Lawyer Susana Prieto Terrazas, workers’ rights advocate in Matamoros, was arrested on 8 June by ministerial police on charges of mutiny, threats, coercion and crimes committed against public servants.
Advocates of labour rights, human rights, activists, academics, researchers and the artistic and cultural community have demanded their immediate release and accuse that she was arbitrarily detained.
This morning, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador suggested that Susana Prieto is the victim of a repressive process and disclosed that she issued instructions for the secretaries of the Governorate and Labor to review the detention of lawyer tamaulipeca.
The lawyer, originally from Chihuahua, headed a series of work stoppages in the border town of Matamoros in February last year to demand a pay rise and a bonus on companies that were not affiliated with any union, a movement that was considered illegal by the working authorities of Tamaulipas.
In a document signed as “Urgent Action”, the activists and the supporting community indicate that the detention was made arbitrarily as “at the time of her arrest and execution of the arrest warrant, the provisions of the highest human rights standards were not met, as the officers did not let her know her rights to the detainee.
They also indicate that it was noted that officers told her that she would be taken to the offices of the Tamaulipas State Prosecutor’s Office, an issue that violated due process, as she should have been filed immediately with the control judge, so she was incommunicado for several hours until she was presented to the media.
“Subsequently, and after considerable time, she was transferred to the Control Judge, which should have annulled such action by not adhering to the procedures established in the Constitution, the international treaties and the National Code of Criminal Procedures.”
Today Susana Prieto was arrested for “mutiny” in Matamoros. She is an advocate for the workers in the maquilas. The charges are clearly false and of a prosecution for denouncing a employer who exposes the Workers to the Covid on the assembly lines. URGE RT pic.twitter.com/jh4i2sSTcj
— Feminasty (@CynthiaHijar) June 9, 2020
“First, we asked the authority for the immediate freedom of Mr. Susana Prieto Terrazas because its guarantees and human rights were violated, especially due process. Second, that perpetrators be investigated and punished for the human rights violations of defender Prieto Terrazas, as well as the threats received against her. Thirdly, that the necessary assurances be provided for their protection and security, both in their detention and in their release,” they emphasize in their missive.
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