The Story of Vicente, Who Murdered His Mother, His Father, and His Sister

October 19, 2015
Mexican investigative reporter Nieto takes a grim look at a brutal triple murder in this depressing true crime narrative. After recounting the 2004 discovery of a burnt-out truck containing three corpses in Mexico's Ciudad Juarez, just south of the U.S. border with Mexico, she explains who they were, and how they got there. High school student Vicente Leon Chavez, angry at his parents for their preferential treatment of his younger sister and their adverse attitude toward him , convinced two friends to help him to murder his family. Vicente's inept efforts to conceal the killings, including an obviously false story about a ransom demand for his missing family members, quickly led to his arrest. Nieto contends that Vicente's crimes were motivated in part by his belief that there would be no genuine investigation by corrupt police forces who were themselves responsible for multiple murders. Her searing introduction to the dysfunction of the Juarez government over the last decade will help educate readers unfamiliar with the situation, but the lack of an explanation of her methods makes it unclear how much of her description of Vicente's state of mind is fictionalized.

December 1, 2015

In Spring 2004, 16-year-old Vicente recruited two of his friends to assist in murdering his mother, father, and little sister. Vicente bought a gun from a classmate, and the three teens entered his home late one evening and murdered his family in their beds. They then burned the bodies beyond recognition. Vicente was sure he had planned the perfect crime. A citizen of Juarez, Mexico, Vicente was certain that the murders would not so much as warrant a second look. At the time of the killings, it seemed there was little value for human life in Juarez and most crimes went uninvestigated and unpunished. More than just the story of Vicente's cold-blooded murder of his family, investigative reporter Nieto's (El Diario) account describes how poverty and a corrupt government created an environment in which murder, especially femicide, became commonplace and often eluded prosecution. Stories of shocking murder, gang violence, and crime intertwine to illustrate the culture of extreme violence that surrounds the city. VERDICT For serious true crime readers and libraries with large true crime collections.--Kristen Calvert Nelson, Marion Cty. P.L. Syst., Ocala, FL

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