Espooky Tales: The Case of Miriam Rodriguez

0:00 Hi everyone, this is Cristina and Carmen and this is another episode of “Espooky Tales" the podcast for all things "Espooky" but also sometimes very sad, tragic, infuriating, two crime stories and that's what we're doing today, Carmen. Great. Yeah, man, we are gonna have a lesson or story but it's gonna be at the end of the episode before split your recommendations answer the case. We're just gonna dive into this week's case. I don't know if you've heard about and I didn't know her name for the longest time, I just heard about the case but although like headlines or articles that announce or talked about it, all said the same thing. It was like, "Woman takes down cartel by herself."

0:40 Do you remember seeing that? Yeah, that's who we're talking about today. That woman. Her name was Miriam Rodriguez and again, it's very sad. It happens in Mexico and so if you, you know, don't want to hear a very sad, tragic case then skip this episode. "Miriam Elizabeth Rodriguez Martinez Martinez was born on the 5th of February 1960 in San Fernando, Tamaulipas in Mexico and everyone that knew her since childhood describes her in the same way that she was fierce. She was a fierce, strong Mexican woman and San Fernando was her home. It always has been but it wasn't the place that she knew from her childhood. It changed a lot especially starting the late 1990s and I don't know if you know where San Fernando in Tamaulipas is but I'm sure you can imagine why it changed so much because it became a very dangerous place. It's 85 miles from Brownsville, Texas, you know, along the US-Mexico border. This made it very easy for it to become stomping grounds for cartels because of the location. It's a long highways that lead directly to the US. It's in the desert. It's very easy to make, you know, different smuggling roads for drugs so it was like an ideal location for cartels and that's what happened. By the time she was an adult that's what it became and she was there in San Fernando raising her three children who were now adults as well. Luis, Asalea and Karen with her husband who was also Luis. There they had a cowboy apparel store called Cowboy. No, sorry,

2:14 where's the name? I wrote it down. Rodeo boots. Wow. That's cool. Yeah. And they've had this store for a very long time. They didn't want to leave but many were leaving because like I said, it was a very dangerous city by this time. It's the stomping grounds for Los Zetas and Los Zetas control San Fernando. They were formerly for people that don't know. Los Zetas were formerly part of a bigger cartel, the Gulf Cartel. They were the armed branch of the Gulf Cartel and then like former military Mexican military members branched off and became Los Zetas. So they were trained, they're armed and they're dangerous. Ever since they split from the Gulf Cartel, they've been feuding with, you know, that cartel and numerous others. Yes, thank you. And I mean, again, very dangerous Los Zetas, they need to finance their way of life. They're feuding with other cartels. So they started kidnapping innocent people for ransom, stealing, extorting local businesses, all typical cartel things.

3:14 And many, many, many in this area have and all over Mexico have been killed bit the cartel. In 2010, a mass grave of 72 central and South American migrants was found in San Fernando. When, sorry, 2010 and they were possibly killed because they refused to work for Los Zetas. That was like one working theory. The other one was that Los Zetas believed they were going to be recreated by the opposing cartel and killed them before that happened. But I mean, that's still 72. Yeah. Central American and South American migrants, like one would be too much with 72 that's just like out of this world. It's horrendous. And then in 2011, the following year, another 193 remains were found across seven different mass graves in San Fernando. All cartel related.

4:00 How many? Sorry. 193 remains across seven different mass graves. Every time you see the numbers, like I don't grasp it, it's unbelievable. And then those are the mass graves, but it's not uncommon for at least once a month for 20 people to be found in different areas to this day. That's still the case. So yeah, many fled San Fernando because of the increasing violence. But many stayed, including medium and her family, except her oldest son, Luis moved to two hours away. But a lot of people stayed because you know, this was their home. This is all they knew and they had drown in the home, thriving businesses like medium and her family. And then on top of the business, their own store, medium also occasionally did some nanny work in Brownsville, Texas. She would drive across the border to work there a few. Sometimes she'd stay like a week and then you know, go back home. And then her youngest daughter, Karen and her husband will work at the store. And like I said earlier, Luis, the oldest son had moved two hours away to Sue that Victoria, hoping to escape the violence.

5:04 The Rodriguez Martinez family, they were not rich, but they were okay. They were better than most in this area because of you know, their business and the other work media was doing as a nanny. So as a Lea and Luis were gone from the home and Karen, who was 20, she was still working there, finishing college and working at the family store. And then on the evening of January 23rd, 2014, Karen was leaving rodeo boots. She was in her in the family truck trying to merge into a traffic when two trucks pulled up on each side of her truck, forcing her to come to a stop. Then armed men forced their way into the family truck and drove away with it with Karen still inside. And they drove to the family home. No one else was there because you know, Miriam was in Texas at her nanny job.

5:53 We don't know where the dad slash husband where he was. He was just gone work at work or something. I don't know. So they bound and gagged Karen and then left her lane on the floor. And then there was a knock at the door. And it was the uncle's mechanic. He had stopped by to work on the family truck. So the kidnappers grabbed him, tied him up. But then they later let him go for reasons unknown to the state. We don't know why he was just they didn't need him. I guess then as a la called Miriam. And immediately Miriam thought something was wrong because you know, as a la was crying and she told her the cartel has Karen. We received the ransom call. So Miriam left the nanny job right away to her home. One of the like hard parts is she had to write the bus. God, she has like this urgent, urgent, urgent crisis going on and she has to wait for the bus. Wait for the bus. Like beyond someone else's time. Yeah. And then on top of that, it was a two hour bus ride, which is that is just I can't imagine having to sit there knowing this is happening and there's nothing you can do because you're just you can't do anything. Yeah. Yeah. You're trying to get there as soon as Miriam arrived in San Fernando, a cele app picked her up and they got another call to Miriam's phone. And it was the kidnappers again with Karen this time. And you know, it was the typical ransom call where they forced Karen to give the message of like drop the money off here and then they just hang up. They don't give they don't give the family a chance to talk to her or anything other than Karen giving them the message. And the family they talked they were like, well, this is this is the cartel. This

7:26 is a business transaction. They they don't want Karen. They want money. So if we give them the money, obviously, we'll receive Karen in return. And that makes sense like to think that. Yeah. Plus, she wasn't the first kidnapping at all. This was such a common thing. Yeah. Like people knew how these things went. Yeah. It wasn't a matter of if but a matter of when for a lot of people. And so they gathered just under $10,000 with their own savings. Then they went out to get a loan at the bank. And it was so bad that banks now had loans to get families for ransoms. God, that's terrible. Yeah. I can't even fathom being the the lone person. We're like, um, our loans for ransoms actually have lower interest rates like what the fuck? Right. That's terrible. It really is. It's crazy. It's terrible. But they gathered they gathered all this money. They followed the kidnapper's instructions.

8:20 To the tea, they dropped the money off at the health clinic like they were instructed. And they waited at the local cemetery. This is where the kidnappers were supposed to give back Karen. And they waited hours. The kidnappers never showed. So two days later, medium asked for a meeting with the members of the local cartel and to her surprise they agreed. So she met with the tall skinny light-skinned man with curly hair. They met at a restaurant called El Junior and he told medium that Los Zetas did not have Karen. But he could help find her for $2,000. But then he was contradicted in himself and everything he was telling medium because he was like, well, I'll find her for $2,000. Also, Karen has been such an ideal captive person. She's been so easy to deal with.

9:02 Okay. So you can't tell someone, hey, I don't have your daughter, but also your daughter is a good kidnapping victim. Yeah. Wow. Also, these these kind of situations are so difficult because yeah, like anyone could be like, hey, I can end you here by all the time. Like, I remember this other. I don't remember the case or the names of anybody because I'm horrible with memory. But I remember that it was this girl. I say girl, but she was probably like early 20s. She went missing from a boat or something like that. Her family didn't know what happened to her. And then during their search, they hired a private detector and gave him so much money, but he had been making up everything he was doing. He wasn't helping them at all. Oh my god. Yeah. And they just gave over all this money.

9:45 And so like, I think about that guy you just said saying like, oh, I can help you find her for $2,000. And it's like, it's it's so horrible and opportunistic and so easily to be taken advantage of that state of desperation. 100% and it wasn't adding up, but medium, she'd do anything. Obviously, anything to get carried back. So she gave him the $2,000. And during the meeting, the man had a walkie talkie on his belt. And there was conversations going coming in and out that he wasn't responding to, but she overheard the same thing again and again, Samma. And she was like, that must be his name or a nickname that'll come back. So then over the next weeks, Samma, he stopped answering the phone.

10:27 He so obviously, this was what you said, him being opportunistic. The cartel probably didn't even know he did this. He just was like, oh, this is an easy way to make $2,000. And then other others appeared claiming to be Karen's kidnappers. And they it was always the same thing. They asked for more money. The family continued to pay, hoping to find Karen. It's because they don't know who it is either. Yeah, this terrible. It really is. And after every payment, there were more calls demanding more money. And after each payment that failed to return Karen, they began to lose hope naturally. And I mean, when things like this happen, like no one knows how they're going to react. What's going to happen. But sometimes families lose hope. They start to fall apart. Yeah. So by this time, medium had separated from her husband. She had fallen into despair. They both had fallen into their own despair. He was not doing anything either. He was, I mean, depressed. And so was she. I mean, it's very common for that to happen, like two families, even when someone dies, like a child of theirs dies. Yeah, they don't make it.

11:35 By this time, medium was living with Assela, the oldest daughter. And she wasn't neglecting pretty much everything. Then one day suddenly, weeks after the first payment was made, medium got out of bed. She shot where she fixed her hair. And then she just turned to Assela in like a super matter of fact tone. She told her Karen's not coming back. Karen's dead. And Assela was like, what's happening? She was confused. Then medium told Assela she would not rest until she found the people that took Karen. And she vowed to hunt them down one by one until her own death. This is when Assela understood the mother that she once knew was gone, completely gone. Any hope that medium maybe had felt or still had it was not there anymore. It was now replaced with the desire to avenge her daughter. And so instead of continuing in the loss and despair like her husband, medium, medium started to make a list of people she knew that were in the cartel. People that she had seen or because you know you're in these towns and you know names like all that house in that corner. Yeah. That house in the corner belongs to so and so and he's like, never look at tell whatever. Yeah. Exactly. So she started to make a list of the things that she knew. And then thanks to the mechanic that was like go during Karen's kidnapping, he was the one that confirmed. Summer was there. Oh, medium met with him and got the details. Then medium cut her hair super short, died a bright red and hopes that when she found

13:10 Sama, he would not recognize her as Karen's mother, the woman he met at that restaurant. So then medium spent hours looking through Karen's Facebook profile, looking for clues, just clicking on tag picture of their tag picture, just slew them looking for anything that would help her. After days of the search, she finally found something. It was a picture tags with the name Sama. And it was him. She recognized him from her meeting at the restaurant. So she knew him. Yeah, she recognized him in the picture. And he was with the young woman who was wearing a uniform, wearing a uniform of an ice cream shop in Cidad Victoria, where her son lived. She knew the uniform because she'd been there before. So then she went to Cidad Victoria and she stuck the store for weeks until she memorized the young woman's schedule. And she waited outside of each shift waiting to see when Sama would show up because she knew he would. And when he finally did, she followed Sama and the ice cream worker. Yeah. Yeah, she was doing like legit detective work. Yeah. When he finally showed, she followed them to her house and she marked on the address, but she knew she needed more information than just an address. She needed like names, more information on him, anything, right? Yeah. So then she found one of her old government uniforms from years ago when she worked at a health clinic, a government health clinic. She put the uniform on. She used an old ID that so looked like legit.

14:37 And she spent the day conducting a fake poll in the neighborhood going door to door, getting information on everyone, including Sama. Oh my god. How does she think of this? Wow. Yeah, the determination. And yeah, she got the basic information with this information. She went to authorities, local state, federal. She tried them all, but no one was willing to help. I mean, it was a cartel case like nobody wanted that. Yeah. And not to mention the people that were working with the cartel because we know that's a thing too. So nobody wanted to help her until one police officer, one federal police officer did. He remains anonymous in all of the articles. He never says his name, but he does say the following about her when she pulled her files onto the table. I had never seen anything like it. The details and information gathered by this woman working alone were incredible. She had gone to every single level of government and they had slammed the door in her face to help her hunt down the people who took her daughter. It was the greatest privilege of my career. Oh, that gave me chills. Oh my god. I know. And you know what? I would have remained anonymous to file. So oh, 100%. The files he mentions though, she had like, you know, those folders that have you open them and they like an accordion file, I think is what they're called. Yeah. She had one of those. And that's where she put everything that she was learning into. So it was like a legit big case of files that she carried everywhere with her. So with this information, there was

16:08 finally enough for an arrest warrant, but it took a while. So when the arrest warrant was finally issued, Sama was nowhere to be seen. Yeah, I knew it. Yeah. And this frustrated medium, of course, but she continued her work to gather more intel on everyone. Eventually though, Sama did turn up two hours away in South Africa. And it was September 15th, 2014, the day before Mexican Independence Day and still on that day, there's festivities leading up to El Vito, right? Yeah. So places are still closed, there's still, you know, things going on. And Luis, who had his own shop in Sudas Victoria, he was getting ready to close his own shop to celebrate when one last customer walked into his store.

16:52 It was Sama. I fucking knew it. Oh my god. I know. I know. Leave him alone. Well, no, Sama didn't know who he was. He just walked in. Oh, I'm sorry. Okay. I thought he was going to go kill him or something. No, no, he just walked in to buy some things. No, okay. No, no, you're fine. Luis recognized him from his mom's files. So he immediately called medium. And then he followed Sama. Oh, wow. And like, did not lose trail of him until the police arrived to arrest him. And of course, when the police arrested Sama, he faked a heart. He was like, I have a heart condition. And he was like crying and screaming like that he couldn't be arrested. Basically, been a little bitch. I have no words. But he was arrested.

17:34 Good. And then he folded. Uh, he started giving names. Wow. Yeah. Everything. He filled the details that my name was missing in her vials. So arresting Sama led police to then arrest Cristian Jose Sapa Dago Salas who had just turned 18 and was pretty young to be part of the cartel. That's young. Yeah. Yeah. And so when he was picked up and being interrogated, medium sat outside of his interrogation room and he could hear Cristian repeatedly asking for his own mom and repeatedly saying he was hungry. And medium entered the room, gave Cristian her own lunch and then went and bought him a coke. Oh my god. Yeah. And the police were like, what are you doing? Let him suffer. Like, yeah, you know, he did this.

18:20 And then medium told them like, I'm still the mother. And that is a child no matter what he did because she's an amazing person. She's going to make me cry. You're going to cry. I cry. And after she did this, he started talking. And it's, I mean, maybe because of the kindness she showed him. Yes. Yeah. So he, yeah, he said everything. And he then said he could take them to the ranch where all the kidnapped were held killed and buried. It was going to be like a, like, this whole big operation a raid and Mexican Marines and police worked together during the raid and they let medium participate and she put on a marine uniform. Oh my god. I mean, she, she did all of the front work for them. So they better let her write. And when they arrived at the ranch, it was like a scene out of a horror movie. There was a news hanging from a tree. There was debris everywhere. Turns out there had been a firefight between other cartels there 10, like 10 days before this raid. And then they also went through a brief firefight. Oh wow. There was some cartel members that were killed. I think two female members were killed. No, sorry. They were found and the Marines killed them on the spot.

19:27 That's what happened, which they're not supposed to do, but they did because they're also kind of corrupt. And they found some people that were kidnapped and being held there. Sadly, Karen was not among them. And so the raid was semi successful. I mean, they saved some people. They found some remains, but medium, of course, she wasn't happy because Karen wasn't there. Yeah. And as she was looking around the ranch, she found a stack of personable longings and among them, there was a scarf that belonged to Karen and the sea cushion Karen used when she drove the family truck. So Karen had been there. Wow. After they analyzed and you know, identified the remains, they said Karen wasn't there. So she had to be somewhere else. Miriam had to keep looking, right? As they were leaving the ranch, medium passed by a barbecue restaurant that's kind of at the entrance of the road that leads to the ranch. Okay. And she remembers this restaurant. She had been there two days after Karen's could not be in with Aselaa. And sitting outside of the restaurant at a table, there was a girl that medium knew Elvia, Yulisa, Bettencourt. And Elvia was sitting by herself, sipping a coke, medium approached her and asked like, Oh, have you heard about Karen? Everyone had been the whole city of San Fernando knew about Karen. And Elvia was like, No, I haven't heard what happened. So that's weird. It's suspicious, right? Yeah. And that's what medium thought to. And it felt like a stab

20:58 in the back because medium had known Elvia her entire life. Elvia had been abandoned by her own mother and medium frequently helped her out, gave her Karen's old clothes. She looked out for her and Elvia answering this was so suspicious because everyone knew what was happening. So medium left and when she got home, she returned to her research. And she discovered that Elvia was romantically involved with one of the suspected kidnappers of Karen, who happened to be imprisoned for a completely different reason. So medium went to that prison and just like she had at the extreme shop, she waited there every day for hours because she was like, Elvia is going to visit this guy there together.

21:42 Like, I know it. She did this for weeks. By this time, she had also found out that one of the ransom calls for Karen came from Elvia's house. Wow. Medium suspicions were right. Elvia finally showed up to visit her imprisoned boyfriend. And when she did, medium was ready to have her arrested. Medium just getting it done. She is. So this was three cartel members involved in the kidnapping of Karen arrested. She crossed three names out of her list. But as she continued to investigate, her list grew and changed because she was researching. Yeah. And then during all of her research, she also began to work with other families of the disappeared. They began going to her because they saw what she was doing and when she was capable of, too, yeah. Exactly. And it kind of reminds me of Maricella Escobelo Ortiz as well because when she started walking every single day to the judges, offices, protesting and slowly she was joined by more and more people like people. Other family members would disappear. Daughters, sisters, mothers, they started going to her too. And that's what happened here too. She began an organization. And this organization would grow to have 600 families in it.

22:59 Wow. Which is way too much. Yeah. So, you know, she was doing this. She was doing her research. And then her research yielded another name Enrique Yoel Rubio Flores. And she learned that he had left the cartel and became a born again Christian. So she found his hometown. Travel to it is three hours away from San Fernando. It's Aldama. And so she drove over there. And she met Enrique's grandmother at the local church. Andrique's grandmother told media that Enrique had always been troubled but he finally found God. He was attending church again. So, media knew, well, he's going to show up to Mass. She was right. So she started attending Mass herself waiting for him to show up. When he finally showed up, she had him arrested. And Enrique's family begged her not to do this to have mercy.

23:48 No. No. No. Yeah. Exactly. That's what she said. She was like, no, where was his compassion when he took my daughter? You can't just say I'm a born again Christian and everything you did wrong is absolved. Let's not write. No. So the only way to hold him accountable is the criminal justice system. And that's what she's doing. She could have done worse. She could have killed them. Like she could have killed all these people. Yes. Exactly. Yeah. And instead, she's living it up to the justice system, which is not always right. You know, exactly. Exactly. And so yeah, she had him arrested. And now at this point, she's two years into her fight for justice for her daughter. God, two who years. Yeah. And it's the same thing that we said in the Marisolas, gov. Or this episode when we talked about women murdered in the military about Benessaghiyan's mom and family members, there's no chance to even sit with your grief because they're over here fighting against cold ass government, cold ass cartels. There's no, yeah, no chance to grieve. And I just got to take a toll like, oh yeah, I can't even imagine. So yeah, two years after Karen's disappearance, she's still researching. She's continuing with her list. And the next person on her list was a former florist turned cartel member. She had even bought flowers from him when he was a florist.

25:10 When he was before he joined the cartel, when he was like just a struggling florist in the streets, he claims he had been forced into the cartel and then he escaped. So when medium finally tracked him down, he was selling sunglasses and CDs near the US Mexico border. He immediately recognized medium when she was approaching him. So he ran, medium ran after him, tackled him down, held him at gunpoint. Wow. And yelled, if you move all shoot and she contacted the police and she held them there for an hour until the police arrives and arrested him. And you know, sad and it's true, things like that do happen. People are forcing the cartel into the cartel. But again, he doesn't think wrong and he has to be held accountable. So exactly. And she's doing this. Yeah. Because again, she could have killed them. Yeah. No, for real. And so yeah, she continues with her list. At this point, she's three years into her fight for justice. Almost 10 members or actually by this point, 10 members that were involved with Diccona being had been arrested by her basically. And then it was March 22nd, 2017. There was a prison break in South Africa, the 29 prisoners had escaped by Diggin' a tunnel. Most were members of Los Setas and the 10 she had released or she had, sorry, imprisoned, also escaped, including one of the actual killers of her daughter, two, sorry, two of them, including them. One had been captured, one of the killers, but one was still at large. And medium had

26:41 requested protection from the police. But even at this point, she said she wasn't afraid to die. Because she died the day they killed Karen. It's terrible because I know that grief and especially when someone is taken from you that way, it's not natural death. It changes people, but she, you know, she still has other, even though there are adults, other adult children, you know, and it's like her other daughter said the mom that she knew died or was gone, whatever her words or something like that. Yeah, it wasn't the same woman anymore. Yeah, no you're right. So even after the prison break, media was not done. She even went asked like when is it enough. She was like, "Me faltando as putas." There were still two bitches left on her list. This was what she would tell people. And these were the two women that she knew were involved. So she had finally found one of the two women, La Guera Soto. That's what she was known by. She had escaped or left the cartel life. She was now a nanny in Sudavigdoria. And a medium found her. Sat outside of her house waiting, sitting there, you know, listening to the radio and just waiting for her to come out. Her car battery died, what she was doing this. And we survived to jump her car. And then they watched the house together.

27:51 And then when Don broke, medium called the police, La Guera left her house and medium ran after her. And she like, like, went around, medium chased. And then she pulled La Guera down to the ground by her hair and held her there until the police arrived. She did, however, break her ankle in the process of tackling a medium. And I mean, she is not a young woman. She's in her late 50s at this point, 57 by this time. To be catching up to people and tackling them and shit. Yeah. So yeah, she broke her ankle. By this point, three years later, medium had also been to the ranch three times and had insisted for it to be checked for Karen's remains again and again. And this is when finally they re-searched among the first set of remains that were found in that first raid. And they found that one of those femurs had belonged to Karen. Wow. So now it was like officially confirmed Karen was dead. And they kept searching on medium's assistance and they found more, more bones, I guess, more bones. And it wasn't a complete skeleton. So medium insisted they kept searching until they had all of Karen. But they saw how the funeral because they had most of her now. So they held the funeral for her. God, that's terrible. It's terrible. It really is. And then on May 10, 2017, so about a month after finding like wetta and breaking her ankle, medium was still in crutches. It was Mother's Day, May 10.

29:21 They had been celebrating the day and it was 10.21 pm. She was parking, heading back home. She was finally living with her husband again. They had reconciled. She parked on the street, got out of her car when a white Nissan truck pulled up next to her and fired 13 times. Yeah. When he heard the shots, her husband ran out of the house. He found her laying on the ground. Her hand had been reaching for her pistol that she always carried with her. And he called an ambulance and she sadly passed away in the ambulance on the way to the hospital. It's terrible. I'm like, how much loss can one family take? You know what I mean? Yeah. And I have chills because it's like, it just reminds me of Maricella Escobela Ortiz who fought and fought and fought against such a corrupt unjust system.

30:07 Yeah. And in the end, she was also killed, likely by the same people that killed her daughter. And she's not the only one obviously because now we're talking about medium who ended up the same fate as Karen. Yeah. And even the whole like new, not mass movement that I think we've talked about this maybe not, but it began in Argentina, the whole color of purple. And I want to say that it was again a mother who lost her daughter in this manner. I think you're right. And then she is also killed in the same way. So it's not like just Mexico obviously, but it's still so I don't know if you're reading I guess. Yeah. I mean, like, Femiside is alive and real out there. Yeah. That's why International Women's Day is such a big deal. That's what it's really for. Okay. People, well, not that.

30:52 It was working class women, but you know, violence, rampant violence against women internationally is a part of it fighting against that and awareness of that. So that's why it pisses me off when people act like it's a mother's day type of day for women. And it's like, no, we're not celebrating women this day. I'm sorry to say it's not to celebrate women. Do not give your wife flowers for International Women's Day. Why don't you go and I don't know, do something to uplift and fight against oppression of women worldwide instead? Because what is giving your wife flowers do nothing? Yeah. Yeah. Become a feminist instead. Not that hard. Why do you clear house instead? Yeah, no. Okay.

31:38 Brandt over. Go on. So her death was a shock to the community that were protesting demanding justice for her death. Even the governor of Tamil Lipa himself went on the record saying, like, we're going to find her killers. And two men involved in her murder were arrested two months after her death, but they weren't they may they may have been the ones who like killed her, but they were not acting alone because these were two 18 and 19 year olds. Oh yeah, they're feeling we're not. They were given these orders by someone. There were a hundred percent more people involved more men involved in her death. And to this day, they remain free. No one else has been investigated. And on top of that, those two, the 18 and 19 year old received a 10 to 15 year sentence.

32:23 So on top of that, her family, especially Louise, her son, who has pretty much taken over her work, but it's afraid. Of course. I mean, at this point, his sister, Karen, now his mother explicitly targeted for her search and fight for justice. Yeah. He even has said, this is a joke of a sentence, like 10 to 15 years for the death of his mother. And I mean, the other people involved remain at large. Like, but yeah, he took over the group, the 600 member group of other missing kidnapped people. And but after her death, the group's activity diminished due to the fear caused by her death, because obviously it's scary and what message are they sending? Like you become too loud, you become too active. You say too much, we're going to kill you. And we can. And we can get away with it.

33:14 And so far they have. So yeah, the group is still still there, but yeah, the activity has lessened. And in fact, it wasn't until another boy was kidnapped in the same town San Fernando that the group began to act again. That boy is Luciano and the family even knew, they all knew each other. I'm gonna see when he was kidnapped. What year? Very recently, three years ago. Yeah, and it was like such a such a similar case. Trucks pulled up next to his, took him, the family paid the ransoms just like they were instructed to and the cartel still killed him. And they were like, we're not going to do the same thing. Same thing, medium is dead because like they were scared because it was all still so fresh. Her her own death was what four or five years before his. Yeah, but they didn't say quiet. They marched. They recorded a message with Luciano's mom like asking for him back. They put her down speakers and they would drive around town. Oh my god, playing it. I would cry. It's it's so sad. They would play this out loud. They interrupted like government meetings, protesting. They did a lot. And but they what they were like, we're not going to do is track them down and like what medium did because they were like scared. And I think the dad, he was interviewed by the New York Times and he says like, we can't all be like medium and I commend. I don't know if that's right where it commend her for her bravery, but I'm not that brave.

34:47 Like I'm I'm scared and look what happened to her. Well, even honestly, even then protesting in this way, even that could make the matariate because you know, it's not in its affortunate, but um and I could of course understand what he's saying about. And not everyone like you shouldn't have medium should not have had to do what she did. And this family should also even like ideally, you know, ideally, nothing like this would happen, but and it did. But like ideally, the government would respond the way it's opposed to law enforcement would investigate the way they're supposed to instead of being in bed with the cartels. Yeah, exactly. And it wasn't until this happened with Luciano that the group that medium started really started picking up again with their attempts to fight back protest.

35:34 So yeah, it's an at her funeral, um, thousands attended her funeral. They only who she was. She was buried next to Karen in the. Oh, I'm not a cry. Yeah, they have these like, I don't know if they're seated trees, but it was this part of the pantheon of the cemetery with like trees above it and they're next to each other. They're like three plots down from Luciano. Oh wow. That's terrible. And even in death, medium managed to catch the last person on her list. Really? Even after her death, yeah. So one month after her death, um, authorities in Veracruz found the final person on medium's list.

36:18 They found out they're putta. Yeah, exactly. And they only found her because of medium's intel. That's why they knew where to look. So she was a former member of Los Etas. She had fled to Veracruz. She was involved in beating and torturing Karen during her captivity. Then she fled to Veracruz to raise her son. And yeah, medium did the work gave it to Veracruz officials and they found her with medium's information. Good. Two weeks before her own death, medium had updated her whatsapp status to say. And again, they were still missing parts of Karen. They did the funeral because they had most of her, but not all of her. That's a big deal for a lot of people. Well, isn't that belief the Catholic belief? If I remember right, that you had to be whole. Your body has to be whole to enter heaven or something like that?

37:29 Yeah, I think so. And it also has, it's like, I know it's a thing with Muslims too because I know that's such a big thing in Palestine right now where like, a lot of people are not complete and it's such another insult on top of that because now their beliefs are, yeah, I mean, they can't, you know, go to heaven. And yeah, they kept searching for her or trying to search for her, demanding the authorities to search for her. You can find a bronze statue of Miriam in La Plaza Central of San Fernando. And there's a plaque that reads, "Apprendi que el coraje no es la ausencia de miedo si no el triunfo sobre el el hombre valiente no es aquel que no siente miedo si no el que conquista el miedo." I learned that courage is not the absence of fear, but the triumph over the brave man is not one who does not feel fear, but the one who conquers fear. Although I feel like they should have put women not man, but I was going to say in the statue of a woman, yeah, woman. But yeah, she is still loved by, you know, so many and remembered and visited that plaque of hers is to, yeah, it's there. And yeah, it's just like we've been saying this whole time. It's just a tragic, tragic case. Like I've seen people covering it and they're like, "Oh, it's so inspiring." But to me, it's just so sad and unfair. And obviously this is a strong, strong, fierce woman who had to do this, but it's like she shouldn't have had to do this. Yeah, it makes me think of, and there's, I think I've

39:01 talked about this before too, but there's a clip and I don't know her name because I can't remember it right now, but there's a clip that goes viral almost every like international woman's day of a woman. And it was when the march in Sidao de Mexico got like violent and women like broke and burned down like buildings, which honestly, I'm here for it. I'm here for it. But there's one woman who says, "Who cares? Who cares if I burn down the world?" Like, she was my world and you took her and you're not doing anything about it. And obviously it's on Spanish. And she's like a mom whose daughter was killed. And she's saying this and all these stories just make me think of her or also of Vanessa Guillén's mom being, you know, outside of her hood by herself with the sign. But Rufina, Maya, who we've talked about.

39:46 Yes. Yeah. How these women, just all the women we've talked about, yeah, yeah, fighting, not a chance to grieve. Yeah. And honestly, like going up against the world for their children. It's just sad. It is. It is. And yeah, definitely the main takeaway also for me, like you, is not how inspiring it is. And of course, it is. That's not to diminish that, but it shouldn't have to be like you said, inspiring like these women, these mothers, these families should have been allowed the time to grieve and to process and to heal and instead they had to fight and fight and fight and then they were killed for it. Yeah. And then after all that, they were killed many times by the same people that killed their own daughters. Sorry, my voice is done. But yeah, that was the case of medium, Rodriguez. And I'll put pictures up here so everyone can see her bright fiery hair that matches her fiery spirit. Yeah. But yeah, I guess I wasn't going to do a listener story, but I was like, you know what? I guess we should have like something to underpress me specifically. So now we're going to move on to our listener story. And if you have a story that you want us to read, you can email espucuitosagema.com. You can DM us on any of our socials. You can submit it on discord. We have a channel that says submit your scary story. You can also call the espucuit hotline that number is in the show notes or you can record a voice no one email it. All those are options. Carmen's going to read it because my voice is done. I've been sick. I'm a little better, but my voice is done. Yeah,

41:18 so yeah. All right. So here goes the listener story. Hetchy guys, big fan of y'all. I really love the podcast. I listened to Spotify. I have two stories to tell you. I don't know if you find it spooky or not, but I thought they did to me to start on the first story or event and happen to my aunt who lives in Guanajuato in Un Rancho. This happened a long time ago. One night she was coming back from work and she would walk every day from work to the house. And one specific night she was walking near this baseball field and she said that she saw this figure of a man leaning against a tree and she passed beside him and told him, "When does it not just goodnight?" And she said that the moment he lived in his head, he had red glowing eyes and she just walks past her home. Oh no, that's...

42:08 That was atanas. That was the devil. That was atanas himself. Oh my god, that's so creepy. Yeah, that's terrifying. I um, different would Iran home. I would have thrown up. Yep, that's scary. Okay, so the next one. My next story happened to my sister, my cousin, my niece, and my nephew. This happened back in 2015 in the Rancho where I'm from in Guanajuato. I went to Mexico to celebrate my quinceñera and one day when we were in practice and we had to cut it short because it started to rain and then stopped until dark. One of my damas couldn't be picked up by her sister because it was muddy and the motorcycle could slide through the mud so we decided to walk her home. Makes sense. And then in parenthesis, she says, "My mom didn't know we were going to walk all the way to her house which was far from where we were having the practice." We walked her and when we were coming back, we walked through the baseball field. Oh no, not the baseball field. The one at the end. Okay, wow. And we were holding umbrellas because it started to drizzle and we started to feel like something was flying or I don't know how to explain it, but something moved the umbrellas from our hands and then we started hearing something far like moving through the bushes. I just remember we were so scared that we decided to not like back and I wouldn't know the same. And we just ran because we just kept feeling

43:40 something following us and in our mind we just kept saying it's nothing and it was just some cows following us. But my cousin looked back, she saw nothing following us and we just ran home till this day. I just want to keep it in my head that it was a cow following us. It was the cows. Sure, if that makes you feel better, it was a cow. I want to tell myself something like that too. Like, oh, it was, but on us back guys, like don't worry, it was just the cows moving behind us. Oh my god, it's horrible that it was the same baseball field because that immediately makes we think that no, sorry, it was not the cows, it was actually, it was a tenas. Seriously. Yeah, that was creepy. Wow. Okay, well thank you so much for your story. That was for sure, Espookie.

44:26 Very Espookie. Yeah, we, I got scared for sure. Yeah, me too. That's it. Don't cross baseball fields. I didn't run, and if you do, don't look back and just run back and it was the cows. For sure, the cows. And yeah, stay Espookie. We'll catch everyone next time. Bye. (https://www.espookytales.com/the-case-of-miriam-rodriguez/)