In March 2012 a missing-child report from Nacozari de García, a copper-mining town in the Mexican state of Sonora, led state investigators to the home of Silvia Meraz Moreno, a 44-year-old woman who lived with her extended family on the edge of town. Within weeks Sonora prosecutors announced that Meraz and seven others had been detained over three deaths: a 55-year-old woman who had disappeared in 2009 and two 10-year-old boys who had disappeared in 2010 and 2012. Prosecutors described Meraz as the leader of the group and said the killings had been offerings to Santa Muerte, a skeletal folk saint.
The deaths were separate events, more than two years apart from first to last. The Sonora prosecutor's spokesman, José Larrinaga, said the first victim was apparently killed in 2009, the second in 2010 and the third in March 2012. The outcome of the case against her was not reported.
Nacozari de García is a copper-mining town on the edge of the Sierra Madre in northeastern Sonora, about 110 kilometers (70 miles) south of Douglas, Arizona, and about 250 kilometers north of the state capital, Hermosillo. The Associated Press put its population at about 11,500 in 2012.
The town's police chief, José Miguel Espinoza, told the AP that Nacozari had largely escaped the cartel violence then affecting other parts of the border region. "It was a peaceful town," he said. "We'd never seen such violence."
Meraz lived with members of her extended family in a poor neighborhood on the outskirts of Nacozari. The Associated Press described the family as poor and living in shacks, and reported that local people had taken pity on them: the government and the church had helped them with free food, used clothing and farm animals.
Her partner at the time was E. S., whom the AP described as her boyfriend. Those detained with Meraz in March 2012 were her boyfriend, her father, her son, three of her daughters and a daughter-in-law, according to Larrinaga. The youngest of the eight was a girl of 15.
Meraz herself, speaking to reporters after her arrest, said she had believed in Santa Muerte for more than two years. Prosecutors described the household as fanatical devotees of the saint who believed that she would reveal where money was hidden and that offering blood would protect them for a time. A neighbor, a 54-year-old hotel owner whose cornfield bordered the house of the woman believed to lead the group, told the AP that people in the area had not known of any such devotion. "We never knew they were part of a Santa Muerte cult," he said.
Her date and place of birth, her schooling and her life before 2009 have not been reported.
The first of the three was Cleotilde Romero Pacheco. The AP described her as 55 years old and a close friend of Meraz. She disappeared in 2009; the Spanish news agency EFE, citing the state prosecutor's office, dated her death to December 2009.
Little else about her life was reported. Her death came to light only after the arrests of March 2012, when members of the household led agents to her grave, the AP reported.
Martín Ríos Chaparro was 10 years old. He went missing in July 2010, and EFE gave July 2010 as the month of his death.
According to the AP, Martín was the son of a former girlfriend of E. S. He and the other boy both often visited the Meraz home. When he went missing, his mother and her boyfriend told police that acquaintances had seen him in Agua Prieta, the Mexican border city across from Douglas, Arizona, and that they would go and look for him. Espinoza told the AP that police had no reason at the time to suspect a homicide.
The boy remained a missing child for almost two years. His remains were identified only after the arrests in 2012, when family members led agents to them.
Jesús Octavio Martínez Yáñez was also 10. The AP described him as the step-grandson of Silvia Meraz. He was reported missing on March 6, 2012, by his stepfather, according to AP and Al Jazeera reports, and EFE dated his death to March 2012.
His disappearance started the investigation, which led state agents within weeks to the household where he had often spent time.
After Jesús Octavio was reported missing, Sonora's state missing-persons unit sent agents to Nacozari. Weeks later, the AP reported, state investigators learned that the two missing boys, the one from 2010 and the one from 2012, had acquaintances in common, and both had often visited Meraz's home.
According to Espinoza, local police had earlier kept watch on the Meraz house over other suspicions, but had not gathered enough evidence to make arrests. The religion scholar Joseph Laycock, summarizing the reports in April 2012, wrote that authorities searched the house on March 28.
That day, a Wednesday, agents found the body of Jesús Octavio. Members of the family were detained, and they in turn led agents to what investigators believed were the remains of Martín Ríos and to the grave of Cleotilde Romero, the AP reported. EFE quoted Larrinaga as saying that relatives contradicted one another under questioning and then admitted the boy's killing; asked about the boy who had disappeared earlier, and about the woman, they admitted those killings too. Investigators said they were still working to establish whether anyone else had taken part and whether there were other victims. Expansión reported that no further remains were found and that investigators believed the three were the only victims.
Sonora state authorities announced the arrests of eight people on March 30, 2012. Larrinaga identified Meraz as the leader of the group. EFE reported that she was accused of persuading the others to carry out the killings, and of taking part directly in two of them with her partner. Agence France-Presse reported that prosecutors named her son as having carried out the killings; the AP named him as one of those detained.
On March 30, police brought the detainees before journalists at the prosecutor's offices in Hermosillo, a common practice in Mexico, and the reporters questioned them. Meraz told them that the group had agreed among themselves to do it, AFP and Al Jazeera reported. She said she had believed in Santa Muerte for more than two years and that the saint "was going to offer us money." Asked whether she had received anything, she swore, her voice breaking, and said the saint could give nothing, according to the AP.
Expansión reported that E. S. said that until his arrest he had not known that one of the dead boys was his adopted son, a claim at odds with the AP's account of the boy's parentage.
Larrinaga told the AP that the suspects had believed that offering blood to the saint would protect them for some time, and that they all described themselves as fanatical followers of Santa Muerte. EFE reported that, according to the prosecutor's office, the deaths were offerings made in exchange for money, health and protection.
State police called the group a satanic sect, Laycock noted, a label he and other writers on Santa Muerte devotion soon challenged.
The governor of Sonora, Guillermo Padrés Elías, said the state would not allow such practices, and he urged residents to report unusual religious activity, Expansión reported.
The case drew attention well beyond Mexico. The AP, AFP, EFE and Al Jazeera all carried the arrests, and the AP noted that there had been no confirmed earlier case of human sacrifice to Santa Muerte in Mexico. The AP's first report recalled the killings committed in 1989 near Matamoros, Tamaulipas, by a drug-smuggling group whose victims included Mark Kilroy, a 21-year-old University of Texas student, while noting that those killings had no connection to Santa Muerte.
Santa Muerte, usually shown as a robed skeleton, is a folk figure whose veneration mixes Catholic and pre-Hispanic elements, EFE explained in its reports on the case. The Catholic Church does not recognize her and has condemned the devotion; in 2014 Al Jazeera reported that the church called it a satanic cult while millions of people, drug traffickers among them, sought her protection.
R. Andrew Chesnut, a scholar of Catholic studies at Virginia Commonwealth University and the author of a book on Santa Muerte, told the AP in 2012 that Mexico had seen only unconfirmed reports of such sacrifices in recent years. He said most devotees would regard killing as a satanic aberration of their faith, while some practitioners, working without any clergy to guide them, took up extreme rites.
Joseph Laycock, an assistant professor of religious studies at Texas State University, argued in Religion Dispatches in April 2012 that the reporting merged an isolated crime with a large and varied religious movement. He noted that the family had no apparent ties to drug cartels, that everyone implicated came from the same household, and that Meraz described a devotion of about two years that did not rest on any wider tradition. Devotees of Santa Muerte were not Satanists, he wrote, and many considered themselves Catholic. Searching the case for a wider pattern, he argued, would not prevent crime and risked the persecution of innocent believers.
Meraz was arrested and accused, with seven others, in March 2012. Whether she was tried, what verdict was reached and what sentence, if any, she received were not reported, and the killings remain allegations against her.
Early reports differed on several points. One early AP report named a 48-year-old man as the group's alleged leader alongside Meraz; later AP reports listing those detained did not include him, and prosecutors described Meraz as the leader.
The age of Cleotilde Romero was given as 55 by the AP and AFP and as 44 in an EFE report, the same age reported for Meraz. An early EFE report put the age of the missing boy at seven; later reports agreed that both boys were 10.
The AP described Martín Ríos as the son of a former girlfriend of E. S., while Expansión reported E. S. as saying that one of the dead boys was his adopted son. The AP described Jesús Octavio as Meraz's step-grandson.
The ages of those detained were reported differently: the AP gave a range from a 15-year-old girl to a 44-year-old woman, while EFE gave the six detainees other than Meraz and the minor as aged 20 to 83.
2009: Cleotilde Romero Pacheco, 55, a close friend of Meraz, disappears at Nacozari de García; EFE later dates her death to December 2009.
July 2010: Martín Ríos Chaparro, 10, goes missing; his mother and her boyfriend tell police he was seen in Agua Prieta. Police see no sign of a homicide.
March 6, 2012: Jesús Octavio Martínez Yáñez, 10, Meraz's step-grandson, is reported missing; Sonora's missing-persons unit sends agents to Nacozari.
March 2012: investigators learn that the two missing boys had acquaintances in common and both visited the Meraz home.
March 28, 2012: agents search the house and find the body of Jesús Octavio; family members are detained and lead agents to the other two graves.
March 30, 2012: Sonora prosecutors announce eight arrests and show the detainees to the press in Hermosillo; Meraz is described as the group's leader.
April 1, 2012: the AP reports from Nacozari on the family and the investigation.
April 12, 2012: Joseph Laycock's analysis of the coverage appears in Religion Dispatches.