Jalisco Attorney General (Fiscal Estatal) Gerardo Octavio Solís Gómez announced Tuesday his decision to step down for health reasons.
The 64-year-old lawyer first served as state prosecutor during the final months of the 1995-2001 administration of Alberto Cardenas, Jalisco’s first governor from the National Action Party (PAN). Although he has never been affiliated with a political party, Solís was kept on in the role by Cardenas’ successor, Francisco Ramirez Acuña, who named him secretary of government in October 2005. Solis served as interim governor for three months from November 2006 to February 2007, when Ramirez Acuña took a leave of absence at the end of his term of office.
Solís held various posts at both state and federal levels before Governor Enrique Alfaro appointed him state prosecutor in December 2018.
In a message posted Tuesday on social media, Solis said that he was not willing to compromise his “professional ethics” and devote less time to “public safety and the provision of justice” because of his heath issues.
Solis said he has spent “over 30 years dedicated with passion and intensity to defending the safety of Jaliscienses.”
The major case left pending under Solis’s watch is the assassinatuon of former Jalisco governor Aristoteles Sandoval in December 2019, which remains unresolved.
Alfaro has nominated Luis Joaquín Méndez Rui, the state’s exective prosecutor of criminal investigations, as Solis’ replacement. He was grilled by state legislators on Thursday, but is expected to be approved in the post.