Law enforcement stated that they had categorized the fatalities as being a hate criminal activity following the keeps of two females had been present in a badly burned car the other day.
Per week following the systems of two transgender females had been present in a defectively burned automobile in Puerto Rico, law enforcement stated Thursday which they had arrested two males in connection with the killings and had turned them up to the F.B.I.
The guys, Juan Carlos Pagan Bonilla, 21, and Sean Diaz de Leon, 19, were taken into custody on but have not been charged, according to Capt wednesday. Teddy Morales, the main of unlawful investigations for law enforcement in Humacao, on Puerto Rico’s eastern coastline, in which the women’s stays were entirely on April 22.
He stated the F.B.I. had bought out the actual situation and had been investigating Mr. Pagan Bonilla and Mr. Diaz de Leon for feasible civil legal rights violations.
“We are classifying it as a hate criminal activity out they were transgender women, they decided to kill them,” Captain Morales said on Thursday because they were socializing with the victims, and once they found.
The authorities said these were waiting around for autopsy leads to decide how the ladies have been killed. Activists have actually identified the ladies as Layla Pelaez, 21, and Serena Angelique Velazquez, 32, two buddies whom lived in new york. Their keeps had been discovered after a person called 911 to report a burned automobile under a connection on a desolate road in Humacao, right before 5 a.m. on April 22, Captain Morales stated.
Mr. Pagan Bonilla and Mr. Diaz de Leon was indeed socializing with Ms. Velazquez and Ms. Pelaez regarding the evening before these people were killed and had been recorded using one associated with women’s social networking reports, Captain Morales said.
He stated the authorities had additionally tied up Mr. Pagan Bonilla and Mr. Diaz de Leon to your killings through protection digital camera footage and “scientific proof,” which he declined to detail. Mr. Pagan Bonilla confessed to taking part in the killings, and Mr. Diaz de Leon switched himself in, he stated.
Limary Cruz-Rubio, a spokeswoman for the F.B.I.’s San Juan industry workplace, declined to talk about the arrests but stated the bureau regularly collaborates with neighborhood, state and agencies that are federal.
“The Bureau is and certainly will often be thinking about criminal conduct which could fall within federal jurisdiction,” she stated. “However, our policy is we try not to verify or reject the presence of investigations, to safeguard the integrity of any feasible investigative effort.”
https://besthookupwebsites.net/escort/
Mr. Pagan Bonilla and Mr. Diaz de Leon could maybe perhaps not instantly be reached for touch upon night, and it was not immediately clear if they had lawyers thursday.
In the event that guys are charged, it might express a switching point in the control of crimes against L.G.B.T.Q. individuals in Puerto Rico, that has a history that is disturbing of against gay and transgender people, activists stated.
Ms. Velazquez and Ms. Pelaez had been the next and transgender that is fourth killed in Puerto Rico within the last few 2 months, activists stated. These people were additionally considered to be the 7th and transgender that is eighth gender-nonconforming visitors to were killed in america this season, based on the Human Rights Campaign.
Into the previous 15 months, 10 L.G.B.T.Q. folks have been killed in Puerto Rico, based on Pedro Julio Serrano, a homosexual liberties activist. All but three associated with fatalities stay unsolved, he stated.
“These arrests are one step within the right direction, however these murders need to be prosecuted as hate crimes,” Mr. Serrano stated. “We desire the federal government in order to complete the investigations within the other seven murders of L.G.B.T.Q. people regarding the area and serve justice for several of these.”
Ms. Velazquez lived in Queens and Ms. Pelaez when you look at the Bronx. Both had recently traveled to Puerto Rico, and additionally they were about to travel back again to nyc later on this according to family members and activists month.
Luz Melendez, 29, Ms. Pelaez’s relative, stated Mr. Pagan Bonilla and Mr. Diaz de Leon had been arrested after a neighborhood radio place posted pictures of these on Facebook and individuals started to phone the section to recognize them.
“We are super appreciative of this work that the officials as well as the community place in to locate whom did this,” she said on Thursday.
She stated the images originated in two videos that Ms. Pelaez had published on her behalf facebook and snapchat reports, which revealed her and Ms. Velazquez socializing with Mr. Pagan Bonilla and Mr. Diaz de Leon.
“I saw the videos, and it also seemed she said like they were spending time together as friends. “It seemed normal. There is music playing into the back ground. Everybody seemed fine.”
The police was said by her had shared with her family members only that the guys had been in federal custody.
The killings arrived 30 days after Yampi Mendez Arocho, a 19-year-old transgender guy, ended up being killed in Moca, P.R., based on the Human Rights Campaign.
A well-known figure on Puerto Rico social media who was transgender and homeless, was shot to death after a McDonald’s customer complained that Ms. Negron had spied on her in the women’s room in February, Alexa Negron Luciano.
Ms. Negron’s last moments — framed when you look at the headlights of a motor vehicle amid a cackle of laughter — were published on social media marketing, an undeniable fact that activists stated underscored the impunity homophobic attackers feel when committing such crimes.