WIND FARM MANAGER SHOT IN MEXICO, SECOND WORKER SLAIN

February 11, 2013 (Juchitan) –A wind farm worker was slain and the facility’s general manager injured by gunshots, a Mexican media outlet reported on February 8, 2013.  Witnesses reportedly told police that four hooded persons walked into a party in a residential neighborhood “with both pistols and rifles, straight to the two people.” The assailants escaped in a black vehicle.

Leobardo Chavez Gomes, 45, general manager of the Mexican Electrical wind facility in Juchitan, was transported for medical attention.  Jose Aquino Lopez, an employee at the wind farm, died at the scene.   

It is unclear whether the killings were related to their work at the wind farm, or whether the victims were targeted for another reason. No motive for the slayings has been offered by police, according to the story on Radio Formula (published in Spanish):  http://www.radioformula.com.mx/notas.asp?Idn=302771

Wind facilities in Juchitan and elsewhere in Mexico have generated broad community opposition and protests:

http://www.casacollective.org/story/issue-63-september-2008/protests-juchitan-against-wind-companies  and

http://upsidedownworld.org/main/mexico-archives-79/3952-indigenous-communities-in-mexico-fight-corporate-wind-farms .