On Friday evening Mexico lost one of its great legal crusaders, Americo Delgado, in a brazen, brutal murder outside the attorney’s home in Toluca, about an hour outside of Mexico City.
Witnesses state that Delgado, age 81, was attacked by at least three knife-wielding men who stabbed him in the neck. Authorities did not indicate a motive for the killing.
Delgado spent his career, which spanned over half a century, representing the cause of criminal defendants. His clients included the famed Benjamin Arellano Felix of Tijuana, Jesus Amezcua, known as the “methamphetamine king,” and Alfredo Beltran Leyva, (aka “El Mochomo”) a suspected Sinaloa kingpin who was arrested in January 2008.
Also killed earlier this month was Silvia Raquenel Villanueva, a Monterrey attorney who represented a number of suspected syndicate leaders. He was gunned down in a marketplace in what appeared to be an execution-style attack. Villanueva had represented Carlos Resendez Bertolucci, a member of the Gulf cartel who testified against convicted kingpin Juan Garcia Abrego on trafficking charges.
Delgado, honored by national lawyers groups and the National Autonomous University of Mexico for his contributions to the legal field, will be remembered for his stand for the rights of criminal defendants and his battle against the unending tide of tyranny and injustice.
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