Exhumations Continue to Identify Buried Bodies in Tamaulipas
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CD. MIGUEL ALEMAN, Mex. – Families awaiting the results of the exhumations in Tamaulipas can do more than just wait. They say it's not a new process.
The state continues collecting DNA samples. State officials say the more their database is full, the better the odds are of finding a match with one of the many bodies that will be exhumed.
There are places people go and vanish. Ramon Torres Hernandez and Maria De Los Angeles Rodriguez Garcia say that place was somewhere between San Luis Potosi and Cd. Miguel Aleman.
"They left March 17, 2010,” Hernandez said of his lost relatives.
Hernandez's son and brother were on a tour bus that was driven by Garcias’ brother. They were headed to Miguel Aleman.
Twenty-seven people and two drivers were on board. The bus was found; everyone in it disappeared.
They said relatives sought answers by filing police reports.
"We filed a police report but in our town, no one cared about it,” said Hernandez.
"There's a file in San Luis Potosi after we filed a police report. Recently, about a year ago, they told us it got lost,” Garcia said.
Both came to Cd. Miguel Aleman. State authorities are exhuming bodies from the cemetery for unidentified people – suspected victims of violence.
Experts in anthropology, archeology, dactyloscopy and other forensic science professionals are there to run tests.
Reynosa's National Commission for Human Rights Director Gustavo Guadalupe Leal Gonzalez explains what happens after that.
"Once that they run the identification tests, they create a registry and this registry is as much physical, like in paper, as it is photographic from the time the body is found until they are buried," he explained.
Both Hernandez and Garcia offered DNA samples years ago when a mass grave was found. They said they’ve spent eight years and money from their personal accounts seeking answers in whatever form they come.
"If we find them alive, how beautiful that would be?” Garcia said. “If not, in whatever form it is. But as long as they make it back home, in whichever way."
The public is asked to first report their missing relatives to the nearest Mexican attorney general's office. There they will be able to provide a DNA sample to the office.
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