Law enforcement mentioned that they had categorized the deaths as a hate crime following the stays of two women were present in a defectively burned auto the other day.
Each week after the systems of two transgender girls were present a badly burned automobile in Puerto Rico, the police mentioned Thursday which they had arrested two boys regarding the the killings together with turned all of them to the F.B.I.
The guys, Juan Carlos Pagan Bonilla, 21, and Sean Diaz de Leon, 19, comprise taken into custody on Wednesday but I have maybe not started energized, based on Capt. Teddy Morales, the principle of violent investigations for the police in Humacao, on Puerto Ricos east coastline, where womens stays happened to be entirely on April 22.
The guy stated the F.B.I. had bought out the outcome and got exploring Mr. Pagan Bonilla and Mr. Diaz de Leon for possible civil-rights violations.
We are classifying it a dislike criminal activity simply because they happened to be socializing utilizing the victims, and when they realized these were transgender female, they made a decision to eliminate them, chief Morales mentioned on Thursday.
The authorities stated these were waiting around for autopsy results to figure out how the ladies have been slain. Activists have actually recognized the women as Layla Pelaez, 21, and Serena Angelique Velazquez, 32, two buddies exactly who stayed in New York City. Their stays were discover after one known as 911 to submit a burned vehicles under a bridge on a desolate path in Humacao, prior to 5 a.m. on April 22, Captain Morales stated.
Mr. Pagan Bonilla and Mr. Diaz de Leon had been interacting with Ms. Velazquez and Ms. Pelaez regarding the evening before they certainly were murdered and happened to be tape-recorded on one of this womens social networking reports, Captain Morales said.
The guy stated the authorities got additionally tied up Mr. Pagan Bonilla and Mr. Diaz de Leon towards the killings through surveillance camera video footage and scientific proof, which he dropped to detail. Mr. Pagan Bonilla admitted to playing the killings, and Mr. Diaz de Leon switched themselves in, he said.
Limary Cruz-Rubio, a spokeswoman for your F.B.I.s San Juan industry office, declined to discuss the arrests but stated the agency consistently collaborates with regional, county and national agencies.
The agency is and can continually be thinking about violent make that might fall within national jurisdiction, she mentioned. However, our plan is we do not confirm or refute the presence of research, to protect the integrity of any feasible investigative energy.
Mr. Pagan Bonilla and Mr. Diaz de Leon could not straight away feel hit for touch upon Thursday night, therefore had not been immediately obvious when they got solicitors.
When the guys are energized, it may represent a switching reason for the managing of crimes against L.G.B.T.Q. Clarksville TN escort girls folks in Puerto Rico, that has a disturbing history of physical violence against homosexual and transgender group, activists said.
Ms. Velazquez and Ms. Pelaez happened to be the 3rd and fourth transgender folk slain in Puerto Rico in the last 2 months, activists mentioned. They were additionally thought to be the 7th and eighth transgender or gender-nonconforming men and women to currently slain in the us in 2010, based on the peoples liberties promotion.
In earlier times 15 several months, 10 L.G.B.T.Q. folks have already been killed in Puerto Rico, according to Pedro Julio Serrano, a gay legal rights activist. All but three associated with the deaths continue to be unsolved, he said.
These arrests tend to be one step in the correct movement, nevertheless these murders have to be prosecuted as dislike crimes, Mr. Serrano stated. We urge the government to finish the research during the other seven murders of L.G.B.T.Q. someone from the isle and serve fairness regarding of them.
Ms. Velazquez stayed in Queens and Ms. Pelaez in the Bronx. Both have recently moved to Puerto Rico, in addition they were looking to travel returning to ny later on this month, based on family relations and activists.
Luz Melendez, 29, Ms. Pelaezs cousin, mentioned Mr. Pagan Bonilla and Mr. Diaz de Leon were arrested after an area radio facility uploaded files of those on Twitter and people begun to name the section to determine all of them.
We is very appreciative associated with perform your authorities additionally the society put in discover whom did this, she stated on Thursday.
She said the images originated two video that Ms. Pelaez had published on her Snapchat and myspace reports, which revealed their and Ms. Velazquez socializing with Mr. Pagan Bonilla and Mr. Diaz de Leon.
we watched the films, therefore seemed like these people were hanging out with each other as friends, she mentioned. It appeared typical. There was clearly music playing within the history. Everybody seemed great.
She said law enforcement got informed her families merely that the men had been in national custody.
The killings came four weeks after Yampi Mendez Arocho, a 19-year-old transgender man, got slain in Moca, P.R., according to the peoples Rights promotion.
In March, Alexa Negron Luciano, a famous figure on Puerto Rico social media marketing who had been transgender and homeless, ended up being recorded to passing after a McDonalds customer complained that Ms. Negron got spied on the inside the womens room.
Ms. Negrons best moments presented for the headlights of an automible amid a cackle of laughter are submitted on social networking, an undeniable fact that activists mentioned underscored the impunity homophobic assailants feeling whenever committing these types of crimes.