Law enforcement stated that they had categorized the fatalities as a detest criminal activity following the stays of two girls had been present in a severely burned vehicles a week ago.
A week after the systems of two transgender girls are found in a badly burned automobile in Puerto Rico, law enforcement mentioned Thursday which they had detained two people in connection with the killings together with turned them to the F.B.I.
The guys, Juan Carlos Pagan Bonilla, 21, and Sean Diaz de Leon, 19, happened to be used into custody on Wednesday but have not come billed, per Capt. Teddy Morales, the principle of unlawful research for all the authorities in Humacao, on Puerto Rico’s east coast, where women’s remains happened to be available on April 22.
He stated the F.B.I. have taken over the fact and was actually investigating Mr. Pagan Bonilla and Mr. Diaz de Leon for feasible civil-rights violations.
“We were classifying it as a hate crime simply because they had been socializing aided by the subjects, and once they learned these people were transgender girls, they decided to eliminate them,” master Morales stated on Thursday.
The police said these people were looking forward to autopsy results to figure out how the ladies were killed. Activists have recognized the ladies as Layla Pelaez, 21, and Serena Angelique Velazquez, 32, two pals exactly who lived in nyc. Their particular keeps had been receive after individuals labeled as 911 to report a burned automobile under a bridge on a desolate highway in Humacao, prior to 5 a.m. on April 22, master Morales mentioned.
Mr. Pagan Bonilla and Mr. Diaz de Leon was in fact socializing with Ms. Velazquez and Ms. Pelaez throughout the nights before they were murdered and happened to be taped on a single on the women’s social media marketing account, master Morales stated.
He said law enforcement have furthermore fastened Mr. Pagan Bonilla and Mr. Diaz de Leon with the killings through surveillance camera video footage and “scientific evidence,” that he decreased to detail. Mr. Pagan Bonilla admitted to participating in the killings, and Mr. Diaz de Leon transformed themselves in, he mentioned.
Limary Cruz-Rubio, a spokeswoman when it comes down to F.B.I.’s San Juan industry office, dropped to talk about the arrests but mentioned the bureau consistently collaborates with neighborhood, condition and national agencies.
“The agency is and can be into criminal make which could drop within federal legislation,” she said. “However, all of our policy is we do not confirm or reject the presence of research, to safeguard the ethics of any possible investigative efforts.”
Mr. Pagan Küçük insanlar buluЕџma siteleri Bonilla and Mr. Diaz de Leon would never straight away end up being hit for touch upon Thursday night, also it wasn’t immediately clear as long as they have lawyers.
In the event the guys are charged, it could represent a flipping part of the handling of criminal activities against L.G.B.T.Q. folks in Puerto Rico, with a disturbing history of assault against homosexual and transgender folk, activists stated.
Ms. Velazquez and Ms. Pelaez comprise the third and next transgender men and women murdered in Puerto Rico in the past two months, activists stated. These people were also believed to be the seventh and 8th transgender or gender-nonconforming visitors to have been murdered in the United States this present year, based on the peoples liberties strategy.
Prior to now 15 period, 10 L.G.B.T.Q. folks have come killed in Puerto Rico, based on Pedro Julio Serrano, a gay legal rights activist. Just about three of the deaths continue to be unresolved, he mentioned.
“These arrests are a step from inside the correct path, however these murders have to be prosecuted as dislike criminal activities,” Mr. Serrano mentioned. “We craving the government to complete the investigations from inside the different seven murders of L.G.B.T.Q. anyone about area and serve justice for all ones.”
Ms. Velazquez stayed in Queens and Ms. Pelaez for the Bronx. Both have lately traveled to Puerto Rico, plus they happened to be intending to travel back to New York later on this period, according to family relations and activists.
Luz Melendez, 29, Ms. Pelaez’s cousin, said Mr. Pagan Bonilla and Mr. Diaz de Leon were detained after a local broadcast place posted artwork of these on Twitter and people begun to phone the section to recognize all of them.
“We are awesome appreciative associated with the services that authorities as well as the area devote to get just who did this,” she stated on Thursday.
She mentioned the images originated in two films that Ms. Pelaez got uploaded on her Snapchat and myspace profile, which revealed the lady and Ms. Velazquez socializing with Mr. Pagan Bonilla and Mr. Diaz de Leon.
“I watched the movies, and it seemed like they were hanging out along as pals,” she said. “It felt typical. There was audio playing inside credentials. People appeared okay.”
She said the police got informed her group merely your men happened to be in federal custody.
The killings came four weeks after Yampi Mendez Arocho, a 19-year-old transgender guy, got murdered in Moca, P.R., according to the peoples legal rights strategy.
In February, Alexa Negron Luciano, a famous figure on Puerto Rico social media who was simply transgender and homeless, had been shot to passing after a McDonald’s buyer reported that Ms. Negron got spied on her behalf within the women’s space.
Ms. Negron’s final minutes — framed for the headlights of an automible amid a cackle of fun — are published on social media marketing, a fact that activists mentioned underscored the impunity homophobic assailants feel when committing these criminal activities.