Criminalisation threats against woman human rights defender Virginia Garay Cazares

On 2 June 2025, woman human rights defender Virginia Garay Cazares, who has been searching for her disappeared son since 2018, received an anonymous message threatening her with legal actions as a reprisal for her work as a member of a collective searching for disappeared persons in the State of Nayarit.

Virginia Garay Cazares is a searching mother and woman human rights defender from Nayarit, Mexico. She is the spokesperson and founder of the Guerreras en Busca de Nuestros Tesoros A.C. (Women Warriors in Search of Our Treasures) collective, a group of mostly mothers in search of their disappeared family members in the State of Nayarit. She is an honorary member of the Citizen Council of the Human Rights Defence Commission for the State of Nayarit and the Advisory Assembly of the Executive Commission of Integral Attention to Victims. She used to be a member of the National Citizens’ Council of the National Search System. Since the disappearance of her son Bryan Eduardo Arias Garay in February 2018, Virginia Garay Cazares has worked in the search of disappeared family members and in defence of justice, truth, and reparation in such cases.

On 2 June 2025, Virginia Garay Cazares received a message via Facebook Messenger from an anonymous person who claimed to work at the Prosecutor’s Office of a state outside of Nayarit. The message threatened her with fabricating charges against her that could result in a long-term prison sentence. This already happened to another member of the collective of searching family members, who is held in pretrial detention since 2021. The criminalisation of this member happened after the collective reported the involvement of state authorities in cases of enforced disappearance.

In early May 2025, armed individuals kidnapped the mother of the woman human rights defender Virginia Garay Cazares in Guadalajara and demanded to lead them to her daughter, who was already hiding due to previous threats. After telling them that she did not know her daughter’s whereabouts, they searched her phone and took her to the bank to empty her bank accounts. After several hours, the mother of the defender was eventually released.

Concerns have been raised about the potential involvement of state authorities in the case of Virginia Garay Cazares, a factor that would increase the risk the woman human rights defenders face as the state should be central in the protection of human rights defenders.

Front Line Defenders expresses its concern over the risk that Virginia Garay Cazares faces due to her work as a searching mother and human rights defender. Front Line Defenders previously reported on attacks, threats, and smear campaigns against collectives of searching mothers in Mexico, a situation that has lately deteriorated with an alarming increase of killings and disappearances of searching people.

Front Line Defenders urges the Mexican authorities to:

1. Take all necessary measures to guarantee the safety as well as the physical and mental health of human rights defender Virginia Garay Cazares and her family;

2. Carry out an immediate, exhaustive, and impartial investigation into the intimidating messages and harassment towards Virginia Garay Cazares and her family, in order to identify those responsible, bring them before a competent and impartial tribunal and apply the sanctions provided for by Mexican law. And for Meta to collaborate with the Mexican authorities, help identify the accounts, the defamatory and violent content in question, and provide all relevant information for the investigation;

3. Ensure that all human rights defenders in Mexico are able to conduct their legitimate human rights defence work in all circumstances without fear of retaliation and free from restrictions.