The Prosecutor’s Office of Sonora reported the arrest of the alleged femicide of Gladys Aranza Ramos Gurrola, a member of the collective Madres Buscadoras de Sonora, and who was murdered on July 15 in the community of Ortiz, in Guaymas.
According to state authorities, the capture was made in a joint operation with elements of the Navy and public security of the state.
Aranza, 28, was a wife, mother of a two-year-old baby, and for months she had put her life on hold to become a searcher for clandestine graves in Guaymas.
Her husband, Bryan Omar Celaya, had disappeared on December 6, 2020 after armed people took him with everything and his car. And Aranza, aware of the slowness of the investigative authorities in a state that is in the top 10 disappeared people in Mexico – 1,273 between December 2018 and June 30, 2021 – decided to go with the Guerreras Buscadoras collective in search of help.
“Aranza contacted us in January,” Cinthya Gutierrez, a member of the collective, and mother of Angel Godinez Gutierrez, a 15-year-old who disappeared on June 30, 2017, said in an interview.
“He told us that all he wanted was to search and find ‘his’ Brayan’, that this was his greatest desire. And we, as we do with all the desperate families that come to us, we receive her and help her.”
At first, Cinthya said, the woman was reserved, shy, but soon integrated. Equipped like the rest, with a rod, pick, shovel, garden palette, water, and a hat to protect herself from the more than 45 degrees that are reached in the Guaymas desert, Aranza began to look for answers in the land, at the same time that she listened and learned from the stories of pain that her companions told her.
“One day he came up to me and said, ‘If I’m undone and I barely have seven months to look for my husband, I can’t imagine the pain of you who have been looking for your children for so many years. Therefore, even if I find it, I will continue to support them, because I know the pain they carry on their shoulders,” says Cinthya, who describes her partner as a “very beautiful and very supportive” person.
“She was one of those who took the taco out of her mouth to give it to those who did not have to eat,” the activist told Animal Político.
What we do at Animal Político requires professional journalists, teamwork, dialogue with readers and something very important: independence. You can help us keep going. Be part of the team.
Subscribe to Animal Político, receive benefits and support free journalism.#YoSoyAnimal
