By Lucía Flores for Where Do the Disappeared Go?
Robert Cabrera Alfaro former National Commissioner for the Search for Persons (CNBP), was convicted of commercializing the information of 49 thousand profiles Genetics of victims of disappearance in México.
The former official delivered a database with that information to the laboratory DNA México in 2017, as part of a federal government strategy to create “a trustworthy database”, but it did not happen that way.
“Suffering was commodified,” said Judge Jesús Delgadillo Padierna after convicting him of the crime of illicit exercise of public service and sentencing him to 3 years in prison and another 2 years of disqualification from holding any public office.
On March 7, 2018, he was appointed as the first National Commissioner for the Search for Persons, previously he worked at the National Security Commission (CNS), where he handed over Mariana García Sosa, commercial director of ADN México a USB stick with the genetic profiles.
The firm used that information in its favor and not for the victims. The data was used to contact families searching for missing persons and convince them to carry out genetic comparisons in laboratories, thus enlarging the database and then selling it.
This delivery of information was illegal, which is why a trial began on June 27, 2022 in the federal courts of the South Reclusorio against Roberto Cabrera Alfaro.
A question that was heard again and again between the cold walls of the second floor of the federal courts of the South Reclusorio was: What did the former official do on May 31, 2017?
The Attorney General’s Office showed a letter signed by Cabrera Alfaro on the same date to show that he was responsible for delivering the 49,000 genetic profiles to the company.
A small vein popped out on the left side of the former commissioner’s face while he was listening to what the Public Ministry was saying, it seemed that his gaze was lost on television where it was projected in real time to all the parties that attend the hearing, including Judge Jesús Delgadillo Padierna, who has handled other controversial cases, including that of Rosario Robles Berlanga, former secretary of Agrarian, Territorial and Urban Development in the administration of Enrique Peña Nieto, accused of being part of a corruption network that diverted 5 billion pesos of the treasury.
In November 2019, for research “This was the illegal delivery of more than 49 thousand genetic profiles”, made for Fifth Element, The Financial and Process Roberto Cabrera Alfaro spoke in an interview with its authors about how he met the company ADN México and its commercial representative.
At the CNS they sought to generate reliable databases “that could guarantee us the effectiveness of the analyses, not only of genetics, but also of the names of the disappeared persons, the footprints, the photographs; the subject of genetics was one more. There we have the first contact with the ADN company”, Cabrera Alfaro said in an interview with the authors of this investigation, in November 2019.
In that exchange of questions and answers that were made for the investigation, a phrase that Cabrera Alfaro said and that the CNBP victim advisers used in the trial was recorded: “whatever they have done (DNA México with the 49 thousand genetic profiles) it’s up to you.”
“We provide them with information to take certain actions. If they do, sell, buy, rent, do or undo with this information, there is prior responsibility, but it is out of my field of action. I don’t work there, I don’t know what they are doing with that database”, Alfaro Cabrera said in 2019 to this reporter.
The trial against Cabrera Alfaro: day one
On day one of the trial, Roberto Cabrera Alfaro’s defense attorney argued that the day the 49,000 genetic profiles were delivered, he was in Culiacán, Sinaloa. That same day he returned to México City by plane, moved to his apartment in Vasco de Quiroga, where he ordered a tuna ceviche and croquettes for dinner through Uber Eats at the King Fish restaurant.
That was the alibi to try to explain that that day he could not deliver the genetic database to Mariana García Sosa, as the FGR alleged when presenting a letter to corroborate the negotiation.
In response, the FGR presented the commercial director of ADN México as a witness. On the stand, he stated that Cabrera Alfaro had provided him with a USB with genetic profiles at the CNS facilities located on Avenida Constituyentes in México City, although on three occasions he said he did not remember the exact time, only that it was May 31, 2017.
Diego Ulibarri, ADN México partner, was also introduced. He said that he had 2 meetings with Roberto Cabrera, one in 2016 and another in 2017, in which Manuel Rey Barrera, also a partner of the company, was present.
For research, This was the illegal delivery of more than 49 thousand genetic profiles Ulibarri agreed to answer a questionnaire via email and when asked how he had met Cabrera Alfaro, he replied that he went to beginning of the year 2018.
How was the contact with Roberto Cabrera Alfaro?
At the direct request of the same lawyer Roberto Cabrera Alfaro, at the beginning of 2018, when he was in charge of General Coordination of Strategies of the Public Security System in the National Security Commission.
At that time, ADN México was the only laboratory with accreditations to carry out identification, analysis and registration of genetic profiles.
(Excerpt taken from DNA México denies the accusations: Nothing irregular was done with the genetic profiles)
The trial against Cabrera Alfaro: day two
The constant question of where he was on May 31, 2017 echoed again on day two of the trial.
According to the version told by Cabrera Alfaro, that day he traveled to Culiacán as part of the investigation of the murder of journalist Javier Valdéz, and to try to prove it, he showed the plane ticket stamped with departure at 2:27 p.m. to land at 5:00 p.m.: 25hrs. With a grimace and after Judge Delgadillo Padierna brought his hand to his mouth, he accepted the incorporation of the office.
The defense of the former Search for Persons Commissioner presented Fredy Navarrete as one of his key witnesses, for being the person who picked him up on May 31, 2017 at the AICM upon his arrival from Culiacán.
In tennis, with a black shirt and pants, Fredy told how while he was part of the then National Gendarmerie, he worked alongside Roberto Cabrera at the CNS. He was questioned again and again by the Prosecutor’s Office, about how it was possible that 5 years after passing through Cabrera Alfaro to the Airport he could remember the exact time. In response, he said that he asked among his co-workers to reminisce about what they did that day.
Fredy said that he was already waiting for him to take him to his then department located in Santa Fe without going through the CNS on May 31, 2017. That became a new constant questioning of the Prosecutor’s Office: the route taken to go from the AICM to Santa Fe .
The witness stated that the highway was the road that Cabrera Alfaro liked to take the most, but the prosecution claimed that the best route was the one that passed near the CNS.
The trial against Cabrera Alfaro: day three
On day three, in the final arguments, the Federal Public Ministry asked not to consider the plane ticket as relevant and useful. He also mentioned that the email associated with the Uber Eats account that Cabrera Alfaro said was used to order dinner did not match his name.
This day also jumped a new name that was not referred to in the first two days: Mary Port who was mentioned by the commercial director of ADN México in her statement as a companion on July 31, 2017 to the CNS office, located in Constituyentes, where they gave her a USB memory.
The defendant’s defense questioned the convenience of not calling Puerto to testify because he was in Spain, and before this the CNBP advisor, Javier Shüte, had a shock that contrasted with the serenity he had had in the previous days of the trial.
“Why did the government put these profiles in private hands, what did ADN (México) propose to them? How did you get access to all this information? Who benefited, how, when?” said Shüt, who stated that all of this should also be investigated by the FGR.
The trial against Cabrera Alfaro: day four
Shüt’s questions were not answered, but at 5:32 p.m. on June 30, 2022, Roberto Cabrera Alfaro was found guilty of the crime of illicit exercise of public service, after the delivery of 49 thousand genetic profiles to the DNA company México.
Judge Felipe de Jesús Delgadillo Padierna pointed out that the falsity of the signature of the FGR document was not proven, with which it was proven that on May 31, 2017 Cabrera Alfaro delivered the genetic profiles to Mariana García Sosa.
“Suffering has been commercialized and there is no way to return the database,” the judge said in a public hearing.
Those genetic profiles of thousands of victims that would serve to identify thousands of people who have died and are missing were delivered to the DNA México company, there was a subsequent business, the firm used them for the benefit of itself and its partners.
The government was complicit in this commodification of the victims’ pain and now there is someone to blame.
***
Lucía Flores is a graduate of the Communication Sciences career with a specialization in Political Communication from the Faculty of Political and Social Sciences of the UNAM and has been a photographer for 8 years. She is currently a photographer at El Financiero and is the founder of Obturador MX.
