widespread condemnation. The director of Semefo lost his job over the incident.
Sources told Mural that bodies are being left in bags on the floor of the morgue because the freezers are full up.
Between January 2018 and March 2021, 1,071 corpses were exhumed from clandestine burial sites in Jalisco – most of them unidentified.