Salvadorean authorities say they have arrested the gang leader who ordered documentary filmmaker Christian Poveda’s murder, according to Reporters sans Frontières (RSF). Poveda, who had dual French and Spanish nationality, was gunned down in an outlying district of San Salvador on September 2, 2009.
Accused of various crimes and regarded by the police as one of the main leaders of the “Mara 18” gang, Daniel “El Black” Cabrera Flores was arrested on April 20 in La Campanera, the east San Salvador district where Poveda had been filming the gang. His arrest brings the number of people held in connection with Poveda’s murder to 29.
Paris-based RSF welcomed the commitment to the case shown by the Salvadorean authorities. Now that such a large number of arrests have been made, the authorities must establish what role, if any, each of the detained suspects played in Poveda’s death.
The motive also still needs to be established. Poveda was supporting various projects aimed at reintegrating gang members into society. Although La Campanera residents have said he was regarded a friend of Mara 18, some members of the gang reportedly suspected him of being a police informer.
