But that wasn’t all Víctor had witnessed that night in the park, which had been his domain for two decades. Early on, he’d seen a man giving beer and food to the bolitos who slept in front of the garage at the parish house; and then, a little later, when he and his two friends went out to buy their liquor, crossing the park, he’d seen Captain Byron Lima and two other men on a bench. The other men were sitting and the captain was standing with one foot up on the bench, his hands resting on his thigh—authoritative, alert. That demeanor seemed, in retrospect, in keeping with the captain’s persona. Víctor said that Captain Lima was wearing a white T-shirt, jeans, and sneakers.
Captain Lima, like other soldiers from the nearby headquarters of the EMP, was a familiar figure to the denizens of the park. It wasn’t until much later, when allegations about the captain’s participation in the crime appeared in the newspapers, that Víctor realized the significance of what he’d seen.
Rodrigo had suggested to me that Víctor had seen the father, Colonel Byron Lima, in the park that evening as well, but Víctor said no. Another of the park’s vagrants, Héctor Rivera, had seen the colonel. Héctor and his brother, Marco Tulio, the wayward alcoholic sons of a former director of the National Police, had lived in the park. Víctor said that he hadn’t seen Héctor in a while.
About ten minutes before he saw the shirtless man, Víctor had seen El Chino Iván, who said hello when he walked past the open door to the storage room, on his way out of the park.
By now we’d left the park and were in a small café across the street. So why, I asked Víctor, hadn’t he and the others in the park ever told what they’d seen?
The people in the park didn’t talk, Víctor said, because they were afraid of the militares. Didn’t I know about “the incident” in the park soon after the murder? He told me about someone who’d pulled up in a white van and stood outside it on Third Street with a wad of bills in his hand, offering money to anyone who had information about Gerardi’s murder. “Nobody said anything,” Víctor said, “because we knew he worked in the G-2.” The visit was understood, in the language of the park denizens, as a serious warning to keep quiet. Nobody had been foolish enough to come forward.
Víctor, like the Rivera brothers, was related to a police chief. Ángel Conte Cojulún, chief of the National Police at the time of Bishop Gerardi’s murder, was his cousin. Could that be just a coincidence? Or were the bolitos and car washers of San Sebastián, infested with informers, a peculiar extension of the state’s security apparatus, the lowest of the low but with roles and rules that they understood?
Víctor had told Otto Ardón and his prosecutors, when they’d held the first evidentiary proceeding at San Sebastián, on May 17, 1998, a few weeks after the murder, that he’d seen the frightening stranger go past his door, and El Chino Iván leaving the park—essentially corroborating Rubén Chanax’s first statements—while maintaining that he’d seen nothing else. Later I looked at a photocopy of the record of the proceeding. The sole entry about Víctor in the official record of the Gerardi case took up just a few lines. Ardón and his prosecutors had never questioned Víctor again.
But now years had passed, and Víctor was giving out more information than he had offered before. Maybe he felt he no longer had anything to fear. Maybe he felt the end of his life approaching, and the twisted story of the Gerardi case provided him with a sense of meaning. He was surprisingly well informed about the case and had his own opinions about various aspects of it. He believed in the innocence of Father Mario. And he expressed his indignation that the appeals court had shortened the Limas’ prison sentences by ten years.
Víctor told me that he’d once seen Obdulio Villanueva out on the streets when he was supposed to have been in the Antigua prison—at about four in the morning, months before the murder, just down Sixth Avenue, at the beginning of Zone 2, across the street from the Supreme Electoral Tribune building, near the house of Major Escobar Blas’s mother. There were three Chevy Suburban SUVs parked in a row, and Obdulio Villanueva was looking at his image reflected in the black tinted windows of one, adjusting his necktie. Víctor walked past with some friends from the park and said hello, and Obdulio Villanueva looked at them. He raised his fingers to his lips, and said, “Ustedes se callan.” You all keep quiet.
Later, back at ODHA, I asked Rodrigo Salvadó if the prosecutors who’d come after Otto Ardón—Celvin Galindo and Leopoldo Zeissig—had interviewed Víctor, and he said that he guessed they had. Then why hadn’t they called Víctor as a witness at the trial? Rodrigo said that probably Zeissig had decided that with Rubén Chanax he had all he needed, and that Víctor would make an unreliable witness, easy for the defense to discredit, with his obvious drug and drinking problems, and so forth.
MARIO AND I HAD GONE, one afternoon not long after the murder of his young brother, to visit the headquarters of the police detective units, downtown, at the edge of Zone 1. Earlier in the day we had dropped in at the Constitutional Court to see if there was any news about its ruling, and then we’d gone to lunch in the market. I wanted to interview some homicide detectives, and Mario agreed to come with me. We walked down long corridors of modular offices with hand-drawn signs on the doors—Extortion, Kidnapping, Fraud, etc.—until we came to Homicide, located in two adjoining, bleakly austere rooms, with metal desks in rows and cheap computers that didn’t seem to get much use. There were only four detectives present, in street clothes, pistols shoved into their pants. They were startlingly young, the beneficiaries, apparently, of recent reforms requiring that detectives have more rigorous training and at least a high school diploma. Mario said he would take advantage of the visit to check up on his brother’s case, and he went to speak with an officer in the next room.
The young detectives were a demoralized bunch, understaffed and underfunded, despite the ballyhooed reforms. There were only seventy detectives in their section, they told me, for a city currently experiencing seventeen homicides a day. And look at the grim, shabby condition of their office, one said. How was that supposed to affect their morale? As in decades past, there was such a dearth of patrol cars that they often had to ride public buses to crime scenes.
When I came out of the room I found Mario Domingo staring down at a thick folder of papers he held open in his hands. A detective was sitting on the corner of a desk opposite him. Mario’s face was somber, and there were tears in his eyes. We left and were well down the corridor when Mario said, huskily, “They are saying that Darinel’s murder was political.”
In a way, it was what Mario had most dreaded—confirmation that his brother’s murder might be related to his work at ODHA. Still, he told me, he hadn’t seen any evidence in support of the conclusions in the folder. And the prosecutor’s office was not likely to take action anyway.
When we got back to the ODHA office, one of Mario’s brothers was waiting for him. They had agreed, it so happened, to meet that afternoon to compose some phrases for a plaque on Darinel’s gravestone. They set to work, but after a while Mario couldn’t take it. He went out of the room and walked away somewhere.
In the covered corridor running around the patio and the offices off it, ODHA’s employees were occupied with routine duties. The Indian mayor of Nebaj—in the Ixil Triangle, far away in the mountains, one of the areas most affected by the war’s violence—had arrived accompanied by three women in traditional dress. They went into a little conference room with another young lawyer who was the newest member of ODHA’s legal team. I ran into Rodrigo Salvadó near the front door. He introduced me to a hulking, big-bellied youth with long hair and a beard whose name was Christian Ozaeta and who was developing a program for teaching the REMHI report in Guatemalan schools. Out in the corridor, ODHA’s executive director, Nery Rodenas, was taping an interview for a documentary film about the upcoming tenth anniversary of the signing of the Peace Accords. “Can a state of war that has divided a country for decades really end,” the interviewer asked, “with just a signature on a piece of paper
?”
The sky had darkened and a heavy downpour splashed the old stone tiles of the patio. I sat on a bench, watching it rain. Water rushed from drains and eaves and thunder rumbled in the sky. In his quiet voice, Nery had launched into a reply to the reporter’s question that sounded as if it might go on forever.
IN LATE APRIL 2007, a new judge took over as president of the Constitutional Court, and within days—on April 25, the day before the ninth anniversary of the murder of Bishop Gerardi—the Public Ministry was notified that the guilty verdicts against the Limas and Father Mario had finally been upheld. “After six years, the sentences are firm,” Leopoldo Zeissig wrote to me in an e-mail. “At last the second stage of the investigation can begin.” He meant the investigation, ordered by the judges in the original verdict, of other suspects in the murder, particularly higher-ups in the EMP. Prosecutors, Zeissig said, would have to establish the crime’s chain of command. “Don’t forget that the Gerardi crime and the extrajudicial executions carried out during the armed internal conflict have the same pedigree.” The murder’s operational structure, what he called the “intelligence channel,” was the same one, Zeissig believed, that the military had employed throughout the war.
Six years earlier, during the trial, Colonel Lima had drawn a similiar connection when he’d warned: “I’m just the point of the spear. Once they’ve created a judicial precedent, then they’re going to go after the others.” He didn’t mean just the other murderers of Bishop Gerardi, or only the other war criminals whom the amnesty was meant to protect. For half a century the military’s clandestine world had seemed impregnable. The Gerardi case had opened a path into that darkness.
Dramatis Personae
(In order of appearance within categories)
The Church
Bishop Juan Gerardi Conedera, auxiliary bishop of Guatemalan archdiocese, founder of the Archdiocese’s Office of Human Rights (ODHA), parish priest of church of San Sebastián. Murdered April 26, 1998.
Father Mario Orantes Nájera, assistant priest of church of San Sebastián. Arrested for Bishop Gerardi’s murder, January 2000.
Archbishop Próspero Penados del Barrio.
Archbishop Mariano Rossell y Arrellano, conservative prelate; great-uncle of Father Mario and Father Sergio Orantes.
Monseñor Efraín Hernández, chancellor of the Curia. His house-keeper’s daughter, Ana Lucía Escobar (La China), is suspected of being involved in gangs and in the murder of the bishop.
Father Gabriel Quiróz, priest to whom the taxi-driver witness came first.
Father Sergio Orantes Nájera, Father Mario’s brother. Loses prestigious job as rector of Colegio San José de los Infantes under cloud of financial and sexual irregularities.
Bishop Mario Ríos Montt, Bishop Gerardi’s successor at San Sebastián and ODHA. Brother of General Ríos Montt, president of Guatemala, 1982–1983.
San Sebastián church
Margarita López, parish-house cook.
Juana Sanabria, parish administrator, close friend of Bishop Gerardi. Witness for the prosecution.
Antonio Izaguirre, sacristan.
Monseñor Hernández’s household
Ana Lucía Escobar (La China), daughter of Monseñor Hernández’s housekeeper. Said to be involved in gang activity. Suspect in murder.
Imelda Escobar, La China’s mother, Hernández’s cook. Said to traffic in items stolen from church.
Dagoberto Escobar, Imelda’s nephew.
ODHA (Guatemalan Archdiocese’s Office of Human Rights)
Ronalth Ochaeta, executive director until 1999.
Edgar Gutiérrez, coordinator of ODHA’s “Recovery of Historical Memory” report, Guatemala: Never Again, published in April 1998. Becomes head of government’s Secretariat of Strategic Analysis in 2000, in administration of President Portillo.
Mario Domingo, investigating attorney.
Fernando Penados, chief investigator in Gerardi case (Untouchable). Nephew of Archbishop Penados. Later works in Portillo government.
Nery Rodenas, coordinator of legal team. Succeeds Ochaeta as director.
Arturo Aguilar, “El Gordo” (Untouchable).
Arturo Rodas, “El Califa” (Untouchable).
Rodrigo Salvadó, “El Shakira” (Untouchable).
Mynor Melgar, coordinator of legal team.
MINUGUA (United Nations Peace Verification Mission)
Jean Arnault, French chief of mission.
Rafael Guillamón, Spanish head of police investigation.
Military
Presidential Military Staff (Estado Mayor Presidencial, or EMP), in charge of personal security of president and his family. Included elite anti-kidnapping commando unit and an intelligence unit known, during the civil war, as El Archivo. In charge of interrogation and torture. Shut down by President Portillo in 2003 and replaced by Secretariat for Administrative and Security Matters.
Military Intelligence (G-2).
Secretariat of Strategic Analysis (SAE), an intelligence-gathering branch of the military. Put under civilian control in 2000.
Noél Beteta, EMP operative convicted of the murder of Myrna Mack.
General Marco Tulio Espinosa, head of EMP, then head of the Army High Command, and minister of defense under President Álvaro Arzú.
Captain Byron Lima Oliva, member of EMP. Arrested and convicted of participating in the extrajudicial execution of Bishop Gerardi.
Sergeant Major Obdulio Villanueva, member of EMP convicted of murdering the milkman, Haroldo Sas Rompich, who had run afoul of President Arzú’s horseback outing. Later arrested and convicted of participating in the extra-judicial execution of the bishop. Murdered in prison February 12, 2003.
Colonel Byron Disrael Lima Estrada, former counterinsurgency commander and head of G-2, Military Intelligence. Arrested and convicted of participating in the extrajudicial execution of the bishop.
Darío Morales, EMP photographer at crime scene.
Major Francisco Escobar Blas, member of EMP. Head of Protection Services, the former Archivo. Implicated in the murder of the bishop.
Colonel Rudy Pozuelos, head of EMP. Implicated in murder.
Artillery Major Andrés Villagrán, member of EMP. Highest-ranking officer officially on duty the night of the murder.
General Otto Pérez Molina, former head of EMP.
Colonel Reyes Palencia, member of EMP. Head of Presidential Guard.
Public Ministry (prosecutors’ office)
Otto Ardón Medina, special prosecutor in Gerardi case, 1998.
Gustavo Soria, assistant prosecutor.
Attorney General Fernando Mendizábal de la Riva, head of Public Ministry until May 1998. A political appointee.
Celvin Galindo, special prosecutor who replaces Ardón. Goes into exile in October 1999.
Leopoldo Zeissig, takes over from Galindo as special prosecutor. Goes into exile in July 2001.
Attorney General Adolfo González Rodas, head of Public Ministry until 2002.
Mario Leal, special prosecutor who replaces Leopoldo Zeissig in 2001.
Jorge García, special prosecutor who replaces Leal in 2003.
Defense lawyers
Vinicio García Pimentel, Father Mario’s first lawyer.
José Toledo, Father Mario’s second lawyer.
Julio Cintrón Gálvez, lead lawyer for the Limas.
Roberto Echeverría Vallejo, lawyer for the Limas.
Ramón González, lawyer for Margarita López (the cook).
Irvíng Aguilar, Sergeant Major Obdulio Villanueva’s lawyer.
Key witnesses
Rubén Chanax Sontay, homeless car washer in San Sebastián park. Central witness for prosecution. Claims to be informer for Military Intelligence. Testifies and then goes into exile in April 2000.
El Chino Iván Aguilar, homeless bolito. With Rubén Chanax the night of the murder. In exile.
Jorge Diego Méndez Perussina, taxi driver who memorized the license-plate number of the Toyota Corolla seen near th
e church of San Sebastián the night of the murder. Also saw shirtless man. Testifies in February 1999 and goes into exile.
Oscar Chex López (Aníbal Sandoval), former G-2 intelligence agent who spied on Bishop Gerardi. Witness for the prosecution.
Specialist Jorge Aguilar Martínez, EMP waiter. Witness found by ODHA. Incriminates Captain Lima, Major Escobar Blas, and others. Goes into exile before trial.
Gilberto Gómez Limón, imprisoned thief who testifies that Villanueva was not in the prison the night of the murder.
Noé Gómez Limón, brother of Gilberto Goméz. Testifies that Limas’ lawyer tried to bribe them. Murdered December 2002.
Government
Álvaro Arzú Irigoyen, president, 1996–2000. Becomes mayor of Guatemala City in 2004.
General Efraín Ríos Montt, president from 1982 to 1983. Presided over some of the worst atrocities of the civil war. During presidency of Alfonso Portillo, 2000–2004, Ríos Montt heads the Congress.
Luis Mendizábal, security adviser to President Arzú.
President Alfonso Portillo, populist elected in 1999. Presides over especially corrupt government.
Oscar Berger, elected president in 2004.
Judiciary
Judge Isaías Figueroa, first judge to have jurisdiction over Gerardi case. Presides over exhumation of the bishop’s body.
Judge Henry Monroy, assigned to Gerardi case early in 1999. Goes into exile shortly thereafter.
Judge Flor de María García Villatoro, judge who takes over from Monroy. Presides over pretrial investigation.
Judge Yassmín Barrios, trial judge.
Judge Amada Gúzman de Zuñiga, trial judge.
Judge Eduardo Cojulún, trial judge.
Wilewaldo Contreras, appellate judge.
Judge Thelma del Cid, appellate judge.
United States
Prudence Bushnell, ambassador to Guatemala, 1999–2002.
John Hamilton, succeeds Bushnell as ambassador.
James Derham, ambassador in 2006.
The Art of Political Murder Page 36