Argentines See Message in Death of Photographer

The killers staked out a party at the summer home of a postal magnate in a resort frequented by politicians and patrolled by an army of police and security guards.

The killers abducted Jose Luis Cabezas, a magazine photographer who was covering the party, as he left shortly before dawn. They shot the handcuffed victim in the head and torched the car and body. They left the blazing wreckage by a dirt road that the governor of Buenos Aires province, who hopes to be Argentina’s next president, uses to take his boat to the beach.

The slaying is believed by many here to be a murder with a message--common enough in Latin America but rare in Argentina, where the rate of violence is comparatively low.

And although five civilians have been arrested in the case, it is still widely suspected that corrupt police officers were involved.

The case has united Argentines in an outpouring of solidarity. Posters of the 35-year-old photographer cover walls across the capital, and soccer games and military ceremonies begin with photographers saluting their fallen colleague, cameras aloft.

On the one-month anniversary of the crime last week, much of the nation came to a stop. Marchers filled the streets in many cities for a minute of silence.

“Let us not forget Jose Luis Cabezas,” said Gabriel Michi, a co-worker at Noticias magazine, in a speech. “Because today we are all Jose Luis Cabezas.”

For many Argentines, the Cabezas slaying recalls the 1976-1983 dictatorship, when an estimated 30,000 were slain, including 93 journalists. The 14-year-old democracy has been convulsed by a seeming collision between the forces of the past and present: politically tinged gangsterism versus a watchdog press corps that has been leading an outcry against organized crime.

“This represents a breaking point in the democracy,” declared Gov. Eduardo Duhalde of Buenos Aires province. “What is at risk here is liberty.”

According to the theory most widely held by those who believe that corrupt police were involved in the slaying, Duhalde was the intended target of the message because the charred corpse was left near his villa. The governor is considered a favorite for the nomination of the ruling Justicialist Party and is expected to announce his presidential candidacy this year.

The outcome of the case could decide Duhalde’s political future. In one poll, 80% of the respondents said they would not vote for Duhalde if his province’s investigators do not solve the mystery.

The polls also suggest that the killing “is the drop that overflowed the glass,” pollster Jorge Giacobe said. “This is a moment in which people have lost faith in this justice system.”

The civilians arrested in the case reputedly have ties to prostitution and drug trafficking. Initial tests identified a .32-caliber pistol found in a suspect’s home as the murder weapon, authorities say. Eyewitnesses say they saw another suspect outside the party in Pinamar.

But the continuing hunt for a mastermind and a motive focuses on police officials, according to the chief investigator for the provincial police.

Investigators have targeted their own agency, a force of 48,000 officers. After the downsizing of the military, the province’s police became Argentina’s largest armed force, patrolling a Nevada-sized region of 12.6 million inhabitants.

As detailed in a Noticias expose last year, the force has been accused of being a rogue army. Duhalde has purged commanders charged in crimes ranging from drug trafficking to cattle rustling to an anti-Semitic bomb attack tied to international terrorism.

Those who suspect police involvement in the Cabezas case suggest that an alliance of police and gangsters engineered the slaying to retaliate against Noticias and send an intimidating political message, possibly to Duhalde.

Hours before the murder Jan. 25, neighbors testified, police failed to respond to calls about two suspicious vehicles outside the party. And investigators and commanders have been dismissed for sloppy work at the crime scene, alleged corruption and for floating the theory that Noticias editors arranged the murder to increase sales.

This deepens a cloud of uncertainty, said Hector D’Amico, the editor of Noticias. He has spent sleepless weeks leading staff coverage of the slaying, appearing on talk shows and meeting with community leaders.

He recounted incredulously how he provided information and drew diagrams for detectives who are now under investigation.

“Who are you supposed to trust?” D’Amico asked.