Mother wants U.S. military to allow justice for girl's rape (Colombia)

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Miami Herald

Posted on Saturday, 09.05.09
Mother wants U.S. military to allow justice for girl's rape

The alleged rape of a girl at the hands of a U.S. officer on a Colombian military base has rekindled the anger and frustration of her mother, who also was raped 12 years ago and faces major hurdles in her quest for justice.

BY GONZALO GUILLEN AND GERARDO REYES
El Nuevo Herald

Olga Lucía Castillo could never bring to justice the men who raped her in Bogotá when she was pregnant with her daughter. Twelve years later, she is putting up the fight of her life to have a U.S. Army officer and a Mexican-born contractor indicted because, according to her, they raped her daughter at the military base in Melgar.

The older of her two daughters was sexually abused at a military base in this city, 62 miles from Bogotá, in August 2007, according to a criminal charge filed by Castillo at the Colombian prosecutor's office.

The suspects are U.S. Army sergeant Michael Coen and Mexican-born contractor César Ruiz, whose arrest was ordered by prosecutors following testimonies. There is no forensic evidence to implicate them, and after both suspects were taken out of the country under diplomatic immunity, the investigation could not move forward.

`I WILL NOT STOP'

Castillo is outraged and does not want the crime to go unpunished this time, as it happened in her case. She remembered bitterly that her husband had left her at the time, arguing that she had let the men rape her.



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