Carolina Flores and Edith Guadalupe Valdés were murdered on the same day in Mexico City. In the morning, Flores was shot by her mother-in-law while she was at home with her husband and eight-month-old baby in the Polanco district. About eight kilometers away, at 4:26 p.m., Valdés entered an apartment tower at 829 Revolución Avenue to attend a job interview—and never came out. In both cases, the families have encountered opacity and unjustified delays from the capital city’s Prosecutor’s Office: agents took 15 hours to enter the building where Edith disappeared, and—at the time of this publication, eight days later—there are no arrests or arrest warrants issued in Carolina’s case, despite the existence of video footage clearly showing the moment she was attacked—shot six times—by her mother-in-law, Erika María N, who has since fled.
Six Shots in Polanco
“She made me angry. You are mine, and she isn’t,” is the bizarre explanation—delivered in a relaxed tone—given by Erika María N after shooting her 27-year-old daughter-in-law—a former Miss Baja California, her home state—six times. A chilling video captured the moment via a motion-sensing baby monitor installed in the apartment. Prior to the attack, the two women engage in an unintelligible conversation that does not appear to be an argument. The husband, Alejandro N—holding his son in his arms—approaches to look at his dead wife. “What is wrong with you, you crazy woman? She’s my family,” he demands of his mother with a strange sense of normalcy.
This occurred on Wednesday, April 15, shortly before 1:00 p.m., when Alejandro called Carolina’s mother to inform her of what had happened. Afterward, he remained in the apartment for nearly 24 hours alongside his wife’s body—allegedly to record videos containing instructions on how to feed their son, in the event that he himself were to be detained. She came forward to file a report the following day—but only after her own mother had already managed to escape.
An Appointment to Find Work
The Valdés family was forced to block traffic on Revolución Avenue for hours on Thursday the 16th just to be heard, despite having already spent hours attempting to report the disappearance of Edith Guadalupe. The 21-year-old stopped responding to messages shortly after entering a building for a job interview. The last known location of her phone—which she had shared with her cousin as a precaution—placed her right there, at Torre Murano. When the family sensed that something was amiss, they went to the police; however, officers told them they had to wait 72 hours before filing a report and demanded a bribe “to expedite the review of security camera footage.” Finally, the police entered the premises 24 hours and 30 minutes later, where they found her—dead—buried beneath a pile of sand.
