After the death of Ukrainian women in Mexico, American tourists warn of the danger of rest
'17.12.2018'
Source: New York Post
27-year-old Tatiana Mirutenko, a native of Chicago and a daughter of Ukrainian immigrants, arrived in Mexico City for a honeymoon. A few seconds after leaving the bar in a prestigious area of the city, a young woman was killed by a stray bullet fired by two men who rushed past on a motorcycle.
Tatiana, her husband and a group of friends went to the metropolis with a population of a million people in 21 to celebrate the postponed honeymoon and the first wedding anniversary in July of this year, says New York Post.
They ate in Pujol and Quintonil, the restaurants with the highest ratings in the world, happy Tatiana sent parents pictures of food, ornate churches and even dogs from a local park in Lomas de Chapultepec, a privileged part of the city where billionaires own mansions.
“She really liked this culture, these people,” said Tatiana's father Vasil Mirutenko, who owns a security company in Chicago.
His family has been vacationing in Mexico - in Puerto Vallarta and Oaxaca - since Tatiana was a little girl. But this time, Tatiana, a slender blonde who worked for a pharmaceutical company in San Francisco, returned home in a plastic bag - her death was one of the xnumx murders recorded in the country in the first seven months of this year, according to statistics compiled by Mexican law enforcement.
2018 has every chance of becoming one of the most brutal in the history of the country. Homicide rates rose 16% in the first half of this year - a number that has grown at an alarming rate over the past two years, as fragmented drug trafficking groups and gangs vied for leadership.
Have Tatiana's killers been caught?
"I don't care," my father told reporters, swallowing tears. "Whatever happens, it won't bring her back."
In Acapulco, once a charming Mexican resort town where newlyweds John F. Kennedy and Jackie Kennedy frolicked in the surf on their honeymoon, tourists cautiously walked around two corpses on their way to the beach. On a sunny October day, two men were killed in a shootout - and although the tourists hid during the shooting, many returned to the beach minutes later.
Months earlier, in April, shocked beach-goers at the nearby Kaletilla Beach stumbled upon a bullet-riddled fisherman’s body, cast ashore. Police said he was killed because of drugs.
Acapulco has long been known as the Mexican capital of murder. Last year, the Pacific city had 953 murders, compared to 2016 in 918. By comparison, New York, with a population of 8,6 million, had 2017 murders in 290.
Violent crime is so out of control in the state of Guerrero, where Acapulco is located, that last year the US State Department warned Americans to stay away from this region. Guerrero and several other Mexican states have the same “Do not travel” 4-level recommendation, like Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq.
“Armed groups operate in many areas of Guerrero,” the warning says. "Members of these groups often control checkpoints and may use violence against travelers."
Despite these warnings, visitors continue to arrive. More than 35 million people visited Mexico last year, up 9% from the year before. In October 2018, 688 visitors from the United States came to the country, in October 000 - 2017.
In Acapulco, the local government last year set up a Tourist Assistance and Protection Center - known by its Spanish acronym CAPTA - where foreign tourists can report incidents and seek help if they become victims of crime.
“Over the past 10 years, tens of millions of Americans have visited Quintana Roo, and the vast majority of them are not involved in any incident ... They have a great time and come back again and again,” says Dario Flota Ocampo, general director of the tourism office in Quintana- Roo, the state where Cancun is located.
Quintana Roo officials doubled security measures after five people were killed at an electronic music festival in Playa del Carmen in January 2017. Two Canadians, an Italian and a Colombian, were killed at the Blue Parrot nightclub. Tourists were victims of stray bullets during a shootout among visitors to a nightclub.
People are not only afraid of bullets. Abby Conner, a 20-year-old student at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, drowned in a shallow pool at the Iberostar Paraiso del Mar Hotel in Playa del Carmen in November 2017 after drinking tequila at the luxury all inclusive resort with her older brother Austin. Both fainted in the pool, but Austin survived, waking up the next day in a hospital ward with a big bump on his forehead and absolutely not remembering what happened.
“People really need to be careful and have some idea of where they are going,” said Chris Hagon, a former London police officer and founder of a Florida company that helps clients travel safely. "They must have some kind of mechanism for getting help when they need it."
Even the most sophisticated tourists who have traveled to Mexico dozens of times have recently found themselves in a terrifying situation in a country where police are often so corrupt that tourists are not actively advised to seek help from the police if they are victims of a crime.
In July, an 41-year-old mother from Astoria, Queens, flew to Cancun with her Mexican husband and two young children and almost became a party to drug traffic. After leaving the expensive resort complex in Cancún, she discovered that someone had put two packets of white powder in her backpack. She discovered what she considered cocaine when she arrived at Airbnb in the capital of Mexico and opened her backpack. Her husband had already returned to work in the United States.
“It was scary, I was with children, I had to lock myself in the apartment. I was worried that a drug dealer might burst in with a weapon to take what was his, ”the woman said.
She did not dare to call the authorities, having heard that the police in the country were corrupt. The victim called her husband and the US security company - they advised them to leave the backpack and fly out of the country on the first flight, which she did. A few days later, my husband returned to check out, and the backpack was gone. The family did not understand what happened.
Despite the incident, she said she plans to rest in Mexico again.
