MEXICO CITY — Mexican authorities identified the charred remains of an investigative journalist from Michoacán kidnapped a month ago. This is the seventh case of a reporter who covered the government or drug cartels being murdered.
On Monday afternoon, the Michoacan Attorney General’s Office (PGJ) announced the identification Salvador Adame, a journalist who was kidnapped a month prior. Adame’s charred remains were found in Mid-May in an area called Devil’s Creek or Barranca del Diablo not far from a state highway between the rural communities of Nueva Italia and Lombardia. The body was identified after investigators performed DNA testing, Michoacan authorities revealed.
Salvador Adame was the director for a local news station called 6TV in Michoacan, the same state where he was kidnapped by cartel gunmen on May 18 near the rural community of Nueva Italia. For more than one month, the fate of the journalist went unknown. Various colleagues took to social media to express their outrage and even the U.S. Embassy tweeted about his disappearance.
According to information gained from the interrogation of Daniel “El Cabezon” Ruiz, a top enforcer for the Familia Michoacana/Knights Templar, Adame’s kidnapping, murder, and incineration was carried out by Feliciano “Chano Peña” Ledezma. Daniel Ruiz was recently arrested by authorities in the operation where they captured the head of the Nueva FaIgnacio “El Cenizo” Andrade Renteria the leader of the Familia Michoacana/Knights Templar.
According to Michoacan law enforcement officials, the late Salvador Adame was a childhood friend of Ruiz–leading to his cooperation in an effort to recover the slain journalist’s body.
As Breitbart Texas reported, 2017 has been a deadly year for media with a total of seven investigative journalists critical of Mexico’s government or drug cartels being killed. Days before Adame was kidnapped, in the Mexican state of Sinaloa, gunmen murdered award-winning journalist Javier Valdez, sparking outrage among local journalists.
Ildefonso Ortiz is an award-winning journalist with Breitbart Texas. He co-founded the Cartel Chronicles project with Brandon Darby and Stephen K. Bannon. You can follow him on Twitter and on Facebook.
Brandon Darby is managing director and editor-in-chief of Breitbart Texas. He co-founded the Cartel Chronicles project with Ildefonso Ortiz and Stephen K. Bannon. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook. He can be contacted at bdarby@breitbart.com.
Jose Luis Lara, from the Cartel Chronicles Project, contributed to this report, Lara is a former founding member of the Self-Defense Movement in Michoacán.
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