Searching for the bodies of missing loved ones in secret graves doesn’t usually yield quick results. But that wasn’t the case for a Sonora woman on Saturday.

The woman, identified only as Martha, found the remains of her missing son two months after his disappearance thanks to an anonymous tip, family members, and Madres Buscadoras (Searching Mothers), a group that has found over 175 missing persons since 2019.

The woman began her search after receiving an anonymous phone call telling her that her son’s remains could be found in the forest surrounding El Coyote in Caborca, Sonora. Armed with shovels, 30 of Martha’s family members went into the forest to help her find Marco Antonio’s body.

The search party found the body which Martha identified as her son by his clothes.

Madres Buscadoras’ leader Cecy Flores described the discovery as “a very painful moment.”

Flores started the group on May 4, 2019 after the disappearance of her own son in Hermosillo. With this discovery, Madres Buscadoras has now found 176 missing persons in little more than a year. But it doesn’t get any easier when a loved one’s body is found.

Flores said she felt “pain, anguish, and hopelessness” as she watched Martha almost fall to the ground upon seeing the belongings of her son, “a ball of bones amid the smell of decay when the body was disinterred.”

Source: El Universal (sp)