Desert Blood: The Juárez Murders

A missing person advertisement for Irene is released, stating that Irene Feliciana Villa is a 16-year-old girl from El Paso who has been missing since Thursday morning. It explains that she went to the Juárez Expo Fair and then joined her friends at a party in Colonia La Soledad. It describes what she was wearing and the metal stud in her tongue, and it asks that “[a]nyone with information […] contact the nearest law enforcement agency” (146).

At a bar, a girl thinks about how attracted she is to the handsome blond man in the cowboy hat, who readers recognize as J.W. The girl was introduced to the man—known as El Güero—by her supervisor Ariel. 

J.W. says he does not like to dance but that he would like to watch her dance by herself. The girl feels foolish and wonders if Ariel told him she is a 14-year-old virgin. When J.W. dances close to her, the girl feels uncomfortable and retreats to their table. As he sits down next to her, a waitress passes him a folded-up napkin, which he currently ignores. He laughs when the girl orders a Shirley Temple.

J.W. asks her name and whether she is in school; she says her name is Mireya and that she works at the Phillips plant. She thinks about how sore her hands are by the end of the day but how she is frequently told how many girls would take her place. The lineman says he is going to help her enter a beauty pageant. 

J.W. jokes and flirts with her, asking whether she knows who the Lone Ranger is and what a movie producer does. Mireya tears up thinking of how her stepfather killed her mother and how she left for Juárez to escape him. She declines his offer to go to the movies, saying she must meet Ariel. 

J.W. compliments the jewelry in Mireya’s hair. As she explains where she got it, he is distracted by someone at the bar. He reads the napkin and says to the waitress, “‘Tell them not now’” (151). When he tells Mireya she could be in one of his movies, she thinks of “how lucky she is” (152). He offers to ask his friend, who sells Avon, to give her some free samples, and makes a phone call. Mireya is wary when he says they must go to his friend’s house, but she is eager for the samples and reassured when he says his friend has children.

Mireya is surprised that J.W.’s car is not fancy or in good condition. As she sits, she sees plastic bags and a rope on the backseat. After noticing handcuffs, she tries to leave, but the door has no handle. Trapped, she begs him to let her out. He punches her, calls her a “little whore,” and tells her “[i]t’s not time to scream yet” (153).

Pete McCuts has been a detective for only three weeks and is tagging along with Detectives Ortiz and Borunda for “an undercover operation called Rail Raid that was investigating a spate of thefts from the Southern Pacific Line” (154). Though he is still training, he has already been assigned a Missing Person’s case involving a girl from El Paso (Irene). His commander did not want to spend time on a case involving someone missing in Juárez, but Pete’s father, Judge Anacleto Ramírez, requested Pete’s assignment to the case because the missing girl is related to one of Judge Ramírez’s social workers (Ximena).

As the detectives wait by the Río Grande, Pete entertains them with the raucous story of how his mother, a lesbian, begged his father to have sex with her while she was ovulating and agreed to let Anacleto name Pete using an acronym of the muses’ names. His story is interrupted by a suspicious noise, and Ortiz and Borunda order him to stay in the car and call for help if they do not return in 10 minutes.

Pete, growing anxious, exits the car in time to see his colleagues being viciously beaten and dragged to the river. He calls in for help, and officers find them barely alive. Suspects are arrested across the river, and the injured detectives are taken away by helicopter. Pete declines a ride from another officer and sits in Borunda’s car contemplating how his father warned him a life in law enforcement would mean risking his life. Pete realizes “that his life really was on the line in this job” (162) and that he could have been attacked too. He is surprised to find himself crying.

Lydia blames Ivon for Irene’s disappearance. Though hurt, Ivon agrees. To distract herself, she writes down what she knows about Irene’s disappearance. 

A day and a half after Irene was reported missing, Pete McCuts was assigned the case. He informed them that unless they can prove she was kidnapped, Irene is simply considered a missing person. Ivon and Uncle Joe waited six hours before reporting Irene’s disappearance to PREVIAS, an agency in Juárez.

Both Juárez and El Paso police departments deny that Irene’s case is within their jurisdiction, and Ivon feels Pete subtly suggested Irene is at fault because she went across the border to attend a party. Ivon also learned that the INS and Border Patrol have a “binational task force” (166) to stop car thefts but have done nothing to stop the murders. She suspects that “immigration laws […] have always targeted women of color to prevent them from entering the U.S. and breeding babies of color” (166). 

Ivon spoke with families at the PREVIAS office. Many of the missing women came from the interior of Mexico and were lured north by factory jobs. The families believe God will bring back the women, and Ivon refrained from challenging them. She was annoyed when the PREVIAS lawyer took a phone call in the hallway because she could hear his laughter. She writes, “They don’t give a shit about any of us” (168). The lawyer said police action will be taken “only when it has been determined that an offense has occurred” (168).

Given that “[a]uthorities on both sides are washing their hands of this situation” (168), Ivon decides to find Irene herself. She has a feeling Irene is alive and that somehow Irene “knows what to do” to stay that way (168). Father Francis complained to the mayor about the length of time it took for the police to speak with them, so Ivon no longer suspects him of being the killer. 

Ximena assigned her brother William to search Juárez with Ivon. She and William are going to hand out flyers in Juárez, then she will join Ximena and Father Francis on a rastreo the next day. 

Ivon told Brigit about Irene’s disappearance and rejected her offer to come down to El Paso. Seeing Lydia worry over Irene makes Ivon “realize that this is what it means to have children” (170). She and her mother continued to fight; at one point Lydia told Ivon that she wishes she did not exist.

A man is yelling into a megaphone that they “need another one” (171). He tells his men “[t]his is supposed to be a nickel, not a penny” (171). He is angry that they are wasting time and that “[n]ow that El Diablo isn’t around,” he “has to rely on crack heads” (171). Irene, who is tied up naked and trapped under a cot, gathers that they do not realize she speaks Spanish.

Irene is suffering from allergy attacks brought on by the dust under the cot. Men “do things” on the cot (172)—things Irene cannot determine—and they list violent things they want to do to a girl. Irene memorizes the men’s names; she has already learned that the man on the megaphone is Junior, “the rich guy at the fair” (172).

Everything in the room is red. A woman comes in, pulls Irene out by her feet, and cleans her with a bleach solution. The woman wears a mask, but Irene can see purple hair, leading readers to believe this is Ariel, Paco’s wife. She also sees that the woman is wearing Irene’s headphones and portable CD player. When the woman steps out, Irene tries to see the view outside, which always seems to be changing. The woman feeds her and makes her empty her bowels. Irene studies the graffiti on the wall and sees three columns, one with lines for pennies, one with lines for nickels, and one with lines for dimes.

Irene feels as if the woman has drugged her. Back under the cot, she prays and tries to keep her allergies at bay.