Women’s Groups Demand Purge of Quintana Roo Police Forces Over Abuse and Criminal Ties

Chetumal, Quintana Roo — Women’s collectives in Quintana Roo are demanding that authorities purge the state’s police forces, saying a series of crimes involving officers points to a systematic pattern of institutional violence and collusion with organized crime.

The group Xtabay said the incidents “are not isolated cases” and that the events “that have stained Quintana Roo’s police forces with blood and complicity are serious.”

Cases Cited by the Groups

• Municipal police officers accused of abducting three young people as they left a nightclub on Bulevar Bahía and handing them over to a criminal group. Video from a patrol car showed the officers received money from organized crime to carry out the abduction, according to the collective.
• The arrest of Miguel Ángel “N,” a former municipal police officer in Othón P. Blanco, accused of killing a 16-year-old girl whose body was found in the mangroves of Calderitas. The group said the years of impunity in the case also amounted to a form of institutional violence.
• Donaciano “R.,” 36, an active traffic police officer who, according to case reports, shot dead his ex-partner and her 16-year-old daughter with his service weapon before taking his own life inside a home in Colonia Italia. Preliminary investigations indicate he was on duty when he carried out the attack.

The groups said the common thread in these cases is the involvement of men armed by the state, empowered to use force, who turn their weapons on the public — especially women and young people — instead of protecting it.

“The police cannot continue to be a space of impunity, complicity and sexist violence,” they warned.

What the Groups Are Demanding

• Remove from the police forces any officers linked to organized crime, femicide or any act of violence against women.
• Subject all active officers to mandatory, periodic background checks and psychometric and psychological testing, under public and auditable standards.
• Tighten controls over who is allowed to carry and store firearms, ensuring that no abuser has access to a service weapon.
• Immediately suspend personnel facing prior complaints of gender violence, abuse of authority or criminal ties, without waiting for criminal proceedings to conclude.
• Ensure that no abuser remains in a position of power, whether within the police ranks, in command posts or in security institutions.

“We will not accept rhetoric that labels these events ‘isolated cases.’ We will not tolerate the uniform being used as a shield for impunity. We will not allow the women and young people of Quintana Roo to keep being victims of those who swore to protect them,” the groups said.