—Publishers Weekly
“The product of seven years’ research, The Art of Political Murder develops into a multilayered real-life whodunit and quest for justice. Forensic and chilling, with an eye for the absurd, it suggests with somber hope that courage and decency can prevail against the darkest forces, albeit at terrible cost.”
—The Guardian
“Francisco Goldman’s book is a study of how the valorous and treacherous behaved in the infernal conditions that obtained—and still obtain—in Guatemala … Goldman casts aside the official whitewashes of the murder and compellingly and accurately chronicles the bravery of those who dug for the truth and sometimes lost their lives doing so.”
—New Statesman
The Long Night of White ChickensThe Ordinary SeamanThe Divine HusbandSay Her NameThe Interior Circuit
THE ART OF
POLITICAL MURDER
WHO KILLED THE BISHOP?
WITH A NEW EPILOGUE AND UPDATED CHRONOLOGY OF EVENTS
FRANCISCO GOLDMAN
Copyright © 2007 by Francisco Goldman
Afterword copyright © 2008, 2020 by Francisco Goldman
Epilogue copyright © 2015, 2020 by Francisco Goldman
Cover design by Charles Rue Woods
Cover photograph © Rachel Cobb
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review. Scanning, uploading, and electronic distribution of this book or the facilitation of such without the permission of the publisher is prohibited. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated. Any member of educational institutions wishing to photocopy part or all of the work for classroom use, or anthology, should send inquiries to Grove Atlantic, 154 West 14th Street, New York, NY 10011 or [email protected].
Photo Credits: Frontispiece: Courtesy of ODHA; Page 13: Courtesy of ODHA; Page 73: Courtesy of Sandra Sebastian; Page 159:Courtesy of Moises Castillo/ElPeriodico; Page 191: Courtesy of Sandra Sebastian; Page 209: Courtesy of Moises Castillo/ElPeriodico; Page 244: Courtesy of ODHA; Page 255: Courtesy of Moises Castillo/ElPeriodico; Page 293: Courtesy of ODHA
Parts of this work have appeared in
the New Yorker and the New York Review of Books.
Published simultaneously in CanadaPrinted in the United States of America
ISBN: 978-0-8021-5755-3
eISBN: 978-1-558-4637-4
Grove Press
an imprint of Grove Atlantic, Inc.
154 West 14th Street
New York, NY 10011
Distributed by Publishers Group West
groveatlantic.com
20 21 22 23 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Por los que creyeron. For the believers.
And in memory of
Darinel Domingo Montejo, José Mérida Escobar,
Mama Lotti, and others unnamed
No hay nada más injusto que lo justo. Nothing is more unjust than what is just.
—Lope de Vega
Neighborhood of the Murder
San Sebastián Parish House
Contents
Praise for The Art of Political Murder
Also by Francisco Goldman
I The Murder
II The Investigation
III The Trial
IV The Third Stage
V Deciphering the Truth
Afterword
Epilogue
Dramatis Personae
Chronology of Events
Sources and Notes
Acknowledgements
Index
Bishop Juan Gerardi Conedera (1922–1998)
APRIL 26, 1998
1
ONE SUNDAY AFTERNOON, a few hours before he was bludgeoned to death in the garage of the parish house of the church of San Sebastián, in the old center of Guatemala City, Bishop Juan Gerardi Conedera was drinking Scotch and telling stories at a small gathering in a friend’s backyard garden. Bishop Gerardi’s stories were famously amusing and sometimes off-color. He had a reputation as a chistoso, a joker. “In a meeting with him, you would get this whole repertoire of jokes,” Father Mario Orantes Nájera, the parish’s assistant priest, told police investigators two days later. “I wish you could have known