Families of drivers who were disappeared on the highways of Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, have documented at least 30 such cases over the past four years. The number is rising and the authorities are doing little to investigate. The transportation companies linked to these cases have ignored the families and tried to minimize these crimes.

Text: José Ignacio De Alba, originally published July 13, 2021.

Photos: Duilio Rodríguez and courtesy.

Translation: Dawn Marie Paley and María José López.

MEXICO CITY- The number of bus and truck drivers disappeared in the city of Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas has risen such that a specialized search collective dedicated specifically to search for missing drivers has been created.

Though it has great commercial importance, this region has become an extremely dangerous place for everyone who arrives there. Over the past few years, an increasing number of bus drivers have also been disappeared in the border city and surrounding area.

Nuevo Laredo is Mexico’s most important border crossing into the United States, from where the majority of goods leaving the country departs. For over a decade, the city has been caught in a dispute between cartels for control of the crossing.

According to the search group for disappeared drivers (Disappeared Drivers in Nuevo Laredo – ODNL), more than 30 bus and truck drivers have been disappeared in the last four years. And the number is rising: in 2018 there were four, in 2019 there were six, in 2020 eight, and so far this year, 12 have been reported.

Family members of the disappeared don’t think robbery is the motive of the kidnappings, since in all the cases the vehicles and merchandise they were transporting have been recovered intact.

In addition, they say that the Attorney General of Tamaulipas has not carried out investigations of any of the vehicles before the companies begin using them again for transportation. Family members of the disappeared say the companies could have valuable information that could help locate their loved ones. Some of the vehicles are equipped with cameras, geolocalization devices, or audio recorders.

The Covid-19 pandemic has made investigations even more difficult. “It seems like it’s a pretext that the authorities give us to avoid doing their jobs,” said Greta Martínez, who is searching for her husband Alfredo.

Many of the partners of the drivers have had to seek additional employment in order to sustain their families, while also looking after their children.

The danger that the people of Tamaulipas are living through exposes those who try and locate the disappeared to great risk. Some have decided to cross the state, which is controlled by crime groups, in an attempt to find some information about their family members.

In a zoom meeting, family members of eight of the drivers discussed their cases via Zoom. These are their stories.

“Get out of here, it’s dangerous for you”

Greta Martínez is looking for her husband Alfredo Martínez Sánchez, who is originally from México State and who disappeared on January 20, 2020. He was working as a driver for Transportes Brenda and had just arrived in Nuevo Laredo when he was disappeared.

His wife says that over two days the company gave her little information, even tricking her by saying they knew Alfredo was okay: “don’t worry ma’am, your husband is here in the trucking yard.” But after a few days unable to communicate with her partner, she went to look for him in Nuevo Laredo.

At first Greta thought that her husband was assaulted to steal his merchandise, but her trip through Tamaulipas left her convinced that it was purely a disappearance. “I never imagined that he would be disappeared.”

After arriving in the border zone, she came across trucks with armed passengers.

“There are guys with hats and weapons and bulletproof vests. I saw them, they use the ditches along the sides of the highway.”

In the trip to look for her husband, she saw that a criminal group was transporting kidnapped people in the truck bed. She even said she was followed by a pick up truck. When she arrived at the truck yard she was told “Get out of here, it’s dangerous for you.”

Greta tried to search for her husband in hospitals, jails, and in the morgue. When she went to the police station, she was interrogated:

“Why did you come? The truth is you are taking a huge risk, here, organized crime is extremely powerful. The most likely situation is that he was kidnapped.”

“What?” she asked.

“They take people and they don’t come back. Stop searching, file your report, and get out of here.”

Greta went to the Attorney General to report the disappearance, but she felt like she was giving up her search. After a year, the authorities have barely searched at all, and she hasn’t been back to Nuevo Laredo. Since then she’s been collaborating on a Facebook page called Operadores Desaparecidos Nuevo Laredo, which brings together family members from different states.

Transportes Brenda had the vehicle back on the road just a few hours after the disappearance of her husband. “They didn’t even investigate, what’s worse, they put the bus back on the road right away,” she said.

Transportation companies blocking the search

Blanca Elvia Robles is looking for her brother Felipe Otilio Robles Castro, who is originally from San Luis Potosí, and who disappeared on August 8, 2019, on the highway between Monterrey and Nuevo Laredo. His truck was found in a dump, all the cargo was still aboard. 

“When the company found the trailer, instead of calling the police, they took it back to the yard and put it back to work,” she said.

Blanca learned of Felipe’s disappearance through his colleagues. She thinks the Fletes Mex, the company for which her brother was working, has made the search more complicated. His truck was never searched by authorities, the cell phone used by her brother, which is property of the company, wasn’t safeguarded; instead they bought a new chip and gave it to a new driver. Now, Blanca is afraid a key piece in the investigation, the call logs for his phone, have been lost.

The Tamaulipas Attorney General has barely updated her on the case.

“No one tells you how to search”

Alma Leticia Cruz is looking for her husband Mauricio Calva Gónzalez, who was disappeared April 1, 2021.

Originally from Hidalgo State, Mauricio usually called his daughters every day, but this time, after he arrived in Nuevo Laredo, he didn’t get in touch. After a few days, his family heard rumours he had been disappeared.

The company Transportes y Logística de Carga never told Alma about the disappearance of her husband, even though it occurred on company property.

Through her own investigation, Alma learned that her husband arrived in Nuevo Laredo, and that criminals had set up a checkpoint on the highway. Mauricio managed to escape the checkpoint unharmed, he arrived at the truck yard safely. Shortly after, a group of armed people burst into company property and kidnapped him.

“The company says they erase their tapes after 15 days, so the AG couldn’t investigate,” said Alma. No one answers the company’s phone any more. In her view, the company “washed their hands” of the incident.

Alma, who is 30 years old, has no one to help her care for her children. Now she has to figure out a way to keep her family afloat, and use her spare time to look for her partner.

“The companies don’t realize that a family’s breadwinner was taken. There is no manual that explains what to do in these situations, nobody tells you your rights or how to search. You have to learn on your own.”

“They never searched the trailer”

Abigail Villafranco is searching for her uncle Eulalio Vázquez and her cousin César Daniel, both originally from the State of Mexico. Both men were disappeared on March 31, 2021.

Eulalio was 30 years old and worked for Rada Exprés, this year his son joined him in Nuevo Laredo to work for the same company. Eulalio and his son drove various routes near Nuevo Laredo and were doing the paperwork so that César could work in the same company as his father.

“It was his dream to be a driver like his father,” said his cousin. But that dream was broken in the early hours of the last day in March, when the men were disappeared as they passed through a checkpoint of armed men. The truck that was carrying them was abandoned, cargo and all.

“We never heard anything else from them, their trailer was never searched, nothing,” said Abigaíl.

The company got in touch with Eulalio and César’s family and told them that the men had left their vehicle, and that the company was going to treat it as though they had “abandoned their work.” Beginning at that moment, their family members began to look for them.

“They scare you right off the bat, they tell you that narcos took them and you’ll never see them again.”

Abigail thinks the criminal groups are kidnapping the drivers “because they are enlarging the plaza” and because the drivers know the streets and roads of Tamaulipas well. 

She said the only support the family of Eulalio and César has received is from the collective of disappeared family members, because the state AG has done almost nothing.

“If they had stolen the container off the truck, they would all be searching for it”

Beatriz Vega is searching for her husband Epifanio Aguilar Mondragón, originally from Saltillo, who was disappeared June 14, 2020.

No one told Beatriz her husband had disappeared. When she couldn’t reach him, the company Transmex told her that he had left company property without telling anyone. They also told her that he had gone to the zona roja (red light district), and that he was surely lost there.

“If they had stolen the container off the truck they would all be searching for it, but since it was a driver, no one cares,” said Beatriz.

It’s been more than a year since she started working as a waitress in a restaurant on the side of the highway. “I earn very little to take care of my children.”

She said the company left her on her own.

“What’s it worth that my husband worked so many years for them, if they don’t even try and look for him?”

Kilometer 26 

Melisa Hernández is searching for her husband Brandon Isaac, from Nuevo León, who disappeared on June 13th, 2018. Brandon was on his way back to Monterrey from Nuevo Laredo when he disappeared. At that time, Melisa was pregnant with twin girls.

She learned of his disappearance from other drivers. Since then, Melisa has searched for Brandon in hospitals, jails and at the morgue. She even traveled to the ditches where disappearances are common, but she couldn’t access them. “If I get there, I may never make it out,” she said.

Even though she has been searching the longest out of anyone in her collective, Melisa doesn’t have more information than anyone else. She knows the investigation is on her shoulders.

“You have to investigate on your own, no authority is going to help you out. You have to teach yourself how to search,” she said.

Three truck drivers have disappeared in the same exact kilometer where Brandon disappeared, kilometer 26 of the highway between Monterrey and Nuevo Laredo.

Melisa has four children to take care of. She worked as a nurse in a Covid hospital and is now administering Covid vaccines in the state of Nuevo León. In the afternoons, she does manicures. 

“Living without being alive”

Jacinta Rincón is searching for her son Juan Antonio Rincón, from San Luis Potosí, who disappeared on November 27th, 2019. One of his coworkers alerted the family: two gunmen took him from the Aralo Express truck yard, where he worked.

Jacinta says the little she knows about the case she learned through her own investigation: “If I hadn’t moved, nobody else would have moved a finger”.

After nearly two years of searching, Jacinta says she recently suffered a stroke. She doesn’t rule out that her illness could be related to how tough it has been waiting for her son. “It’s like living without being alive,” she says.

“It’s taken a lot to be noticed”

Nancy Aurora Hernández is searching for her husband Benjamín Mendoza, a resident of Tlaxcala who was disappeared on December 16th, 2019.

Benjamín was driving a passenger bus belonging to the company Atah towards Nuevo Laredo when the vehicle was stopped by a group of gunmen. Benjamín and his co-pilot Ignacio Márquez were pulled off the bus. No one has heard from them since. 

Benjamín’s family started on their quest to find him. Authorities told the family that Benjamín hadn’t disappeared, saying instead that he was a fugitive of justice. “Either way, they have to find him. It’s preferable to know that he’s in jail than him being missing,” said Nancy.

So far, no authority has provided evidence of any crime that Benjamín may have been involved in.

Nancy and her daughters’ lives have been transformed by these events. She took a job at a maquiladora in order to sustain her family. “But I also try to keep them from spiralling, and to keep me from spiralling, because if I did I could take them down with me. But lately it’s been weighing more heavily on me: the debts are piling up, the stress is accumulating, and so is the work. It’s taken a lot to get noticed.”

*In Tamaulipas, there are 11,452 missing people, according to the National Search Commission, an agency of the Secretary of the Interior. The majority of these disappearances took place on roads and highways. Many families don’t report the disappearance of their loved ones in this region out of fear; unrecorded disappearances could be much higher.

José Ignacio de Alba was educated in Catholic schools until he became an atheist. He is a shy wanderer, and never finished his journalism degree. He tends to have more faith the old narratives than the new, and he likes to write stories.

Duilio Rodriguez is a photographer and editor interested in art, cinema, architecture, literature, rock climbing and spots in general (except soccer). duiliorodriguez.com.

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