/ Modified feb 12, 2020 10:38 a.m.

Commission head hopes to bring peace to families of missing people in Sonora

The commission aims to aid groups searching for missing loved ones and to ensure identification of remains.

buscadoras-desaparecidos VIEW LARGER Mothers and other family members of missing loved ones march through downtown Hermosillo on Mexico's Mother's Day, 2019, including some from Guerreras Buscadoras de Sonora.
Murphy Woodhouse/Fronteras Desk

Last fall, the Sonoran Congress approved the creation of a commission to oversee searching for the state’s many missing people. Dr. Jose Luis Gonzalez Olivarria, its new head, is a longtime forensic investigator with the state attorney’s office and has years of experience identifying human remains.

Among his priorities for the new commission is to aid groups searching for missing loved ones, and ensure high-quality identification of remains when they are found.

“My desire is to achieve those objectives, which in the end will bring peace to society,” he said.

Data released by the National Searching Commission earlier this year show that the state has over 2,000 missing or disappeared people. Ninety clandestine graves with more than 140 bodies were found in the state in 2019, which were the fourth-highest figures nationwide.

Fronteras Desk
Fronteras Desk is a KJZZ project covering important stories in an expanse stretching from Northern Arizona deep into northwestern Mexico.
By posting comments, you agree to our
AZPM encourages comments, but comments that contain profanity, unrelated information, threats, libel, defamatory statements, obscenities, pornography or that violate the law are not allowed. Comments that promote commercial products or services are not allowed. Comments in violation of this policy will be removed. Continued posting of comments that violate this policy will result in the commenter being banned from the site.

By submitting your comments, you hereby give AZPM the right to post your comments and potentially use them in any other form of media operated by this institution.
AZPM is a service of the University of Arizona and our broadcast stations are licensed to the Arizona Board of Regents who hold the trademarks for Arizona Public Media and AZPM. We respectfully acknowledge the University of Arizona is on the land and territories of Indigenous peoples.
The University of Arizona