Israel Vallarta was released Thursday July 31 after almost twenty years’ imprisonment without judgment. He had been arrested in Mexico, with Florence Cassez, in particular for kidnapping, forcible confinement and organized delinquency.
“I am very relieved by the liberation of Israel, which finalizes mine”reacted Saturday to AFP Florence Cassez, in the next day of the acquittal of her ex-companion Israel Vallarta, twenty years after their arrest in Mexico for kidnapping. “The decision of Mexican justice grows this country that I like”added Florence Cassez, arrested in 2005 and released in 2013 after providing proof that there had been procedural vices in this case, which had provoked a serious diplomatic crisis between Mexico and Paris.
Israel Vallarta, his companion at the time of their arrest, was acquitted Thursday evening and then released on Friday in Mexico, after almost twenty years of imprisonment without judgment. For the French, now 50 years old, “These next few days are now those of Israel, it is now up to him to express themselves rather than me. He is free from his words ”. Florence Cassez told AFP that she did not want to express himself more in the media than through this declaration. She said she wishes her former companion, as well as to her wife, “To take advantage of the life that is now available to them”. In her declaration, Florence Cassez “Thanks the president of Mexico for her support and the words she had for us, the victims of injustice”.
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“TV montage”
Florence Cassez and Israel Vallarta were arrested in 2005, accused of kidnapping, sequestration, organized delinquency and possession of firearms. The French national had always denied the facts, while he recognized ten abductions and murder under torture but has never been tried for the facts alleged. During a press conference on Friday, Mexican president Claudia Scheinbaum qualified their arrest, broadcast live at the time, of “TV montage”. On the morning of December 9, 2005, two Mexican television channels film his reconstituted arrest from scratch because his real arrest took place the day before. This had sparked a diplomatic conflict between Mexico and France.
“We cannot forget how the arrest went”added the Mexican state coverage. This affair, emblematic of the slowness of criminal procedures in Mexico, is one of those that the government of former president Andrés Manuel López Obrador (2018-2024) had put forward to promote a judicial reform which led to the unprecedented election of magistrates on 1is June. The Frenchwoman said she was captured on a road south of Mexico City, then taken to the Ranch “Las Chinitas”where his arrest would then have been simulated in front of several media.
By ordering the release of Florence Cassez in 2013, the Supreme Court of Mexico had determined that she and her companion had been arrested and then taken to a farm where “A staging of their arrest” Then took place, according to a summary of the judgment. At the time of the couple’s arrest, the authorities said that three victims of kidnappings had been released from this ranch: an 11 -year -old boy, a woman and a man.