Authorities have apprehended the mother-in-law of a former Mexican beauty queen, charging her with the young woman’s murder after she fled the country.
Erika Maria Herrera, 62, was detained in Venezuela on Wednesday in connection with the killing of 27-year-old Carolina Flores Gomez. The incident occurred on April 15 in Gomez’s Mexico City apartment, according to various reports.
Gomez, who was named Miss Teen Universe in Baja California in 2017, suffered a brutal attack, being shot 12 times—six bullets striking her head and another six hitting her chest, as detailed by Blog del Narco.
Investigators quickly turned their attention to Herrera, leading to her inclusion on Interpol’s Red Notice list earlier this week. The Mexico City Attorney General’s Office has credited this international alert with facilitating her capture, as noted by Reporte Indigo.
Mexican prosecutors are now working on securing Herrera’s extradition back to Mexico, Diario Puntal reports.
The arrest follows the release of a video online that purportedly shows the tragic event. In the footage, Herrera is seen trailing Gomez into a room in her apartment, followed by the sound of multiple gunshots and screams.
Gomez, who in 2017 was crowned Miss Teen Universe in Baja California, was shot 12 times – with six gunshots to the head and six in the chest
Gomez had recently celebrated her birthday, as she was born April 4, 1999 in Ensenada, Puntual reported.
The video then shows Gomez’s husband, Alejandro Gomez, walking into the frame of the video while carrying their eight-month-old baby, asking his mother in Spanish: ‘What was that? What crazy thing did you do?’
Herrera answered: ‘Nothing. She made me angry.’
Gomez calmly asks her: ‘What’s wrong with you, she’s my family.’
Herrera answered: ‘You’re mine and she stole you.’
She then allegedly replied, ‘Nothing, she just made me angry,’ and emphasized that Alejandro is her son before she fled the premises.
The fact that Alejandro let his mother flee the scene, then wait until the next day to notify authorities about the murder, have led prosecutors to also investigate whether there was a cover-up in the homicide.
Gomez had recently celebrated her birthday, as she was born April 4, 1999 in Ensenada, Puntual reported.
Baja California governor Marina del Pilar Avila told reporters that the investigation into Gomez’s death was a foremost priority.
‘No crime against a woman should go unpunished,’ Avila told a pool of reporters, according to the outlet. ‘Our thoughts are with her family during this devastating time.’
State prosecutor María Elena Andrade Ramírez said that there has been close communication between officials to prioritize the probe, according to Puntual.
Erika Maria Herrera, 62, was arrested in Venezuela on Wednesday for the death of Carolina Flores Gomez, 27, inside her Mexico City apartment on April 15
Authorities have also investigated whether there was a cover-up in the murder, as Gomez’s husband allegedly let his mother flee the scene and waited one day before calling authorities
The tragic death of the beauty queen comes at a time of social unrest in Mexico over what advocates call an epidemic of violence against women, and lack of justice toward their assailants.
Civil organizations are pushing prosecutors to reclassify the case as a femicide, which the United Nations agency UN Women defines as ‘an intentional killing with a gender-related motivation,’ Puntual reported.
The UN agency said last November that femicide ‘is different from homicide, where the motivation may not be gender-related.’
It continued, ‘Femicide is driven by discrimination against women and girls, unequal power relations, gender stereotypes or harmful social norms.
‘It is the most extreme and brutal manifestation of violence against women and girls which occurs on a continuum of multiple and related forms of violence, at home, in workplaces, schools or public and online spaces.’
Among the forms it takes, according to the agency, include ‘intimate partner violence, sexual harassment and other forms of sexual violence, harmful practices and trafficking.’
