Nearly 90,000 Mexicans have vanished in the nation's war on its ruthless drug cartels. It's fallen to families to pick up a shovel and dig f

Trackers of El Fuerte: The mothers digging for Mexico's disappeared

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2021-07-22 05:30:04

Nearly 90,000 Mexicans have vanished in the nation's war on its ruthless drug cartels. It's fallen to families to pick up a shovel and dig for their dead.

Mirna Quiñones was having a beer and seafood with a good friend on a sunny afternoon the day her life would change forever. In the coastal Mexican city of Los Mochis, she was reminiscing about her 21-year-old son, Roberto Corrales Medina. Mirna had married young at 14-years-old and struggled for nine years to fall pregnant.

"We were talking a lot about Roberto," Mirna says, "the amount of love I had for him, how I thanked God for having such a wonderful child. And while I was talking about that, someone was planning to take his life."

Roberto was selling CDs outside a petrol station in Los Mochis when he was abducted. "The last time I saw my son was on July 10, 2014. He said a proper goodbye to me. I remember he hugged me; he gave me his blessing."

When Roberto didn't come home, Mirna filed a missing-persons report, but the authorities and police were indifferent and refused to help. So she went home, grabbed a shovel and a pickaxe, drove to the fields on the outskirts of town and started digging in the dirt for Roberto. She made a promise to herself: "Te buscaré hasta encontrarte" — I will search for you until I find you.