El quince de mayo/May 15th

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Image from La comisión de derechos humanos
del Distrito Federal (CDHDF). Click HERE. 
¡Feliz cumpleaños a ... Digna Ochoa (Digna Ochoa y Plácido! (1964-2001)

A human rights lawyer in Mexico, she won Amnesty International's "Enduring Spirit" Award in 2000 (presented by actor Martin Sheen). In October of 2001 she was shot and killed in her law office, and a note was found beside her warning other human rights lawyers that this could happen to them as well. Nonetheless, her death was ruled a suicide by Mexico City authorities (read more HERE). Journalist Linda Diebel, who headed the Toronto Star's Latin America bureau for seven years before transferring to Washington, debunks the suicide theory in her 2007 book Betrayed: The Assassination of Digna Ochoa (see this review in The New Yorker). Ochoa was from Veracruz, Mexico, where she attended law school. She began working part-time for the Attorney General's office in Veracruz in 1984. Several years later, after finding a "black list" of union and political activists at the office of her employer, she was abducted and raped. Her claims were never investigated. She continued to work as a lawyer until 1991, when she entered the Dominican Convent of the Incarnate Word. She lived and studied there until 1999, though she never took her vows. After the Convent, Ochoa continued to work representing various clients, with her cases sometimes alleging human rights abuses, including torture, by government authorities, particularly the army. Ochoa was awarded the International Human Rights Award post-mortem in 2002 from Global Exchange, an NGO based in San Francisco, and also the Ludovic-Trarieux International Human Rights Prize from the European Bars in 2003. See Democracy Now!'s 2006 segment on Ochoa HERE. Hear her brother call her murder "a crime of the state" and see some of the protests after her death (in Spanish) in this short video, HERE.

For resources for teaching Spanish, Level 1 through AP, CLICK HERE.

Other May 15th birthdays of note:

Gustavo Vázquez (1998-      ): Mexican musician. He is a part of the popular trio Vázquez Sounds.

Giselle Fernandez (1961-       ): Journalist with Mexican roots (she was born in Mexico City) who has worked for CBS and NBC. She has won many Emmy awards for her work. He mother, who was Jewish, was an expert in Mexican folklore, and her father was a flamenco dancer. Click HERE to see her interview Carlos Santana and HERE for her official website.



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