Digna Ochoa

They are after me but I will not live in fear.

On October 19, 2001, Digna Ochoa, a leading Mexican human rights lawyer, was found shot at her office in Mexico City. Her killers also left a death threat against other members of the "Miguel Agustín Pro Juárez" Human Rights Centre (PRODH), where Digna Ochoa worked.

Digna Ochoa was killed because of her human rights work. She and other members of the PRODH have worked on cases of torture and other serious human rights violations in which Mexican officials have been implicated. As a result, these defenders of human rights have been the target of many threats and attacks.

Ochoa’s murder could have been prevented if the Mexican government had investigated these earlier attacks and brought to justice those responsible.

Amnesty International is now demanding that the authorities thoroughly investigate Ochoa’s murder, bring to justice those responsible, and protect the other activists who worked with Ochoa.

TAKE ACTION! Click on “Send an appeal” on the “Listen to the Women” homepage.

The following comments by Digna Ochoa are adapted from an earlier published interview:

My father was a union leader in Veracruz, Mexico. He struggled for potable water, roads, and securing land certificates. He was unjustly jailed, then “disappeared” and tortured.

This led to my determination to do something for those suffering injustice, because I saw it in my father's flesh. I studied law because of these experiences and because I was always hearing that my father and his friends needed lawyers.

Early on, when I was a prosecutor, I remember a very clear issue of injustice. My boss wanted me to charge someone whom I knew to be innocent. There was no evidence, but my boss tried to make me prosecute him. I refused - and then left the attorney general’s office and went on the other side, the side of the defense.

My first case was against court police officers who were involved in the illegal detention and torture of several peasants. I had obtained substantial evidence against the police, so they started to harass me. Then I was detained.

Later, they sent telephone messages telling me to drop the case. Then by mail came threats that if I didn’t drop it I would die, or members of my family would be killed. I kept working and we publicly reported what was happening.

The intimidation made me so angry that I worked even harder. I was frightened too. Then I was kidnapped and held incommunicado by the police.

Now, I felt in the flesh what my father had felt, what other people had suffered. There was a month of torture. Finally, I managed to escape.

I’ve always felt anger at the suffering of others. For me, anger is energy, it’s a force. You channel energy positively or negatively. Being sensitive to situations of injustice and the necessity of confronting difficult situations like those we see every day, we have to get angry to provoke energy and react.

It’s injustice that motivates us to do something, to take risks, knowing that if we don’t, things will remain the same.

- Adapted from Kerry Kennedy Cuomo, Speak Truth to Power, Crown, New York, 2000.