The end of the road for the fugitive "imperial couple" who owned jewelry stores and ruled a southern Mexican city came in a scruffy working-class neighborhood of the nation's capital.
Jose Luis Abarca, the former mayor of Iguala, and his wife Maria de los Angeles Pineda had fled two days after 43 students vanished following an attack by the gang-infiltrated municipal police force on September 26.
More than a month later, federal police finally caught up with the mayoral couple Tuesday in a pre-dawn raid on a small, modest house in Mexico City's densely populated Iztapalapa district.
The cement-colored house, with its dusty courtyard and undulated roofing sheets held down by stone bricks, is far from the lavish lifestyle they enjoyed in Iguala, a city flanked by mountains about 200 kilometers (125 miles) south of the capital, in Guerrero state.
After the arrest, the couple was hauled to the attorney general's office to answer allegations that they ordered Iguala's police to attack the students over fears they would interrupt a speech Pineda was giving as head of the local child protection agency.
In all, six people died, 25 were wounded and 43 went missing in a night of terror. Authorities say the officers handed the students to the Guerreros Unidos drug gang, which worked with the police.
The students have yet to be found despite a massive manhunt around Iguala, while the case has increasingly angered Mexicans tired of a drug war that has left 100,000 people dead or missing since 2006.
The Guerrero state congress has since impeached Abarca.
- Police payoffs -
The investigation has revealed the extent of the Guerreros Unidos' influence in Iguala while the search has led to the gruesome discovery of a dozen mass graves containing 38 unidentified bodies, on top of some 40 others found since February.
Prosecutors say Abarca periodically paid the gang between two million and three million pesos ($150,000 and $220,000), and that part of the cash was used for police payoffs.
The head of the Guerreros Unidos told investigators after his arrest last month that Pineda ran the gang's criminal activities from city hall in complicity with her husband and the police chief.
Three of her brothers are linked to the Beltran Leyva drug cartel.
In Iguala, few can explain how Abarca, who once sold clothing and straw hats on the street, rose to become a local magnate and mayor.
Members of his own leftist Democratic Revolution Party accused him of murdering a farm activist last year, but prosecutors say they never charged him due to a lack of evidence.
Traumatized and ashamed to find their city's seamy underbelly exposed to the world, locals have defined this "imperial couple" as proud and arrogant.
Maria, who works at a small jewelry shop that also sells dollars to businesses, recalled Abarca treating her with contempt when she delivered cash to him five years ago.
"What are you bringing me? Garbage?" Abarca said when she offered bills of one, five or 10 dollars.
"He was a despot. Anything less than $100 was garbage to him," recalled Maria, who declined to give her last name.
Always dressed to the nines, the cold and haughty Pineda was considered the dominant half of the couple, with ambitions to succeed her husband.
"We were scared," said a city hall employee. "It was high time for them to leave."
- 'Hardworking' politician -
Abarca's family gives a starkly different image of the man said to own 17 properties in the city, including a shopping center.
"He is a hardworking boy who set about meeting many challenges. He earned his money himself and was in a very good situation economically long before becoming mayor," his sister Roselia told AFP, insisting on his innocence.
The son of modest shopkeepers, the third of five brothers, Abarca dropped out of medical school to go into business.
He entered politics in 2012, "invited by people who wanted change" for Iguala and who saw him as a "stranger to dirty politics," Roselia said.
"He had no clue about where he had set foot. Politics is the worst of all," added Roselia, a school principal.
The end of the road for the fugitive “imperial couple” who owned jewelry stores and ruled a southern Mexican city came in a scruffy working-class neighborhood of the nation’s capital.
Jose Luis Abarca, the former mayor of Iguala, and his wife Maria de los Angeles Pineda had fled two days after 43 students vanished following an attack by the gang-infiltrated municipal police force on September 26.
More than a month later, federal police finally caught up with the mayoral couple Tuesday in a pre-dawn raid on a small, modest house in Mexico City’s densely populated Iztapalapa district.
The cement-colored house, with its dusty courtyard and undulated roofing sheets held down by stone bricks, is far from the lavish lifestyle they enjoyed in Iguala, a city flanked by mountains about 200 kilometers (125 miles) south of the capital, in Guerrero state.
After the arrest, the couple was hauled to the attorney general’s office to answer allegations that they ordered Iguala’s police to attack the students over fears they would interrupt a speech Pineda was giving as head of the local child protection agency.
In all, six people died, 25 were wounded and 43 went missing in a night of terror. Authorities say the officers handed the students to the Guerreros Unidos drug gang, which worked with the police.
The students have yet to be found despite a massive manhunt around Iguala, while the case has increasingly angered Mexicans tired of a drug war that has left 100,000 people dead or missing since 2006.
The Guerrero state congress has since impeached Abarca.
– Police payoffs –
The investigation has revealed the extent of the Guerreros Unidos’ influence in Iguala while the search has led to the gruesome discovery of a dozen mass graves containing 38 unidentified bodies, on top of some 40 others found since February.
Prosecutors say Abarca periodically paid the gang between two million and three million pesos ($150,000 and $220,000), and that part of the cash was used for police payoffs.
The head of the Guerreros Unidos told investigators after his arrest last month that Pineda ran the gang’s criminal activities from city hall in complicity with her husband and the police chief.
Three of her brothers are linked to the Beltran Leyva drug cartel.
In Iguala, few can explain how Abarca, who once sold clothing and straw hats on the street, rose to become a local magnate and mayor.
Members of his own leftist Democratic Revolution Party accused him of murdering a farm activist last year, but prosecutors say they never charged him due to a lack of evidence.
Traumatized and ashamed to find their city’s seamy underbelly exposed to the world, locals have defined this “imperial couple” as proud and arrogant.
Maria, who works at a small jewelry shop that also sells dollars to businesses, recalled Abarca treating her with contempt when she delivered cash to him five years ago.
“What are you bringing me? Garbage?” Abarca said when she offered bills of one, five or 10 dollars.
“He was a despot. Anything less than $100 was garbage to him,” recalled Maria, who declined to give her last name.
Always dressed to the nines, the cold and haughty Pineda was considered the dominant half of the couple, with ambitions to succeed her husband.
“We were scared,” said a city hall employee. “It was high time for them to leave.”
– ‘Hardworking’ politician –
Abarca’s family gives a starkly different image of the man said to own 17 properties in the city, including a shopping center.
“He is a hardworking boy who set about meeting many challenges. He earned his money himself and was in a very good situation economically long before becoming mayor,” his sister Roselia told AFP, insisting on his innocence.
The son of modest shopkeepers, the third of five brothers, Abarca dropped out of medical school to go into business.
He entered politics in 2012, “invited by people who wanted change” for Iguala and who saw him as a “stranger to dirty politics,” Roselia said.
“He had no clue about where he had set foot. Politics is the worst of all,” added Roselia, a school principal.
