Key Figure in Colosio Killing Freed

A Mexican judge Sunday freed a key figure in the alleged plot to assassinate ruling party presidential candidate Luis Donaldo Colosio, but ruled that two other suspects should be held without bail.

The release of Rodolfo Rivapalacio brings to four the total number of men held for trial in connection with the March 23 killing of Colosio, who was shot after a campaign rally in a Tijuana neighborhood.

One other suspect is still being sought, and another has been questioned but not arrested. Three of those being held were members of the crowd-control forces for the rally, a group that is distinct from the security--similar to the U.S. Secret Service--that guards the candidate.

The fourth, Mario Aburto Martinez, the 23-year-old factory worker believed to have pulled the trigger, is now being tried.

Aburto has confessed to the killing, focusing most of the attention in the investigation on the possibility of a conspiracy and the question of who might have masterminded the assassination.

Judge Alejandro Sosa’s ruling that special investigator Miguel Montes Garcia had not provided sufficient proof of Rivapalacio’s involvement to justify trying him as an accessory to murder provided another twist in efforts to unravel the supposed plot.

As the person in charge of crowd control for the rally, Rivapalacio had been considered a key link tying the alleged conspirators to the local organization of Colosio’s own Institutional Revolutionary Party.

Because the party, known as the PRI, has not lost a presidential election since its founding 65 years ago, Colosio was assured of becoming Mexico’s next president.

However, deep rifts within the PRI were evident even before Colosio’s murder. Surveys show that about one-third of Mexicans believe that factions within the PRI were responsible for the candidate’s death.

For that reason, Rivapalacio’s arrest--and the judge’s decision to free him--were critical to the investigation. He is an important figure in the Baja California PRI organization and formerly the head of burglary investigations for the judicial police in that state.

A former bodyguard for Margarita Ortega, the first PRI gubernatorial candidate to lose an election, Rivapalacio was one of several former officers linked to the PRI who organized the 45-member crowd-control team.

Rivapalacio was accused of recruiting for the crowd-control forces the three men accused as accessories to murder, altering the name of one and adding the name of another in handwriting in the left-hand margin of the recruitment rolls.

The special investigator is free to arrest Rivapalacio again on the basis of new evidence. The statement indicated that Montes also plans to appeal the judge’s decision.

Sosa did find that there is sufficient evidence to try Vicente Mayoral Valenzuela and his son, Rodolfo, as accessories to murder.

However, he found that there is no reason to believe that Colosio was the victim of an ongoing organized crime ring, as the special prosecutor had alleged.

Vicente Mayoral, 47, is believed to have opened a path through the crowd, allowing Aburto to move toward Colosio.

Rodolfo Mayoral is accused of pushing a key member of Colosio’s security forces, thus diminishing his effectiveness. The younger Mayoral was seen talking before the rally with Aburto and a fourth suspect, Tranquilino Sanchez Venegas.