Murder of rural teacher Nancy Godoy in Corrientes: doubts and five defendants
The body of Nancy Godoy was found with multiple wounds in a location 2.5 km from her school. Five people are charged and the family demands that actors in the education system also be investigated.
Five defendants and an abandoned school: the mysteries of Nancy Godoy's murder
The body of Nancy Godoy, a rural teacher from the town of Esquina in the province of Corrientes, was found in an old pasture in the area of El Malezal, approximately 2.5 kilometres from the school where she worked. The autopsy determined that she died as a result of multiple stab wounds, with signs of overkill. According to pagina12.com.ar, the remains were transferred from the provincial capital to Esquina on Friday afternoon and will remain in the Sabattini funeral parlour until at least next Tuesday. The wake will be held in Plaza 9 de Julio so that the entire community can attend the farewell.
"She never had evil in her soul, and she did not see the evil coming," said Érica, a rural teacher and personal friend of Godoy since their early years in the teaching profession. Érica visited the family home in Esquina for the third time in two days—a town located 333 kilometres from Corrientes capital, on the banks of the Corriente River—where Sebastián and José, two of Nancy's three children, were waiting.
A neighbour who was in the vicinity of Hospital San Roque summed up the state of the community: "Nancy's husband retired as a security guard at this hospital, and now he comes to receive his wife's body. This is horrifying."
The five defendants
Hours before the body was transferred, the 12-year-old son of Rosa Leguizamón was testifying in a Gesell Chamber before the city's public prosecutor's office. Leguizamón is one of five people charged with Godoy's murder; the others are Ireneo Felipe Zarza, Felipe Dionisio Sandoval, Nahuel Rojas and Ernesto Ezequiel Bordón.
Leguizamón's defence lawyer, Marcos Neironi, maintained his client's innocence and declared to the press that Rosa is distressed by Nancy's death. "They were two women in a man's world," Neironi stated. According to those close to the victim, Rosa was Godoy's trusted person during her weekly routine: she travelled from her home in the city to the estancia "El Curupí", from where a group would take her to a place known as Puesto 9. From there, Nancy would ride on horseback for an hour and a half to reach the educational establishment.
The prosecutors in charge of the investigation point to Leguizamón as co-perpetrator of the simple homicide: she allegedly used the trust she had built with the teacher to coerce others into participating in the crime.
The family's hypothesis: the school also under scrutiny
Sebastián, Nancy's 27-year-old son, received this outlet completely devastated but wearing a white t-shirt with his mother's image and the word "Justice". He reiterated what the family has maintained since the first days of her disappearance: something does not add up.
One of the hypotheses being investigated points to sexual abuse followed by death at the hands of the five defendants. However, the family members are asking that the network involving actors in the education system also be investigated in depth, particularly rural school No. 626, about which Nancy had made repeated complaints.
Godoy worked as acting director of that institution and had submitted multiple reports about the state of abandonment in which she found it: access difficulties, lack of drinking water, absence of furniture, presence of wildlife and complete lack of cleanliness. "You don't know what it's like at night. I'm poor, you know, my house is made of plastic sheeting, but the smell of the bats—you don't know what it was like. And I told all of this to the supervisor, and she told me just to write a note. It seemed to me that she wasn't going to do anything," Nancy said in voice notes to a fellow teacher, which this outlet obtained.
The establishment had been in a state of abandonment for almost three years when Godoy took on the acting director role. Among her specific requests were the installation of a water pump, the repair of cracked walls and the fixing of windows.
The Education Minister announces an internal investigation
Only on Friday, and after several requests for explanations, the Minister of Education of Corrientes, Ana Miño, confirmed that an internal investigation process will be launched to determine how matters were handled regarding school No. 626. Miño clarified, however, that the situation of the previous director, Norberto Gamarra, will be handled differently: "The teacher is on leave, so that has a different procedure."
Key evidence in the coming week
Gustavo Briend, one of the lawyers representing Nancy Godoy's children, emphasised in a press conference the importance of two pending elements. The supplementary studies from the Forensic Medical Institute and the analysis of biological samples will be known next week; those results could place the defendants at the crime scene.
Monday could also be a key day for the incorporation of evidence extracted from the mobile phones of the accused. It has emerged that this evidence would contain dialogues between them and even a photograph of Nancy Godoy accompanied by messages in which they asked what to do with her—that is, how to dispose of her body.
The peace of the town of Esquina, according to locals themselves, was lost two weeks ago. The community arrives in silence at the family home, embraces the relatives and leaves, united in the call for justice and bewildered by a crime that still holds unanswered questions.
Source: Google News AR — Crime