Order for Patishtán Gómez to Return to Chiapas Prison

** A federal tribunal confirms the protective order for the indigenous professor

 

** In October they took him to the Sinaloa prison; he has been in prison for 12 years

 

By: Hermann Bellinghausen

A federal tribunal confirmed the protective order (amparo)[i] in favour of the Tzotzil Alberto Patishtán Gómez, a prisoner of conscience, to be returned to a prison in Chiapas, from which he was transferred in October to Guasave, Sinaloa, with no other motive than to punish him for his defence of human rights from prison for 12 years. The sentence was released one month ago, on June 14, and the first collegiate tribunal of the twentieth circuit in Tuxtla Gutiérrez just announced it today.

 

The Fray Bartolomé de las Casas Human Rights Centre (Frayba) revealed that the decision, issued by the federal collegiate tribunal, based in Cancún, Quintana Roo, “resolves the amparo[ii] promoted by this centre in favour of Professor Patishtán Gómez against his unjustified and forced move, which occurred October 20, 2011, to the Federal Centre for Social Re-adaptation (Cefereso 8) in Guasave, Sinaloa”, when the indigenous professor was on a hunger strike “demanding his freedom together with that of a group of prisoners (also) unjustly (imprisoned).”

 

The tribunal of second appeal thus confirmed the amparo that orders Patishtán’s return to the State Centre for the Social Reinsertion of those Sentenced (Cerss) Number 5 in San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas, where he was previously. The Frayba emphasized that: “nine months was spent delaying the process on the grounds of ‘complying with institutionally established procedures,’” but was, rather, “due to the appeal for review filed by the Director of Protective Orders of the Unit for Legal Issues and Human Rights of the Secretary of Federal Public Security.”

 

During the process, the Frayba documented violations of human rights and health rights, “the right to a simple, rapid and effective judicial appeal,” as well as “obstruction of an adequate defence;” all rights “that the Mexican State has promised to comply with when signing and ratifying international instruments.”

 

The Frayba demands compliance with the protective order: “Patishtán must be moved immediately to the San Cristóbal state prison; we urge the responsible authorities to comply with the ruling without any delay.” It demands the professor’s immediate freedom, “because the accusations against him turn out to be inconsistent and unjust, since he didn’t commit any crime of which he is accused.”

 

Patishtán himself wrote last June 19, on completing 12 years behind bars, that “for living together at the side of the defenceless, the illiterate, the poor, etcetera, for the purpose of protecting the defence of their rights and demanding justice, and on the other hand opposing the injustice to myself, such as that exercised by Mayor Manuel Gómez Ruiz of the town of El Bosque, known as ‘the executioner of the poor,’ who for the purpose of protecting and maintaining his interests, abused his power fabricating my crimes based on the acts that occurred in the ambush (against police) on the Simojovel-El Bosque Highway stretch in 2000.”

 

From his cell in Guasave, Patishtán demanded “once again” his immediate freedom from President Felipe Calderón Hinojosa and “and the immediate freedom of those in solidarity with the Voice of El Amate imprisoned in Chiapas,” likewise prisoners without reason.