MEXICO CITY (AP) — A Mexican lady who killed a person defending herself when he attacked and raped her in 2021 was sentenced to greater than six years in jail, a choice her authorized protection known as “discriminatory” and vowed to enchantment Tuesday.
The ruling in opposition to Roxana Ruiz spurred anger from consultants and feminist teams who stated it speaks to the depth of gender-based violence and Mexico’s poor report of bringing perpetrators of sexual violence to justice.
“It will be a nasty precedent if this sentence had been to carry. It’s sending the message to ladies that, you recognize what, the legislation says you possibly can defend your self, however solely to some extent,” stated Ángel Carrera, her protection lawyer. “He raped you, however you don’t have the appropriate to do something.”
The Related Press doesn’t usually establish sexual assault victims, however Ruiz has given her permission to be recognized and participates in public demonstrations led by activists who help her.
Whereas the Mexico State courtroom discovered Monday that Ruiz had been raped, it stated the 23-year-old was responsible of murder with “extreme use of reliable protection,” including that hitting the person within the head would have been sufficient to defend herself. Ruiz was additionally ordered to pay greater than $16,000 in reparations to the household of the person who raped her.
In Could 2021, Ruiz was working promoting french fries in Nezahualcoyotl, one of many 11 municipalities within the Mexico State with an ongoing gender alert for femicides and one other one for pressured disappearances of ladies.
Whereas having a beer with a pal, Ruiz, a Indigenous Mixteca lady and a single mom from the state of Oaxaca, met a person she had seen across the neighborhood. After hanging out, he supplied to stroll her dwelling and later requested to remain the night time as a result of it was late and he was removed from dwelling.
Ruiz agreed to let him sleep on a mattress on the ground. However whereas she slept he climbed onto her mattress, hit her, tore off her garments and raped her, in keeping with Carrera, Ruiz’s authorized protection. Ruiz fought again and hitting him within the nostril, and he threatened to kill her. Within the battle to free herself she killed him in self protection, Carrera stated.
In a panic, Ruiz put the person’s physique in a bag and dragged it out to the road the place passing police arrested her.
Regardless of telling police she had been raped, Carrera stated a forensic examination was by no means taken, a vital step in prosecuting sexual violence circumstances. As an alternative, an officer responded that she most likely needed to have intercourse with the person at first after which modified her thoughts, he stated.
“I remorse what I did, but when I hadn’t accomplished it I might be useless as we speak,” Ruiz informed the AP in an interview final yr, including, “It’s evident that the state desires to close us up, desires us to be submissive, desires us closed up inside, desires us useless.”
Girls’s rights teams have repeatedly accused Mexican authorities of revictimizing survivors and failing to guage circumstances with a gender perspective.
Ruiz spent 9 months in jail on expenses of murder with extra of reliable self-defense, and was lastly launched to await trial.
The courtroom responded to public outcry of the sentencing Wednesday, saying the choose did look at the case with a gender perspective. It additionally famous {that a} blow to the top in the course of the battle left the person unconscious at one level, saying the courtroom discovered that was “sufficient to include the bodily aggression.”
The lady’s lawyer stated the courtroom’s protection “is completely false.” Carrera stated that whereas there was some proof the attacker acquired a blow to the top, it was by no means confirmed the person misplaced consciousness. He stated the protection hopes to problem the courtroom’s assertion in its enchantment.
Regardless of the sentencing, Ruiz nonetheless stays free pending additional judicial steps.
Practically half of Mexican ladies have skilled sexual violence of their lifetime, authorities information exhibits.
In 2022, the Mexican authorities registered a complete of three,754 ladies – a mean of 10 a day – who had been deliberately killed, a major soar from the yr earlier than. Solely a 3rd had been investigated as femicides.
That quantity is probably going only a fraction of the true quantity as a consequence of rising disappearances and lack of reporting of violence within the nation.
Angelica Ospina, gender fellow for Worldwide Disaster Group in Mexico, stated she worries that the sentencing could empower victimizers whereas discouraging ladies from reporting gender-based violence or defend themselves.
The case factors to only how “normalized” gender-based violence is in Mexico and different components of Latin America, Ospina stated.
“When a girl defends herself, the system is especially environment friendly in processing and sentencing her with out making an allowance for the situations by which she killed the person,” Ospina stated.
In the meantime, outdoors the courtroom, ladies carried indicators and chanted “justice!” A tearful Ruiz stood earlier than the group, thanking feminist teams and the ladies who had supported her via the years-long judicial course of.
Talking to the group, she considered her 4-year-old son.
“My son, I hope to see him once more. I hope to stick with him, to be the one who watches him develop up,” Ruiz stated.
