HomeNewsBriefMexican Set to Compensate Victims of Drug Violence
BRIEF

Mexican Set to Compensate Victims of Drug Violence

JUDICIAL REFORM / 26 APR 2012 BY HANNAH STONE EN

Mexico's Senate has approved a bill to compensate victims of organized crime, one of the major demands of the peace movement led by poet Javier Sicilia.

The law would oblige the state to help and protect victims of violence and human rights abuses connected to organized crime, reports El Universal. Under the law, the state will provide compensation of up to 934,000 pesos ($70,000) to victims.

The legislation would create a National System for Attention to Victims, which will provide support to those hurt by crime and oversee compensation payments. The body would include representatives of victims' groups and of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.

Poet and activist Javier Sicila was a major force campaigning to get the law passed. He became deeply involved with the peace movement after his son was killed, along with six friends, by a drug gang in 2011.

The bill must now be approved by the House of Representatives before it becomes law. Leading lawmakers have committed to passing the bill by Monday at the latest.

InSight Crime Analysis

It is not clear how the Mexican state will judge who qualifies as a victim, as many crimes are never brought to trial. It could also prove extremely costly to provide compensation to all those who have been victimized, with at least 50,000 people estimated to have died in organized crime-related killings since 2006.

There are high hopes for the law, with Senators Fernando Baeza and Tomas Torres saying that it "lays the foundations to reconstruct the social fabric which has been so gravely affected by violence." The drug violence in Mexico has not ended, though there are signs that killings have peaked -- it may be impossible to begin the healing process while violence continues.

The law invites comparison to Colombia's Victims Law, passed last year, which sets out reparations for people hurt by the five-decade-old civil conflict. A key difference between the two is that Colombia's law is aimed at victims of the state, paramilitary groups, and guerrillas, all of whom are combatants in the conflict. In Mexico, on the other hand, there is no civil conflict between insurgent groups.

share icon icon icon

Was this content helpful?

We want to sustain Latin America’s largest organized crime database, but in order to do so, we need resources.

DONATE

What are your thoughts? Click here to send InSight Crime your comments.

We encourage readers to copy and distribute our work for non-commercial purposes, with attribution to InSight Crime in the byline and links to the original at both the top and bottom of the article. Check the Creative Commons website for more details of how to share our work, and please send us an email if you use an article.

Was this content helpful?

We want to sustain Latin America’s largest organized crime database, but in order to do so, we need resources.

DONATE

Related Content

FENTANYL / 10 MAY 2023

While cooks produce vast quantities of fentanyl in makeshift labs across Mexico, they are watched over by a small group…

ELITES AND CRIME / 21 JUN 2023

Guatemala's elections see the participation of political power blocs who have created a system to protect their interests.

ARGENTINA / 8 FEB 2023

InSight Crime's 2022 Homicide Round-Up covers more countries than ever before, with a major expansion into nations of the Caribbean.

About InSight Crime

THE ORGANIZATION

InSight Crime Contributes Expertise Across the Board 

22 SEP 2023

This week InSight Crime investigators Sara García and María Fernanda Ramírez led a discussion of the challenges posed by Colombian President Gustavo Petro’s “Total Peace” plan within urban contexts. The…

THE ORGANIZATION

InSight Crime Cited in New Colombia Drug Policy Plan

15 SEP 2023

InSight Crime’s work on emerging coca cultivation in Honduras, Guatemala, and Venezuela was cited in the Colombian government’s…

THE ORGANIZATION

InSight Crime Discusses Honduran Women's Prison Investigation

8 SEP 2023

Investigators Victoria Dittmar and María Fernanda Ramírez discussed InSight Crime’s recent investigation of a massacre in Honduras’ only women’s prison in a Twitter Spaces event on…

THE ORGANIZATION

Human Trafficking Investigation Published in Leading Mexican Newspaper

1 SEP 2023

Leading Mexican media outlet El Universal featured our most recent investigation, “The Geography of Human Trafficking on the US-Mexico Border,” on the front page of its August 30…

THE ORGANIZATION

InSight Crime's Coverage of Ecuador Leads International Debate

25 AUG 2023

This week, Jeremy McDermott, co-director of InSight Crime, was interviewed by La Sexta, a Spanish television channel, about the situation of extreme violence and insecurity in Ecuador…