# Mario Ruiz Massieu

Mario Ruiz Massieu (December 24, 1950 – September 15, 1999) was a Mexican ambassador and key figure in Mexican politics in 1994, the last year of the presidency of Carlos Salinas de Gortari.

## Early life and family

Ruiz Massieu was born December 24, 1950, in Acapulco, Guerrero. Two of his brothers, Wilfrido and Roberto, were shot dead at a young age in January 1965 in Acapulco. Another one of his brothers, José Francisco Ruiz Massieu, went on to become governor of Guerrero and a powerful figure in the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI).

## Career and entry into government

Mario initially maintained a lower profile. He served as secretary general of the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), Mexico's leading public university, and later as undersecretary of the Interior and ambassador to Denmark before being appointed deputy attorney general in the administration of Carlos Salinas.
A key component of his job was to bring the leaders of the country's powerful drug cartels to justice.

## Corruption

In December 1993, he made an initial deposit of $4 million at what was then the Texas Commerce Bank in Houston. Between then and February 1995, another $2.5 million was found, all deposited in cash, in amounts ranging from $98,000 to $800,000.
According to U.S. grand jury testimony, Jorge Stergios transported the money on Ruiz Massieu's behalf in cardboard boxes or suitcases from Mexico to Texas on commercial flights. Stergios is currently in prison.
The U.S. Department of Justice said Mario Ruiz Massieu's $9.9 million came from bribes paid by drug traffickers in exchange for immunity from prosecution. Ruiz Massieu always insisted it was family money, or "bonuses" paid by the Mexican presidency. He had more than $3 million in accounts in Mexico.
Historically, several such deputy attorneys general were similarly corrupt.

## Downfall

Ruiz Massieu's regime began to crumble with the assassination of his brother José Francisco ("Pepe"), who was general secretary of the PRI and linked to a highly influential political clan through marriage to Adriana Salinas, sister of Carlos Salinas de Gortari (the marriage ended in divorce). Six months earlier, the party's presidential candidate, Luis Donaldo Colosio, had been shot dead at a campaign rally.
In what appeared to be a clever move, Carlos Salinas appointed Ruiz Massieu to investigate José Francisco's death. But less than two months after the murder, he resigned, claiming that high-ranking party members were blocking the investigation. Ruiz-Massieu claimed he had proof of PRI party president Ignacio Pichardo Pagaza and party secretary María de los Ángeles Moreno hiding evidence and thus blocking the investigation. Pichardo Pagaza and Moreno requested for proof to be shown, but it was never found. In a famous press conference on November 23, 1994, he announced the following:
   El pasado 28 de septiembre una bala mató a dos Ruiz Massieu. A uno le quitó la vida, al otro le quitó la fe y la esperanza de que en un gobierno priísta se llegue a la justicia. Los demonios andan sueltos, y han triunfado.
   On September 28, a bullet killed two Ruiz Massieus. One's life was taken, and from the other was taken his faith and hope that justice would be achieved under a PRI government. The demons are on the loose, and they have triumphed.
For a brief period, Mario Ruiz Massieu was able to present himself as the avenging angel. He authored a political column in a newspaper and a book, entitled Yo Accuso ("I accuse").
In December 1994, with the inauguration of President Ernesto Zedillo the following month and the appointment of new authorities, the net began to close. In February 1995, news arrived that the police had arrested the mastermind behind José Francisco's assassination—none other than Raúl Salinas de Gortari, brother of former President Carlos Salinas de Gortari.
Accused of protecting his own brother's killer, Ruiz Massieu fled the country. However, when he switched flights, he was unable to declare the $46,000 he was carrying, allowing U.S. authorities to arrest him in Newark, New Jersey. Only the incompetence of Attorney General Antonio Lozano Gracia [es] and the suspicions of the U.S. judge hearing the case regarding the methods of the Mexican police allowed him to evade four successive extradition requests from the Attorney General's Office.
However, U.S. authorities also began to move against him, seeking to confiscate his money deposited in Texas as proceeds of drug trafficking, and prosecuted him in a Houston court as a money launderer, a charge for which he could have faced 20 years in prison upon conviction.

## Death

Mario Ruiz Massieu was kept under house arrest for the last three and a half years of his life in New Jersey. Two days before his trial for money laundering, on September 15, 1999, he died of an antidepressant overdose, leaving behind two suicide notes: a private letter to his family and an open letter made public by his lawyers. In the latter, he continued to proclaim his innocence and accused former President Ernesto Zedillo of having "a good deal to do" with his brother's death.
Upon his death, Mario Ruiz Massieu left behind his wife, María Barrientos, and a 10-year-old daughter, Regina.
The official narrative says that he took his life on Independence Day in Mexico.