Translated by Jesús Ronquillo / Circuito Frontera
Juan Carlos was the coordinator of the Beta Group of the National Migration Institute in Ciudad Juárez until last year, but after the fire on March 27, 2023, where 40 migrants lost their lives, he was arrested and is now in the prison of this border.
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His case attracts attention, after the Attorney General’s Office (FGR) sentenced him to trial for allegedly being responsible for the building where everything happened.
A year after the incident, Juan Carlos Meza Cumplido, coordinator of Grupo Beta, is still in a legal limbo, where he is not being held in custody, but requires 2 million pesos to be released.
The Process
On the night of March 27, 2023, Juan Carlos Meza Cumplido was assigned to the area of Tornillo, 60 kilometers from the place where the event occurred.
Although he was indicted for the fire a month later, after the Attorney General’s Office presented evidence against him due to the existence of a document in which he is held responsible as the person in charge of the INM’s Internal Protection Unit.
However, it is a document that lacks his signature accepting such position, but also lacks all the signatures of the officials named, explained Manuel Pineda Contreras, head of Legal Estudio Jurídico and defense attorney of Juan Carlos Meza Cumplido, coordinator of Grupo Beta.
The lawyer also referred that the Prosecutor’s Office omitted evidence in the trial of his client, such as the videos of the security cameras of the National Migration Institute.
In the case of Juan Carlos, the law applied differently, because unlike the rest of the officials, his position did not involve him as responsible, he said.
Also, even when the fire was started by the migrant population and the reaction mechanisms and protocols were carried out, the keys were guarded by the personnel of the private company.
A long and difficult trial
On November 9, 2023, a control judge removed the preventive detention of Juan Carlos Meza, for his alleged link to the fire at the National Migration Institute (INM) in Ciudad Juarez, but a bail of 20 million pesos was imposed on him, during a hearing to review precautionary measures.
Two months later, on Friday, January 12, the bail amount was reduced from 20 to two million pesos. However, this is an amount that the family members of the Beta Group coordinator have still not been able to pay.
Regarding the case of Juan Carlos, Leonardo Lara Ferreiro, attorney of Legal Estudio Jurídico and defense attorney of Juan Carlos Meza, told Circuito Frontera that in an incidental hearing to substitute the economic guarantee, the Control Judge, Juan José Chávez Montes, reviewed the precautionary measures and approved the change of the bail imposed.
Likewise, the Control Judge accepted the imposition of an electronic bracelet, once this amount is collected.
However, the lawyer pointed out that Juan Carlos Meza is not being detained under the precautionary measure of justified preventive imprisonment, nor is he being detained under the official preventive imprisonment, but rather he was left in a legal limbo without being able to carry out his process in freedom.
“The main reason why Juan Carlos is detained is because the Prosecutor’s Office alleges that he was responsible for the Civil Protection of the property. For this, they attach a constitutive act where they assign it to him, but we have alleged from the beginning that this document was not signed by Juan Carlos”, he explained.
The defense pointed out that the former coordinator of Grupo Beta cannot be held responsible for having caused harm to migrants materially, since his detention is based on administrative and bureaucratic issues.
“Juan Carlos is detained for a designation that was not well done and for administrative irregularities. He is the only one they are holding on to, he is the basis of the Attorney General’s claim, there is nothing else,” the lawyer affirmed.
