Benjamin Castro filed a complaint of torture and provided two videos of proof of him doing nothing wrong after he was assaulted by Tijuana Police.
Benjamin denounced that Tijuana police took him to a place that was not a police station or delegation, where he was repeatedly beaten. His case joins a series of complaints of police abuse registered in different entities of the country in the last month.
The case of Jair López, suffocated by police until his death in Baja Ca, is already in the hands of the Prosecutor’s Office. There is a Video of that murder. Before the Floyd case, in Tijuana a police officer allegedly suffocated a man to death.
Following the murder of George Floyd at the hands of US police officers on May 25 in Minneapolis, Minnesota, some Tijuana residents this week decided to re-circulate the video on social networks where it is observed how more than two months ago, local police officers submitted with violence to Jair López who died, and the cause of death ruled, was “nullification by strangulation”.
Benjamín Castro Peredo, because of the pain, walked slowly, while he went to the offices of the Municipal Sindicatura of Tijuana on Thursday, June 11, to denounce the municipal police officers who he claimed deprived him of liberty, beat and tortured last Saturday June 6th.
In his version of ZETA, the young man explained that around 7:20 p.m. on Saturday he went to look for his wife at work in the downtown area of Tijuana and he did it by bicycle because he likes to exercise, at one point of the journey he was approached by municipal police officers, as he did not want to be arrested, he tried to run, but was violently subjected, and he was put on a patrol.
Benjamin charged that the officers took him to a place that was not a police station or delegation, where he was repeatedly beaten for a long time. And then the agents took him to a delegation where the Qualifying Judge on duty released him, without making a report that the detainee had been beaten, nor did he report that the detainee’s wife had been pushed when she went to ask for him.
”I would like them to be in prison (the policemen who attacked him), they cannot even be as civilians, they have to be corrected, they are criminals, they only bring uniforms but they are criminals,” Castro said.
The lawyer Ernesto Beltrán, from the corporate Legal Force, is the adviser to Benjamín Castro Peredo, and he accompanied him to the Sindicatura to file the complaint, and personally ask the municipal authorities to issue a position regarding these events.
Beltrán said that they will also denounce the Qualifying Judge for all the omissions he committed. And he stated that they already have two responsible Municipal Police officers located, but he did not mention them, because he will ask the authorities to deepen the investigations to find out if there were more officers involved.
ZETA had access to two videos of the day of the events, in the first it is observed how Benjamin runs away from the agents, and in the same video-material, witnesses to the events are heard saying that the young man did nothing to intervene .
The second video was taken by Benjamín Castro Pereda himself with his cell phone when he was on board the patrol, and he asked the officer for an explanation for the arrest, to which the agent responded “because he ran”.
NOTE: Use the ZETA Link at top to access the two short videos.
Here is the conversation:
Benjamin: “I only went for my wife, to her job, I don’t have any problem, I don’t know why you stop me, you hit me, officer… I’m talking to you.
Officer: “You run joto … why are you running?”
Benjamín: “Because of the videos that are happening on Facebook of how they pass the old spear.”
Officer: “Who’s going overboard?”
Benjamin: “The carnal officers !, with the people.”
Official: “Fuck your mother asshole, you’re not in the United States slimy eh!”
Benjamin: “Well, they hit me old man and I did nothing!
Officer: “What are you running for? You are not criminals, are you?”
Benjamin: “No , old man, I have nothing, nothing!”
At the end of the dismissal with honors of officer Joel Saraos Ruiz, which took place on the outer esplanade of the Municipal Palace, this Thursday, June 11, Jorge Alberto Ayón Monsalve, Secretary of Security and Municipal Citizen Protection (SSPCM) assured that municipal officials involved have been made available to the authorities that require them.
He stressed that the SSPCM has nothing to hide and in all cases where municipal police officers are identified as allegedly responsible for being involved in a crime, they collaborate with the other instances in a transparent manner.
Through a press release from the Baja California State Commission on Human Rights (CEDHBC), it was reported that following the case of Benjamín Castro Pereda, file 2319/2020 was opened to investigate these events.
Oliver Jair López Murder Case:
They also recalled that they are working three other folders: one for the death of a person that occurred on January 9, 2020 during an arrest executed by municipal police, in Plaza Santa Cecilia, also in the Central Zone: and another on March 28, for the investigation of events that occurred on Salvador Rosas Magallón Boulevard, in which Jair López was assassinated by agents of the Municipal Police during the arrest.
A police of Tijuana was captured while subjected to a man with foot on his neck, last March 29, 2020 in Baja California; the detainee died, that detainee was Jair López.
The events were recorded by witnesses at a gas station south of the Manuel Paredes neighborhood in the city of Tijuana in Baja California.
The video shows the moment when the man is subdued by a policeman, who places his foot on his neck.
Already on the floor, the man who had his hands cuffed, lay motionless. Before long they noticed that he was not breathing, the witnesses who recorded the video noticed the purple color of his face and deduced that he had died.
Minutes later a uniformed man tried to revive the detainee, however, it was too late. The man, identified as Oliver Jair López, had died.
According to local media, the victim’s next of kin stated that they did not oppose the arrest.
It was also reported on the portal Agencia de Noticias México that the Secretary of Security and Citizen Protection of Tijuana reported that Oliver was arrested for throwing stones and “had convulsions when he was arrested.”
In response to messages on social networks, on Tuesday, June 2, the Municipal Citizen Security and Protection Secretariat (SSPCM) reported through a press release that the corporation has collaborated with investigating authorities to clarify the events.
And they recalled that both municipal agents remain suspended, a process by which includes their charge weapons were removed.
Regarding events registered on May 18 in Playas de Tijuana, in which a man arrested by municipal police officers lost his life, the CEDHBC opened the file on Complaint 393/20 / 1VG on May 19.
The CEDHBC has registered, so far in 2020, 175 complaints regarding municipal public safety.
The main human rights violated have been the right to legal certainty, the right to decent treatment, the right to liberty and the right to legality.
The Secretary of Security and Municipal Citizen Protection of Tijuana is the one with the most complaints, a total of 106.
The Mexicali Municipal Public Security Directorate, 31 complaints; the Ensenada Municipal Public Security Directorate, with 24 complaints; the Municipal Public Security Directorate of Playas de Rosarito, 9 complaints; and the Directorate of Citizen Security and Municipal Traffic of Tecate, 5 complaints.
The CEDHBC made available the telephone number 664-450-3534, the various social media platforms, and the institutional email,
[email protected] , to file complaints regarding possible human rights violations.
