Press freedom activists have asked the Colombian attorney general to classify the 1991 deaths of two journalists investigating a massacre as crimes against humanity, the Foundation for Press Freedom (FLIP) reports via IFEX.
Luciano Leitão Pedrosa was killed the night of April 9 in a restaurant in the northeastern Brazilian state of Pernambuco, G1 reports. The journalist worked for Radio Metropolitana FM and hosted the program Action and Citizenship on TV Victoria, where he discussed criminal allegations and police issues.
Nine years after the assassination of the deputy editor of La Patria newspaper, Orlando Sierra, two influential Colombian politicians from the interior were accused of being the masterminds of his killing, and they were ordered imprisoned to prevent them from fleeing, RCN Radio reports.
In an unprecedented decision favoring transparency about the impact of drug trafficking, Mexico’s Federal Institute for Access to Information (IFAI) ordered the national intelligence service to furnish precise data on the number of people killed in clashes between authorities and organized crime groups, El Universal reports.
TV host José Luis Cerda of the Televisa network was found assassinated in the northern city of Monterrey—which in recent months has become the site of several attacks on media and aggression on the press by organized crime. He was kidnapped the day before by a group of armed men, Terra reports.
The killing of journalist Francisco Javier Ortiz Franco, editor general of Zeta weekly, was allegedly ordered by Javier Arellano Félix, then leader of the Tijuana Cartel, the gang that controls the drug trade between the Mexican border city of the same name and the United States, the Committee Protect Journalists (CPJ) reports.
A special court in San Salvador sentenced 11 of the 31 suspects charged in the 2009 killing of a photographer to between four and 30 years in prison, reported EFE and La Prensa Gráfica.
Gabino Cue, governor for the Mexican state of Oaxaca, has created a special prosecutor's office to re-open the investigations into the deaths of 26 people -- including New York journalist Bradley Will -- who were killed during protests against the government in 2006, reported Milenio and the Associated Press.
The Costa Rican Journalists’ Guild has asked the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) to sue the government for not investigating one of the worst attacks on the press in Central American history, El País reports.
São Paulo police recaptured Wilson de Moraes da Silva, who was convicted for the death of journalist Ivandel Godinho Júnior, Globo Notícias reports. The journalist was kidnapped in 2003 and his body was found and identified by a DNA test in 2006. The police found the fugitive after an anonymous tip claimed that Silva was selling drugs in a house in São Paulo.
Journalist Clara Fernández died after being shot in the head on Feb. 23 in the northern city of Valencia, Canal de Noticia reports.
Organized crime, whether drug cartels, mafias or paramilitary forces, poses the greatest threat to journalists today, according to a new report released Thursday, Feb. 24, from Reporters Without Borders. In the last 10 years, 141 journalists have been killed for reporting on organized crime, the report said.