The murder of acclaimed Mexican journalist Regina Martinez in 2012 was a heinous act: Martinez was violently crushed in her home before being murdered.
Martinez worked as an investigative journalist. However, the circumstances surrounding her death were incredibly upsetting. In Mexico alone, ten journalists had been murdered in 2010, and Martinez was the fifth journalist to be murdered in the state of Veracruz since Javier Duarte became governor in 2011.
(Duarte is currently serving time in prison for stealing billions of dollars) The investigation into the death of the journalist that was conducted by the federal authorities was a fraud; it was built on propaganda and false arrests.
The vast majority of people are not aware of catastrophes such as this one. Or, if they learned about this incident once more at that time, they thought it was just another instance of violence committed by drug cartels. The purpose of the latest book by Katherine Corcoran, titled “Within the Mouth of the Wolf,” is to unearth the truth about the assassination of Martinez while also highlighting the broader consequences for civil society, and not just in Mexico.
In 2012, Corcoran served as the regional bureau head for Related Press, with his primary base of operations located in Mexico City. She had just a brief interaction with Martinez. Still, she was familiar with her work. She realized that the murder of a journalist of Martinez’s national prominence was a step too far even for Mexico — even for Veracruz under Duarte. Katherine Corcoran was spotted in the Mexican city of Las Colonias.
She said that this is precisely how the system works in Mexico and that we should read her e-book not only as an investigation of a corrupt land outside our borders but also as a sign of what’s to come in our own country: “We’ve always thought that none of these things could happen in our system, but I needed to show that the erosion has already begun.”
Corcoran worked hard to find evidence to determine who was responsible for the murder. She talks to journalists, family members, and others to discover the stories Martinez was telling and who might have felt threatened. She also looked into everyone who had anything to do with the case.
Corcoran almost quit often because so many people wouldn’t help her, leaving her at many dead ends and worried about the safety of those who did help, especially Martinez’s nephew and the journalists who had worked with her. Only two people took Corcoran up on her offer to change their names. “I wanted to show how brave these people are to tell this story despite the risks,” she said.
But the book also tries bringing Martinez, her friends, mentees, and her enemies to life. It paints a picture of a culture where official autocracy is just a memory, and brave journalists fight — often at significant personal risk — for immediate change or at least some accountability. By the end of the book, Corcoran has narrowed her search to a single suspect, but that was not her primary concern.
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“I found enough for an angle for the police to look into,” she said of her main suspect. He still has power in Veracruz, and the federal government doesn’t seem interested in going after him. “However, you have no idea. Politics is always changing, so it’s good to put this out there. But the rest of the story is just as important, if not more so, than the whodunit. I wanted to explain why.”
Regina Martinez was a well-known journalist in Mexico who wrote for the Proceso journal. In her new e-book, “Within the Mouth of the Wolf,” Katherine Corcoran looks into her murder.
Corcoran said, “Mexico has a prison system that is usually run by the narcos, but most of the time, it’s just the people in charge running their prison businesses.” “I wanted to explain to everyone what was going on. When journalists are attacked outside of war zones, it’s usually because they’re exposing illegal actions by the government. These governments prey on their people, which is why they want peace.
Even though the book is done, Corcoran is still committed to holding those in power in Mexico and elsewhere accountable. She said, “I’m not going to drop the subject because it’s important, and I see similarities between what’s happening in Mexico and the US.”
A Mexican journalist helps Corcoran run a program where editors learn how to do investigative reporting. She says it’s crucial because Mexico seems to be going backward. Before multi-party elections, the country was run by one party for seven years. She says that free elections without institutional reform open the door for autocracy to return.
Journalists have helped make this happen. Corcoran’s book shows how widespread corruption in the press has been. Some reporters were just bought off, while others stayed quiet because they feared for their lives. Violence kept happening because it worked: “One reason so many journalists were killed was that the press’s response was to shut down and stop talking, which is what they wanted.”
At least, Corcoran thinks this has started to change: “The quality of journalism is getting better, and there is a big increase in the solidarity among journalists.”
She hopes her book will also shed some light on things closer to home. Corcoran said, “We need to help the general public understand what we do.” “Journalists are the ones who find out about things like contaminated water supplies or how to vote, which helps people live their lives. “Independently reported information is important to the freedom of society.” Corcoran thinks this is a truth that can’t be changed and doesn’t care where it is.
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