‘Pattern of Irresponsibility’

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Mexico’s top immigration official will face criminal charges for a fire that killed 40 people in a migrant center in Ciudad Juarez last month, an incident that has increased scrutiny over poor conditions and corruption at the country’s migrant facilities, Sky News reported Wednesday.

The federal Attorney General’s Office filed charges against Francisco Garduño, the head of Mexico’s National Immigration Institute, late Tuesday. Prosecutors said Garduño was remiss in failing to prevent the disaster, adding that other officials will also face charges for failing to carry out their duties.

But Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador later said Garduño would meanwhile remain in his post, the Associated Press reported, a move seemingly at odds with the Attorney General’s prosecution bid.

Last month, a migrant allegedly set fire to foam mattresses at the facility near the US border, in protest against what he presumably thought were preparations to relocate or deport the migrants.

Security camera footage showed guards walking away instead of releasing people trapped inside their cells.

So far, authorities are holding three Mexican immigration officials, a guard and a Venezuelan migrant for involvement in the fire. They face homicide charges.

But the blaze prompted calls domestically and from other Central American nations to further probe the matter, the Associated Press added.

Prosecutors noted that the case showed a “pattern of irresponsibility.”

They added that following a fire at another detention center in the state of Tabasco in 2020 that killed one person and injured 14, it was shown that the immigration service had known of the problems at the facility but failed to act.

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