Former local PRI MP Javier Ramírez murdered inside his car in Celaya

Javier Ramírez, former PRI local deputy, was killed this Wednesday afternoon, April 13 inside his vehicle in the municipality of Celaya, in the state of Guanajuato.

The former legislator of the 51st. Legislature of the State Congress, 80 years old, was attacked with bullets in the community of Juan Martín, near the road that goes to San Isidro de Trojes.

The authorities received a report around 18:30 hours yesterday, through the emergency number 911, which alerted them to a series of firearm detonations.

The municipal police officers who responded to the report found a van on a dirt road and inside it the deputy's body with several bullet wounds.

After paramedics confirmed that the politician had no vital signs, the crime scene was attended by National Guard personnel and experts from the Forensic Medical Service.

The Attorney General's Office has not commented on the matter, some versions of the local press claimed that it was an assault in which Ramírez was killed for resisting, but other accounts claimed that it was a direct attack. A poster with a criminal message was allegedly found at the scene.

Javier Ramírez was also the trustee of the City Council during the administration of former mayor Salvador Guerra Jiménez during the triennium 1983-1985.

The community of Juan Martín has recorded several violent events in the last month. The most notorious was the massacre of seven musicians who were members of the music group Los Chupacierro, who were burned in the community of San José el Nuevo.

In recent weeks, several violent events have been recorded in the Juan Martín area, including the murder of members of the gang called Chuparrecio, who were burned inside a vehicle. Days after this event, the former candidate for community delegate was murdered; days before, she had been reported missing.

The former Celayan trustee and former deputy of the 51st. Legislature of the State Congress, Javier Ramírez Melecio, was reportedly assassinated this afternoon in the community of Juan Martín, Celaya, where a candidate for municipal delegate and a group of musicians were murdered days ago. They had traveled from Juan Martín to San Jose to give a concert.

Last week, prosecutor Carlos Zamarripa confirmed that the candidate for the Juan Martín community delegation, Teresita Torres Miranda, had been murdered, and that the alleged perpetrators had been arrested.

Days earlier, the Alba Search Protocol had been activated, after the candidate was found.

Over the past few years, Guanajuato has positioned itself as the entity with the highest number of homicides in the country. In 2018 it reached the top position with 3,436 homicides, in 2019 it stood at 3,875 and in 2020 it reached its all-time high in the last thirty years with 4,964.

Celaya (812), León (780) and Irapuato (530) were placed among the five most lethal municipalities in 2020, behind only Ciudad Juarez (Chihuahua) and Tijuana (Baja California). Among the three, they account for up to 47% of the homicides that occur in the 46 municipalities that make up the entity, according to the Atlas of Homicides, Mexico 2020, prepared by the Mexico United Against Crime Association (MUCD).

The spiral of violence that plagues Guanajuato began in 2014, when it entered the ranking of the most violent entities and homicides continued to grow year after year: in 2015 it grew 23%, in 2016, 27%, and the following year it rose to 85%. In 2020, only two of Guanajuato's 46 municipalities did not record violent deaths: Santa Catarina and Atarjea.

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