A prosecutor has opened an investigation into two former congressmen, Francisco Ferney Tapasco and his son Dixon Ferney Tapasco Triviño, for their alleged role in the death of Orlando Sierra, a journalist and editor at La Patria newspaper, EFE and RCN Radio report.
Marvin del Cid Acevedo, part of the investigative team for the Guatemalan newspaper elPeriódico, had his home broken into for a second time, and his laptop, where he stores all the documents associated with his journalistic work, was stolen, reported Cerigua.
After one of its photographers was killed by gunmen Thursday, Sept. 16, the Mexican newspaper Diario de Juárez, in an unprecedented move, published an extensive editorial on Sunday, Sept. 19, asking for a truce with drug cartels that would end the violence and, above all, stop the attacks against journalists in Mexico, reported CNN and the Associated Press. Newspaper editors also clarified that the call for peace does not mean the newspaper is giving up its journalistic work.
A photographer from the newspaper El Diario de Juárez was shot to death Thursday, Sept. 16, in a mall parking lot in Ciudad Juarez, ground zero for the drug trafficking violence in Mexico and just along the border with the United States, according to CNN. Another photographer, an intern at the newspaper, was seriously injured in the shoooting, according to the Associated Press.
Marcelo Tejero Ocampo, a 64-year-old radio journalist, was found dead the morning of Sept. 7 in his home in the town of Carmen in the state of Campeche, reported El Universal.
Adams Ledesma, director of a news program for the cable channel Mundo Villa TV, in Villa 31, a large slum in the center of Buenos Aires, the capital of Argentina, was stabbed to death early Saturday, Sept. 4, reported the news agency DyN and magazine Perfil.
Israel Zelaya Díaz, a renowned radio journalist from San Pedro Sula, was found dead outside the city with three bullet wounds, reported Radio-Info and La Tribuna. He was the 10th journalist killed in Honduras this year, explained Radio Nederland.
The Venezuelan Supreme Court approved the request to seek extradition of Walid Makled, alleged Venezuelan drug dealer arrested in Colombia last week, reported the Associated Press. Makled is considered the mastermind behind the 2009 killing of journalist Orel Sambrano, according to El Universal.
A police operation ended in the capture of Marco Álvarez Barahona, the lead suspect in the killing of radio reporter David Meza Montesinos, who was shot to death last March, La Tribuna reports. According to El Tiempo, two other suspects remain at large.
The following account is a testimony from Marcela Turati, of the Red de Periodistas de a Pie (On-the-ground Journalists Network), one of the organizers of the unprecedented demonstrations in Mexico protesting the violence against journalists.
Luis Valdez Villacorta, acquitted in February because of a lack of evidence for the killing of Alberto Rivera, was released from prison in Lima, where he had been incarcerated for 21 months, in order to wait for another trial while under house arrest, reported EFE and La República.
A new report by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) says the government is “fostering a climate of lawlessness” that has led to the deaths of nine media workers this year, including seven in just two months.