Police narrative about surfers killed in Mexico not true: sources

US News

From Jennie Taer

Mexican police’s version of the events that led to the murder of three surfers appears shady to those familiar with the area and local corruption, The Post has learned.

Australian brothers Jake, 30, and Callum Robinson, 33, and American Jack Carter Rhoad, 30 – who were last seen alive in the city of Ensenada on April 27 – may not have been carjacked but killed by cartel members, who were looking for a rival gang. as Baja California is currently in the midst of a drug war.

Mexican prosecutors said a trio of bandits targeted the victims’ truck to capture its tires and then responded with violence when they confronted the surfers, leading to their deaths and the hiding of the bodies four miles away.

A source in charge of private security services in Mexico told The Post the situation was “deeply disturbing” and warned he was cautious about the police’s version of events.

“Basically, the argument that these were victims of car theft makes little sense. These surfers were well-traveled and would probably know better than to try to fend off a truck break-in,” the source said.

“I suspect they were misidentified as a rival criminal organization and murdered. The exposure would lead to an ongoing investigation that no cartel wants to deal with and would have a devastating impact on tourism in the region, which is popular with surfers and visitors from the United States, the source said.

Police have arrested three people, Jesús Gerardo Garcia Cota, his partner Ari Gisel García Cota and his brother Cristian Alejandro Garcia, in connection with the disappearance of the three surfers, but have not charged them with murder at this time.

Cartels in Baja California are known to pay police to keep their names out of their investigations, and Andres Martinez-Fernandez, a Latin America expert at the Heritage Foundation, said corruption could easily be involved among the surfers.

“The case is highly unusual, as portrayed by Mexican police, who say that the alleged robbery was committed by petty criminals who ultimately destroyed the vehicle they supposedly wanted to steal,” he said.

“Given the deep and widespread corruption in the Mexican police force, it is difficult to rule out the possibility of a cover-up, perhaps to shift blame away from a powerful drug cartel. “This would certainly be consistent with the Mexican government’s efforts to downplay the severity of cartel violence in Mexico,” he added.

Senior prosecutor Maria Elena Andrade Ramirez said during a news conference that the suspected killers targeted the surfers after noticing their truck and tents.

“They approached with the intent to steal their vehicle and take the tires and other parts to install on the older pickup truck they were driving,” Andrade Ramirez said.

“When they (the foreigners) came and caught them, they certainly resisted,” she added. “And these people, the attackers, got a gun and first killed the one who resisted the vehicle theft, and then others came and joined the fight to defend their property and their companion who was attacked, and “they have them also killed.”

The suspects then burned the surfers’ tents and dumped their bodies into a 50-foot-deep well four miles from the crime scene, Andrade Ramirez said, adding that the thieves covered the well with boards.

“It was literally almost impossible to find,” Andrade Ramirez said of the fountain.

Canadian Malcom Madsen, 68, was another foreigner who went missing in Mexico. He was in Puerta Vallarta in 2018 when he was kidnapped and eventually killed, although his body was never found.

Osborne said “bribery” and corruption were “the norm in most cases” in Mexico. Madsen’s daughter fought to break corruption in his case after the killer and her accomplices bribed the local prosecutor and let her off the hook for about two years, Osborne said.

In the case of the three surfers, they went “to a remote area of ​​Ensanada where bad things happen and no one is there to see it,” American Jesse Atkinson, owner of Ensenada Excursions and Tours, told The Post.

Atkinson noted that the group was camped in Santo Tomás, a small village about 28 miles outside the city, when they were killed.

“There are a lot of places to camp, surf and do other things, which is amazing, but there aren’t a lot of people out there either, so no one notices when bad things happen,” Atkinson said.

“The drug cartels are active, you won’t meet people with guns on their shoulders (the Mexican Federal Police).”

Barnett English’s friend Wilmer Dean Trivett, whose body was found in another remote area of ​​Mexico south of where the surfers were killed, told The Post that driving into rural areas would lead to trouble.

“It seems like if you ever want to go there and camp and be remote and only be with one or two people, you’re leaving yourself wide open, a sitting duck,” English said, adding the region “seems less so “To be safer than years ago.”

Trivett’s body was found in a pit in Baja California Sur and prosecutors said the motive was a “car accident.” Trivett had attempted to collect damages and medical bills related to the collision from the perpetrators, but they were not satisfied with this and decided to kidnap and kill him.

The details of the surfers’ murders are still being investigated by U.S. authorities and officials in Mexico, a State Department spokesman told The Post.

“The U.S. Department of State and our embassies and consulates abroad have no higher priority than the safety of U.S. citizens abroad,” the spokesman said.