RELIGION BULLETIN-MEXICO: Church Excommunicates Notorious Kidnapper

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Diego Cevallos

MEXICO CITY, May 31 1998 (IPS) - In a new twist to a growing criminal industry, one of Mexico’s most notorious alleged kidnappers was excommunicated by the Roman Catholic Church.

Daniel Arizmendi – who the Attorney-General’s Office says is about to be arrested – is a devotee of the Virgin Mary, and reportedly invokes the names of God and the Virgin while torturing or killing his victims, an “unacceptable” practice, says Bishop Luis Reynoso of Cuernavaca, a city located south of the capital.

The Bishop reported Monday that Arizmendi was excommunicated “independently of his religious beliefs.”

Allegedly protected by a sector of the police, the 40-year-old Arizmendi amassed millions of dollars and sumptuous houses over the past five years by kidnapping wealthy citizens, most of them in the central Mexican state of Morelos, whose capital is Cuernavaca.

One week after the resignation of the governor of Morelos, Jorge Carrillo, due to political pressure arising from allegations of corruption and crime, the Attorney-General’s Office searched several of Arizmendi’s safe houses, located less than one kilometre from the former governor’s residence.

During the search, police arrested several of Arizmendi’s family members and collaborators, who confessed to a number of kidnappings. Investigations indicate that Arizmendi and his gang were responsible for more than 20 kidnappings, for which they reportedly received more than five million dollars in ransoms.

Arizmendi is just one particularly infamous participant in a criminal industry that is booming in Latin America. Mexico is second only to Colombia, the world leader in kidnappings. Kroll Associates, one of the top security consultancy firms in the United States, estimates that more than 1,400 kidnappings are carried out annually in Mexico.

Official statistics point to 450 kidnappings reported in the first quarter of the year. The victims were not only members of the business community, for whom hundreds of thousands of dollars in ransom are demanded, but professionals, students and workers from middle or even lower-income brackets as well.

Bishop Reynoso recommends the excommunication of all criminals who profess the Catholic faith and make annual pilgrimages to the temple of the Virgin of Guadalupe, patron saint of the Catholic Church in Mexico.

According to police reports, confirmed by several kidnapping victims, Arizmendi cuts off the ears of his victims to threaten families to pay ransom. And if the ransom is not paid as demanded, he allegedly kills the victim.

Victims say Arizmendi considers kidnapping a normal business endeavour, and begs them for “a little bit of comprehension.”

Statistics from the Attorney-Genral’s Office point to more than 2,200 kidnappings in Mexico from 1989 to 1996, with around 120 million dollars demanded in ransoms.

Forbes magazine in the United States puts Mexico at the head of the list of Latin American countries in terms of the number of individuals and families enjoying fortunes of upwards of one billion dollars.

The private security business has also flourished in the past few years. Mexico today is one of the top five countries in the world with respect to purchases of instruments of security and investment in armoured vehicles, say authorities.

And the number of private security agencies has shot up from 40 in 1970 to more than 1,400. Bodyguards do their best business in the capital, where an average of one person a day is kidnapped.

The local insurance association says that in the past two years kidnap and ransom insurance has boomed, with the cost of a policy ranging from 9,000 to 45,000 dollars a year.