FORGOTTEN - EP 9: Untouchable

on this side of the border. When they changed her shift, she signed an insurance policy. Joking around, she told me, if something happens to me, mamma, they're going to give you a ton of money. I don't know. If my innocent girl had a feeling that something was going to happen to her, I don't know. And so when I saw where this graveyard was located as it, I can't believe it. It's in the middle of the city. Across the street is the Association of Macueladoras. Why choose this

side to dump eight bodies of women? From the beginning, Dina Washington Valdez told us that the femicides in Huarez were not random, that the women were selected, and Diana also mentioned all kinds of strange connections between the victims and the maculadoras the mass grave containing eight women's bodies at the cotton field was discovered right across the street from the Maculadora Association, shortly before Lilia Alejandra Andrade was

abducted in February two thousand and one, her photographs were featured in a promotional brochure for her Maculadora and Diana also mentioned that men claiming to be model scouts would take photographs of young women outside the factories. And then there was Sagrario Gonzalez Flores. After the factory changed her shift, Sigario was forced to commute alone. Her mother, Paula, remembers the day that Sigario failed to come home from work.

We knew that she had worked and that she had left at the time, everyone left, but no one saw anything. And I tell you that very night we began searching at the Red Cross and the hospitals, on the streets, searching for her. You always san much. That night I grabbed all the photos I had of my daughter. I would pass them out at gas station saying I'm looking for my daughter, can you please help me find her? And that nights, I would step outside and I would

shout her name. I would run around the house and shout her name with all my strength. In the silence of the night. I felt she could hear me, so I would call to my daughter. After a few agonizing days and nights of searching for Cigario, I hope that she might be found alive began to fade. Paula joined a protest group outside the police station with other mothers

displaying photographs of their own missing daughters. One morning, after Segario had been missing for two weeks, Paula arrived at the protest to learn that a young woman's body had been found the previous night. We arrived at the sit in that day as usual, and as soon as we arrived, a reporter approached me said, ma'am, did you know they found the body of a murdered woman. As soon as he told me that, I ran to the photos we already had there. I said to the reporter, which one

did they find? He said, no, I don't know. I don't know which one they found. I just know she had a white mail. It was then that I sensed that it was my daughterdo had her name on the white Makilla coat. I had embroidered her name with colorful yarn, just her name, Sagaradio, Paula's sense of foreboding was proven correct. Next to the young woman's body dumped in the desert outside of Huirez was the factory coat that Paula had

stitched by hand with her daughter's name. And this pattern of young women in Juarez disappearing between home and work was by no means unique to Sagrario. Lilia Alejandra had also disappeared on her way home from work, and Cloudy Evet Gonzalez, one of the victims discovered in the cotton field, went missing after she was turned away from her factory

job for arriving two minutes late. These connections between the murders and the Maquilas began to attract international attention, including the ABC news piece where Heredrik Crawford appeared and where Roberto Urea, a former president of the Maculadora Association, appeared to blame the victims for their own deaths. We're worth these young ladies. Where they were seen last? Were they drinking all right? Were they parting? Were they in a

dark street? Urrea's defensiveness raised all kinds of questions. Did he and Immacula Door as he represented, have something to hide? Could there be some truth to Heredrich Crawford's assertion that his advocacy for the women disturbed big business interests on both sides of the border and contributed to his downfall. And could there be another group of men operating with or in parallel to the cartel who were also praying on vulnerable young women in Huarez? Amos voloshin and this

is forgotten the women of Juarez? You know now see Hala Felicia. That comment from Urreya Monico where he's saying, you know, where were the women last seen? Were they partying? Were they drinking? That really stuck with both of us. First of all, I have to point out how infuriating it is to listen to that interview. That sort of victim blaming has been done by police and politicians, and now it was being done on national television by a

former president of the Makiladora Association. How dare he shirk the responsibility his industry bears for not recognizing and responding to the risks their employees clearly faced. This kind of attitude alone puts women in danger, and in the late nineteen nineties and early two thousands, it wasn't just ABC News who were drawing a line between the maquilas and the murders. Diana was also pointing out the connections, as

were Amnesty International correct Yes. In the beginning, the whitest femicides were known as the maki Ladora murders because so many of the murdered women worked in the factories. Women were actively recruited because of these sexist stereotypes, like they're

more docile and nimble fingered. Pressure from the victims' families, combined with international media scrutiny, did push the Maculadoras into making some efforts to improve, especially providing transport to stop young female employees disappearing on their way home from work, But the fundamental situation in Juarez hasn't changed. Some people get rich there because others stay poor. There are two groups in particular who benefit, the largely American corporations who

manufactured goods in Juarez, and the city's own industrialists. Here's how Diana describes them in her book. Mexico's business elites are called impresarios, a word that sounds like emperor which is how they are viewed. The business emperors in the border state of Chihuahua benefit directly or indirectly from the labor of young women. Diana goes on to write, they own the industrial parks, at least buildings to maculadoras they produce materials for housing, and they produce them sell consumer

products that all families in Juarez purchase. But I still want to know just how powerful these empressarios really were. Were they powerful enough to pressure the state Department to silence a senior FBI official like Hardrick Crawford. To find out, we spoke to one of the few journalists who's gotten access to Huires's secret business elite. My name is Lauren Edder.

I'm an investigative reporter at Bloomberg News. In twenty seventeen, Lauren wrote a cover story for Bloomberg Business Week about how crucial huires Is manufacturing industry is to the global economy. I think there is this invisibility about wires in general, but I don't think you could walk through an average day without touching something that was made in a maquila, whether it's the pockets of your genes or the heart

stent inside your body. Any product that you pick up today will have made its way through the border region for one reason or another. There are over three hundred maculadoras in Huirez, employing roughly three hundred thousand people, more than half of whom are assembling products for US companies. But the goods manufacturing what Lauren calls the quote guts of the consumer economy. The windshield wipe on a car, a blood pressure cuff, a medical glove. So to make

the story land, the journalist needed a character. Somebody brought up Don Jaime, the godfather of the makila industry. Jaime Bermudez had a very storied career where he interacted with extremely prominent business men. You know, he went to England and was the guest of the Queen for a polo match. And I was just fascinated to learn that there was a somebody behind this massive manufacturing economy along the border. So Lauren traveled to Juarez to interview the then ninety

four year old business magnate. Benmordez has since passed away, but in life he was one of the city's leading empressarios. I had talked to people ahead of time, and people said you should probably have a bodyguard, but it turned out that Don Jaime had more bodyguards than me. So it was funny traveling around this very gritty city. And essentially what was a motorcade almost like floating through Juarez

in a chariot of some sort. The destination of the motorcade was the Bedmudes industrial parks, where many maculadoras operate. When you get into the manufacturing sector, inside these little fiefdoms, as I described them, it's just a different world. Really. There is a sense of security and a sense of insulation. Now, of course, most of the workers live in places that

do not have that sense of security. To understand how Juarez became a city of such stark contrasts, you need to understand the history of the Beermudes family and how their relationship with the US transformed their cotton fields into fiefdoms. It all started in the nineteen twenties when the family partnered with an industrious Kentucky distiller called Mary Dowling. After Prohibition, she was like, hell, no, am I going to shut

down this business. So she literally hired people to dismantle her distillery, loaded onto rail cars, and she had it shipped to Warez and so when she arrives in Warez, she meets with Jaime Bermudez's uncle. They end up going into business together. Prohibition didn't stop America's demand for liquor,

It just pushed it onto the black market. And this is the story of Warez, a place that constantly responds to what America wants, but what America doesn't want to take responsibility for bootleg liquor, sex, tourism, drugs, and from the nineteen sixties onward, outsourced labor. But this last chapter in Quires began when the US ended the so called Brassero program, which had allowed Mexican workers to fill labor shortages in the US created by the Second World War.

After the war ended, it became really a sensitive topic. There were a lot of people that were very concerned that the Mexican laborers were taking jobs that were otherwise suited for Americans. So the Brassero program was ended in what has been called the largest mass deportation in history. Hundreds of thousands of workers were sent across the border

into Mexico. Many of them ended up in Huirez, and both the Mexican and US governments were nervous about the potential for unrest if these men remained unemployed, So the two countries collaborated on the Border Industrialization Program, which created a duty free zone with no tariffs on imports and exports. And this would have effectively allow American companies to rehire

the Bresseros. But in Mexico, the Bermulez family, who made a fortune distilling whiskey with Mary Dowling, were tasked with turning the vision into a reality, and none other than Don Jaime traveled to the US to pitch companies on the idea of outsourcing to Mexico. His trip paid off in spectacular fashion. By nineteen sixty eight, Hime was standing in the family's old cotton fields laying the foundation for a one hundred and fifteen thousand square foot plant to

assemble television parts for the Radio Corporation of America. Our CIA no longer exists, but companies from Dell to General Electric followed the path to Huarez that they forged. This was really the beginning of the globalized economy, and the beachhead of that was Inhuirez. That was where we saw American companies going and testing out this new model, which was a cross border transnational global manufacturing economy. That's originally

why RCA started manufacturing its televisions and warez. They didn't want to have to pay the higher wages, they didn't want to have to pay the increasing benefits that the unions were demanding. And no matter how you look at the makula industry, and the fact of the matter is, it's still completely dependent on low wage workers. I mean, that's the reason why the industry exists, that's why companies

continue to go there today. The Benmula's family remain among Huarre's's most important local partners to the Macula doors and there's no suggestion that they were involved in the murders. But Capcom, the Makuela ware Sagaria worked and Leah the Maquila ware Claudia Vet worked are both located on Bedmudez Industrial Park, and both Claudia Yvette and Sagrario disappeared after leaving work. Although the Makilas do now provide transportation, the

vulnerability of the workers remains constant. I mean, you can't ignore the fact that at the end of the day they're getting paid seven dollars a day. You can't ignore the fact that, yeah, they're bust in every day to work, but when they're bust home, their homes might be a cardboard shack, and they might not have running water or electricity, And ultimately American consumers benefit in cheaper televisions and cheaper

washing machines. The Bermudez family drive around in SUVs, they played Polo don jaime, even hung out with the Queen of England. And although they're among the richest of the Juires impresarios, by no means the only Juires industrialists who have profited from generations of doing business with US companies. Meanwhile, those US companies who have key manufacturing operations in Huarez have hundreds of billions of dollars of market capitalization and

the political clout that comes with it. But was there some kind of direct conspiracy to keep profit margins high by deflecting attention from the vulnerable women who worked in the factories and paid the ultimate price. Could Hardrich Crawford have been silenced because of drawing attention to the connection between the Makilas and the murders. When we come back, we asked the US ambassador who revoked Hardrick's country clearance.

So before the break Monica Lauren mentioned some thing that you've been telling me since day one, which is that Juarez as it exists today exists because of low wage workers. Firstly with the Brasseros, and then once the Makilas were there, they attracted internal migrants like the Flores family for the jobs. Now, the Flores family arrived thirty years ago, but what's the condition of the workers like who arrived today. I'll never forget visiting one of these factory workers Insu love Huais

in twenty sixteen. Her name was Brenda Estralla and she worked for Comscope, a multi billion dollar communications company headquartered in North Carolina. This is the company that outfitted the Dallas Cowboys new football stadium with Wi Fi. Brenda assembled cables for Comscope in Huatas for seven dollars a day, not per hour per day. And when you go to her house, you can see what kind of a life you can live on that salary. But in the lived

in a government subsidized three rooms cinder block home. She had no central heating or cooling. In the winter, she stayed warm by tossing plywood in a middle trash bin, and that plywood is worth half her daily salary. And meanwhile, in its annual letter to its shareholders, Comscope brags about saving them money by putting its factories in quote low

cost geographies like Wattas. And you told me that for the lauge international companies who do business in Huarez, these conditions aren't just an open secret, but almost pot of Wuires's appeal. Yes, here's another example. In Alpasso, there's a regional business alliance that's dedicated to helping big companies set up in Huattas. And one of the selling points they advertised on their website about WA was a quote cooperative, predominantly non union workforce. In other words, come to Juares.

The workers here are submissive and they won't try to defend themselves. When Howard Campbell first told us about how the cartel bribes US law enforcement officials to facilitate the flow of drugs across the border, I began to see the wall that separates El Paso and Juarez in a new light, and now my understanding was shifting again. The wall also disguises the deep connections between the legitimate economies

of Mexico and the US. It obscures the reality that many Juarez femicide victims died, creating value for the US economy. This was the situation that FBI Special Agent in charge of El Paso, Hardrick Crawford, was beginning to shed light on when he received a warning that he was making enemies on the US side of the border. He even alluded to a possible moiracy to silence him, involving big

business interests and the US State Department. So we had to ask the ambassador from that time, Antonio Gaza, if that was possible. Do you remember Hardrick Crawford. I remember in general terms. I don't remember having any personal interaction with him. Yeah, you effectively withdrew his country clearance. Why would you have done that? I likely would have done it on the recommendation of people working within the embassy that felt that having him in country would not be

beneficial to the US interest. I did interview Hardrick Crawford for this podcast, and this is what he said to me, which I'd love your response to. If I was a conspiracy theorist, I would say that the State Department and the US Corporation said, look at this guy who's harming the makuladora industry and Mexico are upset We're going to

have to make a sacrifice out of him. But I'm curious as to what you think about this idea that the Mikuiladora industry were in some sense putting pressure on the State Department to avoid too scrutiny of the fate of their workers. Yeah. No, I think that's absurd, And I and it's no, I just find I find that absurd.

But here's the thing. Many of America's most important and valuable companies outsourced to quires, So it was at least plausible that bringing bad press to the manufacturing industry there would not be smiled upon by the US government. How did the maculator industry interact with the State Department and how much of a priority was maintaining good relations with them,

you know, in a very very broadly. You know, I'll go back to the day I took my oath, and it was to represent and protect and defend the United States interests abroad, and largely my focus in terms of priority was our citizens and our US interest and investments. The ambassador went on to deny that he gave any

undue consideration to the mackela industry. Nonetheless, he did say that protecting US investments in Mexico was a top priority, and in fact, trade between the US and Mexico is now worth more than half a trillion dollars each year. That figure has risen almost eight hundred percent since the start of the North American Free Trade Agreement or NAFTA.

Just this year, the current American ambassador publicly put pressure on Mexico to keep the Macula doors open in the face of work of protests about death from COVID, because the factories were manufacturing key medical and defense supplies for

the US. In a further demonstration of just how intertwined business interests are between the countries, Ambassador Gaza himself married one of Mexico's richest industrialists in two thousand and five, opening him up to accusations of conflicts of interest, which he also denied. But in the end, as much as the US economy does benefit from low wage workers in Juarez, it seemed unlikely that there was a direct conspiracy to

keep them vulnerable by silencing Hardrick Crawford. But maybe somebody else with big business interests in Huarez did feel Hardrick was getting too close to the truth. Remember those Empressarios, those emperors of industry, well his Diana. Again, there was a suspicion on the part of authorities in Mexico City that the Aduana the customs was not collecting the assessments people have to pay at the border to take items

into Mexico. In fact, the authorities in Mexico City suspected that they were off by two hundred and fifty thousand dollars a month. The federal government in Mexico was worried that several business people in Huarez weren't paying their fair share of import duties, so they started listening in on their conversations. The investigation involved the use of a sort islens equipment. It was during these interventions of telephone calls that the investigators became aware of people involved in the

disappearances and murders of Wadis. They notified their superiors in Mexico City, Hey, you know the sort of stuff we're hearing and bodies and being transported and blah blah blah, and so they said. Their superiors told them keep it quiet for now, just continue with the investigation. We'll do that later. The customs investigators were assigned to solve a tax issue, but they stumbled across evidence that connected certain

industrialists to a much larger crime, the femicides. Here's what they told Diana and her colleague, said Hio Gonzalez Rodriguez. A group of powerful men killed the women with impunity sort of became a sport. And by the way, the victims of the group, not all of them have been found, because the sources indicated they were buried in properties that

the public does not have access to. Although these revelations about powerful men abducting and murdering women for pleasure weren't the crimes the investigators had been asked to solve, they passed along their findings to their superiors in Mexico City, anticipating an intervention. A lot of recordings were made, and so the principal investigators were very proud of themselves and that, wow, we solve the femicide. And so, you know, they wrapped up their field work and waited and they waited it,

and they waited and they waited. Nothing happened. And so that's when they started contacting, said and myself. When it became clear that the federal government wasn't going to do anything with their discovery. The investigators gave Diana and Sergio a huge tip, not just the general profile of the killers, but the specific names of the men involved. And when Diana heard them, she didn't even need to do a background check. She already knew who these people were. We're

talking about people involved in major industries. According to Diana, the men were major players in industries ranging from transportation to energy, to communications and real estates. And Diana also told us she had received an off the record tip about these men being implicated in the murders once before from a source in US intelligence. And what was amazing to me is that there were the same names, the

same names that came out. And so you're investigating this story, you get a call about these phone conversations where these names come up after the authorities have also been handed this information. Don't do anything, I mean, you must want to publish something. Well, actually, my first reaction was to want to crawl under a desk and hide. It was scary. When you sit down and think about who may be involved in the names. Oh my god, it's like, oh

my god. You know, these are people that are well known not just at the border, but in Mexico nationally and they have global business interests. I mean, they're powerful economically, they're influential, and you know, I'm just a little old reporter, you know. And I also saw an explanation for the impunity of these crimes. All right, I could understand the cartels and the gangs serial killers to an extent, but this,

this was bigger than all of that together. What Diana was being told about powerful man and murdering women for pleasure was almost exactly what Alfredo had been told about the cartel parties by his source in the Huirez jail. But these new revelations didn't rule out the previous ones about La Ligna or make it impossible that one or

more serial killers were praying on a vulnerable population. The murderers were not mutually exclusive, and I was starting to understand better how Diana had chosen the title The Killing Fields for her book. When We Come Back, Diana attempts to make contact with the industrialists alleged to be involved

in the murders. Diana told us that when she heard the names of the businessmen allegedly involved than the femicides, her first reaction was to want to crawl under her death but it didn't take long for her reporter's instincts to kick in. I made an effort to contact a lot of these people. UN left all messages as well as emails, faxes, I went through personal secretaries. I never got an answer from any of them, not a single

solitary answer. You know. Despite the lack of response, Diana and her editors at the El Paso Times felt confident enough in the story that they ran it in the paper. But crucially, they decided not to identify the industrial lists by name, both for legal and for safety reasons. There were no names named, but they were characterized. The editor chose the word cabal to describe this network of powerful

businessmen involved allegedly in these murders. I wonder how far you were able to go or were you just these are too big and I better not. I think I weren't as far as I could journalistically speaking. But I also knew that even if their names appeared, nothing would happen, and in fact, the messenger with them would become a target, meaning you, meaning me. Of course, Now, given the time that his past your series was published, would you be willing to name those names now, Monica, I mean just

can't get away with her, they'll bury you. This is the same Diana who walked into the neighborhood where Lilia Alejandra had last been seen, despite Ahuire's lawyer literally tearing up a map he'd drawn for her and telling her to stay away. The same Diana would continue to report on the murders after receiving a death thread traced back to Mexican military intelligence. But it was these business people pool who Diana seemed to fear more than anyone else.

We wanted to know if it would be possible to speak to the customs investigators ourselves, but sadly, Diana said that wouldn't be possible. Nobody knows where they are anymore. The two guys, one of them told Sethio Gonzalez that he was asked to provide a proof of his loyalty by Mexican officials. It may be that they were already suspecting that there were leaks, and they were probably trying to tear down who could have been leaking during the

cartail wars. There's a suspicion that they might be dead. The problem that the drug cartels wars created for everyone is that then became like a way to off people who might be inconvenient and just make it look like, you know, the cartels did it a drug hit? Yeah, yeah, so many, so many of them. It seems remarkable to me that these Mexican investigators would come and reach out to to journals lists they wanted justice. Two more people who wanted justice for the women in Huires, two more

people who disappeared presumed dead. So let's rewind for just a second. Remember when Alfredo Corcillo first learned that Uirez police officers were involved in the kidnap and murder of young women. He wasn't sure what to believe, so he turned to Phil Jordan of the DA who was able to corroborate that reporting and the existence of La Ligna.

Phil was the director of the El Paso Intelligence Center, a multi agency initiative to gather as much information as possible about the movement of drugs south of the border. We wanted to know, in the course of all of his intelligence gathering whether Phil had ever heard anything along the lines of what the Mexican customs investigators had told Diana, so we called him. Diana has a line of investigation that suggests that some of the powerful industrialists in Silajuarez

were involved in having the women abducted. Did your informants ever tell you anything which suggested that may be true? I would be lying if I tell you I didn't hear about that. Yes, I believe those rumors to be accurate. Diana Washington was accurate in the powerful and the elite could pick up women, party with them, and then do away with them. But since it did not involve directly

drug trafficking, we obviously didn't get involved. No, I don't know if the FBI got involved or not, but yes, La Lina existed primarily to traffic drugs, and so the DA actively tracked their activities, including the kidnap and murder of women, to celebrate successful drug shipments. But the city's business elites were outside at the agency's direct purview. So despite believing the rumors to be true, Phil never followed

up on them, but he did mention the FBI. So we've reached out to Frank Evans, the former Assistant Special Agent in Challenge of El Paso, to find out what he knew. We were getting uncorroborated information of involvement by prominent officials and warez in what we're purported to be you know, no holds barred sex parties. If that's in fact the case, the victims cannot be left alive because

they know they've seen certain people. If you had a victim that turned up and says, hey, I was dragged into this house and this guy was there, and that guy was there, and this guy was there and that guy was there, now you've got a real problem. But if the victim's killed and it's a nonsolved thomicide, did anyone try to cooperate this for us? The ability to one hundred percent corroborate did not exist. Unlike the drug information. You call Diana Washington Vold as a witness to the truth.

I think you know if you read her book, there are some very concrete facts in there. Like any investigative reporter, some of what she reports cannot be one hundred percent corroborated. But the simple fact that the matter is she's a witness to the truth. The only way that you stop this is somebody has to say I'm not running, whether it's a Diana Washington or someone else. We used to make a joke. It was you can kill me, but you can't eat me, and people would say, what the

hell does that mean. It's an attitude of you know what, I'm here and I'm not leaving. That's one of the things I respect about Diana Washington and the news media and wires. They're getting blown up and killed, but you have people that still go to work every day and they still do their jobs. And that's when I called Diana a witness to the truth, because once you're a witness to the truth, you can kill me, but you can't eat me. Although they can't put you in a

bat of acid and dissolve your bones. You can kill me, but you can't eat me. So in the end, Alfredo Corciallo was able to corroborate his story Monica about police being involved in the kidnapping of women in Juarez. He got the documents from the DA, he got the confirmation from the drugs are in Mexico City. Diana never got the same degree of corroboration about the rich men. So what do you make of it? To me, the investigation into powerful men being involved in the murders of women

is not far fetched in the least. I mean, time and time again, there are examples of powerful men abusing women, whether it's Jeffrey Epstein, Harvey Weinstein, Dominique Straskon, r Kelly Roger Ales. I could go on and on. I mean, our own president was caught on tape describing how he feels he has license to sexually abuse women. Two men are now sitting on the US Supreme Court despite strong

allegations of sexual abuse. The differences, you know, their victims were still around to make allegations and tell their stories. In what is the victims can no longer speak up against their attackers. But are there examples of powerful men being involved in this kind of twisted and sick and deadly behavior. Absolutely, in Mexico, the elite and powerful, whether it's in business politics, act with just as much impunity as the drug cartells do. One thing I'm still not

completely clear on. Does Diner's reporting suggest that there were two sets of parties where women were trafficked and used for sport or the industrialists and the knockers attending the same parties. Both the drug cartels and the powerful men were said to consume these women under similar circumstances in these horrific parties. Whether or not these were the same parties,

I don't think we know. But what we do know, as Candace Scrapic, the forensic psychologist, told us, it's a way to cement bonds, ensure silence, and fament a brotherhood. We know that even college frat boys engage in this kind of behavior. These men feel empowered to you, possess and attack women because they're used to getting away with it. Rarely are they ever held accountable for their actions. That's one of the most frustrating parts about this particular story.

When you have the police and the judiciary not doing their jobs, and when you have journalists being threatened or killed for asking questions, and you have powerful bestive financial interests in keeping a population vulnerable, you just don't get any answers. On the other hand, Diana, it seems, was so close to revealing the identities of these industrialists who were allegedly involved in the murders, and we know she was willing to risk her life so many other times.

Why do you think she drew a line on theyre trying to publish their names. Some of my initial reactions were, what do you mean you're not going to publish these names? What do you mean you're not going to try to get more confirmation, I mean, for God's sakes, for the sake of justice, for the sake of accountability. But the reality is, even if you were able to get some kind of solid confirmation, the retaliation you could expect could be deadly. And I mean you just have to think.

You just have to think, how hard is it to hold powerful men accountable in this country, in the US To even begin to fathom how much more of a challenge it would be to hold them accountable in a place like Quattas, where you have cops in alliance with criminals. When you talk about power and protection in Wattas, the elite business class seems to be more powerful and more protected,

more untouchable than even the top drug cartels. The odds that young women in Huarez are up against are overwhelming, the poverty, the corruption, the invisibility. It was in response to all of this that Paula, a daughter Ye and several other families came up with a symbol of resistance that they went on to paint all over Juarez, a symbol that made it impossible to forget the fate of Sagrario and so many others like her. Why not have

a protest, but a permanent one is. She thought of a black cross with a pink background as a symbol for the girls, the pink background representing the women, and the black cross for the morning of their loss, but its main purpose was one of prevention, that whenever a girl stood by one of those lampposts and saw the cross, she would know that she was in danger. Next time, I forgotten Paula's continuing demands for justice and the consequences for her and her family. I'm Asoloshin and I'm Monica.

See you next time? Do you Know? See? Do you Know? Halla? Felicia Forgotten? The Women of Horres is co hosted by Me Monica and me oswald Oshan Forgotten is executive produced by Me and Mangesh Hatia. Our producers are Julian Weller and Katrina Norvelle. Sound editing by Julian Weller and Jacopo Penzo. Lucas Riley is our story editor. Caitlin Thompson is our consulting producer. Production support from Emily Maronoff and Aaron Kaufman.

Recording assistant to this episode from Miguel Perez and Ethan Bean. Music by Leonardo Hablum and Hakkabo Libermann, Additional music by Aaron Kaufman,