Author: ABC News
MEXICO CITY — Authorities believe residents of a remote community in the mountains of southern Mexico’s Oaxaca state beat five people to death and burned their bodies, the state prosecutor’s office said Wednesday.Oaxaca state authorities and National Guard arrived to the community of Llano Amarillo in Santa Maria Texcatitlan on Tuesday looking for the five missing people. They found a burned out vehicle with the remains of five people inside, the Oaxaca state prosecutor’s office said in a statement Wednesday.They believe the killings occurred Monday, but forensic investigators were still working to identify the remains.Preliminary information suggests that the five had arrived to the mountain community about 125 miles (200 kms) from the state capital Monday to collect a high-interest loan from a woman, the prosecutor’s office said.Popular ReadsSuch vigilante killings occur from time to time in Mexico, especially in remote areas where there is little government presence.In March, a mob killed and burned a man who worked as a clown after he was a accused of abusing a child in another Oaxacan town. Last year, a mob killed a woman accused of involvement in the kidnapping and killing of a girl in Taxco, Guerrero.A 2019 report — the most recent available — from the governmental National Human Rights Commission said that such killings were the most serious expression of people’s distrust of authorities and the pervasiveness of impunity. The study tallied 271 vigilante killings in 2018.
A man with a history of arson-related arrests who is accused of setting a fire that gutted the 250-year-old San Gabriel Mission in Southern California has pleaded not guilty to arsonByThe Associated PressMay 21, 2021, 12:48 PM• 2 min readShare to FacebookShare to TwitterEmail this articleSAN GABRIEL, Calif. — A man with a history of arson-related arrests pleaded not guilty Thursday to setting a fire that caused millions of dollars in damage to a historic Southern California Roman Catholic mission.John David Corey, 57, is charged with breaking in and setting a July 11 pre-dawn blaze that engulfed the rooftop and most of the interior of the San Gabriel Mission, east of Los Angeles, as it was undergoing renovations to mark its upcoming 250th anniversary celebration.No one was hurt. Prosecutors said the flames caused millions of dollars in damage but firefighters managed save the mission’s altar and historic paintings.Corey, who has been described as homeless, entered pleas in Los Angeles to two counts of arson of an inhabited structure and one count each of arson during a state of emergency, first-degree residential burglary and possession of flammable material.The church was the fourth in a string of Roman Catholic missions established across California by Junipero Serra — an 18th-century Franciscan priest who was canonized by Pope Francis in 2015 — during the era of Spanish colonization.While many credit Serra with spreading Catholicism along the West Coast, he has long been a symbol of oppression among Indigenous activists.Authorities have not released a motive for the arson, although Corey has a history of arson-related arrests in the San Gabriel area.Corey was arrested two days after the fire on suspicion of trying to burn a San Gabriel business. He pleaded no contest and was sentenced that September to three years in jail, the San Gabriel Valley Tribune reported. Authorities say they later tied him to the church blaze.Court records show he also was sentenced to three years in county jail for setting fire to a dilapidated structure at a construction site and got 50 days in jail for setting a fire in a restaurant in 2015, the paper said.Corey’s criminal record also included convictions for drug use, theft and burglary and vandalizing a house of worship, according to the Tribune.
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