Sunday, October 6, 2024

Tomás Zerón, wanted for crimes in Mexico, says there is ‘no proof’

Former federal law enforcement official and fugitive from justice Tomás Zerón has denied any involvement in the purchase of the Pegasus spyware system during the 2012-18 administration of former president Enrique Peña Nieto and rejected the suggestion that he fled to Israel because that country doesn’t have an extradition treaty with Mexico.

The Federal Attorney General’s Office (FGR) announced in May that it was prosecuting the former head of the now-defunct Criminal Investigation Agency (AIC) and three other ex-officials in connection with an “illegal” purchase of the Israeli-made Pegasus system in 2014.

Tomás Zerón in a TV interview
Tomás Zerón gave an interview on Israeli television on Saturday. (Screenshot/Channel 12)

The FGR said the four ex-officials were accused of embezzlement, fraud, abuse of power and criminal association in connection with a 460-million-peso purchase of Pegasus, which can infiltrate and extract information from cellphones. It said that the purchase was made by the PGR, as the Attorney General’s Office was formerly called.

Zerón also faces charges related to the disappearance and presumed murder of 43 students in Guerrero in 2014, a crime he was tasked with investigating as head of the AIC. Those charges include torture and tampering with evidence. The current government has been asking Israel to extradite Zerón to Mexico for over two years.

In an interview with Israeli television in Tel Aviv, the ex-official asserted that he is a victim of “political persecution” in Mexico and said that he has the evidence to prove it.

Zerón said he had received threats in Mexico and that it was risky for him to stay there given that his government-provided security detail had been recalled.

AMLO at morning press conference in 2021
The president discusses the Zerón case at a daily press conference in July 2021. (GALO CAÑAS/CUARTOSCURO.COM)

“I took the decision to leave my country, I went to Canada and later flew to Israel,” he told Israel’s Channel 12.

When the interviewer asked whether his decision to go to Israel was because that country doesn’t have an extradition agreement with Mexico, Zerón gave a strange and less than convincing response.

“No. There are other countries in the world. Why come to a country where my language isn’t spoken? Why not go to Chile? Why come to a country that complicates everything for me?”

The interviewer then remarked that “people in Mexico think that you fled here because you had connections … to NSO,” the company that makes Pegasus.

Ex Sinaloa Cartel leader Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman Loera in 2016
Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán in an archival photo from 2016 after being recaptured by Mexican authorities. He had escaped in 2015 from a prison while awaiting formal sentencing. (Photo: Pedro Valtierra/Cuartoscuro)

“There is no way. I don’t know anyone from NSO, I don’t have a relationship [with the company], I never sat down with them, there is no proof, ” Zerón said.

According to a 2021 report by The Guardian newspaper, journalists, activists, opposition figures and others, including at least 50 people close to President López Obrador, were potentially targeted with Pegasus by the Peña Nieto government. The current government has rejected claims that it has used Pegasus to spy on citizens.

After he spoke about his involvement in the 2014 capture of former Sinaloa Cartel leader Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, Zerón responded to the assertion that he was living in Israel “like a criminal.”

“It’s not an easy situation. In the end my objective is to be able to return to my country, return to my family … and for justice to be served,” he said.

“… It’s not easy to live in another country,” he reiterated at the conclusion of a 12-minute news story that included other interviews as well as information about the 2014 disappearance of the Ayotzinapa Rural Teachers College students in Iguala, Guerrero.

“… I live alone without my family, without my people. Now I have only one target in my life in Israel and the target is [to] fight for my life,” Zerón said.

Protesters outside the Israeli embassy in Mexico City
Protesters outside the Israeli embassy in Mexico City in September last year, demanding Zerón’s extradition. (ROGELIO MORALES /CUARTOSCURO.COM)

Last Friday, the day before the interview with Zerón aired on Israeli television, Mexico’s Interior Ministry (SEGOB) released a statement in which it said that “investigations, evidence and testimonies” implicate the former AIC chief in the torture of a presumed member of the Guerreros Unidos, a crime gang allegedly involved in the abduction and murder of the Ayotzinapa students.

“Physical and psychological torture of people was one of the multiple lies that inspired the construction of the poorly named ‘historical truth‘ about the disappearance of the 43 Ayotzinapa teaching students,” SEGOB said.

“… Despite a million-dollar campaign to make [Zerón] look like a politically persecuted person, Mexican authorities have asked Israel to extradite him. The Mexican state maintains that no government should protect a torturer,” the ministry said.

López Obrador said in late July that he had received a response to a letter he sent to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to seek the extradition of Zerón. He said there was “willingness” on the part of the Israeli government “to help us,” but didn’t confirm that it would actually agree to the extradition.

Mexico News Daily 

Have something to say? Paid Subscribers get all access to make & read comments.
Felipe Angeles International Airport at sunset

Felipe Ángeles International Airport wins architectural design award

0
The military-run airport built and championed by former president Andrés Manuel López Obrador has been recognized with a Prix Versailles award.
State police officer with a machine gun and wearing a baclava stands at a crime scene where a pickup truck with the Sinaloa attorney general's logo on it is parked, blocking the street horizontally.

7 bodies found in Culiacán as Sinaloa Cartel infighting continues

1
The bodies, which showed signs of torture, are believed to be the latest victims in an ongoing war between two Sinaloa Cartel factions.
Blue electric municipal-style bus with an icon of an electric plug on the bus.

Mexico City’s municipal solar panels to power the capital’s electric buses

0
A solar farm, located at Mexico City's Central de Abasto market, will power nearly 100 EV city buses in the capital.