Paola Ledezma González ("Paola Buenrostro")
Age 2330 Sep 2016
Ciudad de Mexico, Distrito Federal (Mexico)
Shot
TDoR list ref: tgeu/30-Sep-2016/Paola Ledezma Gonzalez
Paola was shot twice after climbing into a client's car on the night of Friday 30th September. She died almost instantly.
"This guy arrived and it looked like he was drugged and drunk, and my friend got up to give him the service, but the car did not go seven meters when he shot her twice and killed her."
"I began to scream desperately, and in that instant a patrol passed and stopped him while he was still inside the car," he said.
Her companions tried to come to her aid and managed to stop the car with the help of the crew of a police patrol. Although her killer was arrested, 48 hours later he was released on the grounds that there was insufficient evidence to link him to the homicide process.
Paola's body was delivered to her friends on Sunday, before taking her to a funeral home.
A couple of hours later the remains of Paola arrived at the wake, there she spent the night between prayers and tears of her acquaintances. Her funeral was a luxury, the cost exceeded 25 thousand pesos for the ward, the coffee service, advice on paperwork, transfer, embalming, makeup and burial in the Civil Pantheon of San Lorenzo Tezonco in Iztapalapa.
"In order to pay for the funeral, girls from different areas cooperated: de la Merced, Sullivan, Insurgentes, Puente de Alvarado and even Tlalpan. You see a few here but there are many who supported with something, they can be whores ... but not culeras", explained Adriana Barrios Ruiz who had rented to Paola for more than a year a small room where she lived in the street of Doctor Enrique González Martínez and Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz in the Doctores colony.
The hostel Casa Hogar Paola Buenrostro was named in Paola's memory.
A space free of violence and discrimination is what the first hostel in Mexico represents for its founders for the LGBTTTI community : Casa Hogar Paola Buenrostro.
Kenya Cuevas, activist and founder of the civil organization Casa de las Muñecas Tiresias, named the shelter after her friend Paola, murdered on September 30, 2016. The site is located at Lázaro Cárdenas 59, La Casilda de the mayor Gustavo A. Madero.
Kenya explained that the fact that the shelter is named after a trans woman and sex worker is of great importance, because it means that everything that has been learned after her loss has been worthwhile.
Paola Buenrostro was murdered on September 30, 2016 and her case was the first transfemicide recognized in Mexico City, according to a CDHDF recommendation.
“She was my best friend and they took her away. That is why this space is like a pull of ears for all institutions, for society, because it will be named after a sex worker or, as they vulgarly tell you, that of a whore in the corner. But whatever they want, I'm sure it will give more results than other spaces,” she says.
In October 2021 the Paola Buenrostro Law was presented to formally recognise the crime of transfemicide.
The local deputy of Morena, Temístocles Villanueva, presented a package of bills to recognize the crime of transfeminicide as the Paola Buenrostro Law, in the Criminal Code of Mexico City, to impose penalties of 35 to 70 years in prison in the Mexican capital who commits the crime.
The package of initiatives presented on Tuesday in the Congress of Mexico City also includes the reform of the Civil Code, the Organic Law of the Prosecutor's Office and the Victims Law of CDMX. Included in the initiative are provisions to allow friends are allowed to claim a victim's body in cases where the family does not.
The bill adds Chapter VII to the Penal Code, section XIV Bis to article 3 of the Victims Law of Mexico City, section V to article 37 and sections XXIV, XXV, XXVI to article 65 of the Law. Organic of the Attorney General's Office (FGJ).
In April 2023 the office of the Attorney General publicly apologised to Paola's family and offered a reward for the arrest of Arturo Felipe Delgadillo Olvera:
The capital's Attorney General's Office (FGJ) offered a reward of half a million pesos as a reward for anyone who provides information that leads to the location and apprehension of Arturo Felipe Delgadillo Olvera, accused of the 2016 femicide of Paola Buenrostro, a transgender woman engaged in sex service in Buenavista area, Cuauhtémoc mayor's office.
The Mexico City Prosecutor's Office apologized in a public act for the performance of its members in the investigation of the murder of Paola Buenrostro, a transgender sex worker, in 2016.
On October 2 of that year, a Criminal Chamber of the Superior Court of Justice of Mexico City (TSJ) released the defendant, Arturo Felipe Delgadillo Olvera, a former military man and security guard. The magistrates stated that the Public Ministry did not provide sufficient evidence to support the accusation. Since then, Delgadillo Olvera has disappeared and the investigative police do not know his whereabouts.
For this, the head of the capital's Prosecutor's Office, Ernestina Godoy Ramos, offered a public apology, since the investigation was not carried out correctly.
In a public act, the official maintained that "those in charge of investigating Paola's trans femicide, public ministries, investigative police and expert personnel made omissions, errors and negligence that allowed the murderer to be released."
For this reason, prosecutor Godoy recognized the institutional responsibility and offered a public apology to the memory of Paola Buenrostro and her family.
In April 2024 a reward of half a million pesos was offered for reliable information leading to the location and capture of Olvera.
In July 2024 the Congress of Mexico City passed the "Paola Buenrostro Law” under which murders of trans people can carry a sentence of up to 70 years in prison.
MEXICO CITY - Murders of transgender people will carry prison sentences of up to 70 years in Mexico City under tough new penalties approved by local lawmakers on July 18.
The changes, which were promoted by the ruling Morena party, were passed by 45 votes to one, the capital’s legislature said on social media platform X.
The killing of transgender people because of their gender – known as transfemicide – is “an extreme manifestation of gender violence and discrimination”, lawmaker Ana Francis Lopez said.
Transgender people gathered outside the Mexico City legislature to celebrate the approval of the reforms, known as the “Paola Buenrostro law” in memory of a murdered transgender woman.
Mexico City is the second of the country’s 32 states to criminalise transfemicide.
TvT partner organisation Centro de Apoyo a las Identidades Trans & Processo, 04.09.2016
https://pulsoslp.com.mx/nacional/ya-puede-descansar-en-paz/1823977
https://elsubmarinojujuy.com.ar/ciudad-de-mexico-tipificara-el-transfemicidio-como-un-delito/
https://www.zocalo.com.mx/ofrecen-medio-millon-de-pesos-por-asesino-de-mujer-trans-en-cdmx/
https://ntrzacatecas.com/2021/10/06/buscan-tipificar-transfeminicidio-en-cdmx/
https://ddmbj.mx/index.php/ofrece-fgj-disculpa-publica-por-transfeminicidio-de-paola-buenrostro
https://www.sinembargo.mx/12-12-2020/3908795
https://www.homosensual.com/lgbt/trans/activistas-trans-cierran-periferico-con-ataud/
https://www.animalpolitico.com/2016/10/paola-trans-asesinada-trabajadora-sexual/
https://ulisex.com/la-vida-muerte-velorio-las-calles-paola-ledezma-obituario-transfeminicidio/
http://www.sinembargo.mx/06-10-2016/3101213
http://www.excelsior.com.mx/comunidad/2016/10/06/1120885
https://twitter.com/CentroTrans/status/782334849805787136
