Cristina “Titi” Hernández

Cristina Hernández

On the evening of July 27, 2005, four men forced 20-year-old university student Cristina Hernández into a grey car outside her house. Neighbors witnessed the abduction and immediately alerted her parents.

Cristina’s father borrowed a neighbor’s car and tried to go after them. He then went to the San Juan Police station to report the incident and beg them to chase the car. As the father later recounted, “I begged them to put up road blocks to stop them and catch them.” After two hours of searching he returned to the police station, but the officers claimed that they had not followed up on his desperate pleas for help. His brother-in-law turned to the homicide unit of the police, but they informed him that nothing could be done. “They said many young girls run off with boyfriends; and so they couldn't start a search for 24 hours.” Cristina, however, did not have a boyfriend.

The next morning her dead body was found. She had been shot four times and had bite marks all over her body.

All but one item of clothing she was wearing the night of her murder was returned to the family prior to being examined. According to reports, the family presented the clothes to the Public Prosecutor’s Office for evidence, but were told to burn them or throw them away.

After Cristina’s murder, her family went into hiding in fear for their safety. 

More than a year after her murder, her case remains unresolved despite the existence of critical leads. According to Amnesty International, the police officer in charge of the investigation did not carry out any further investigations in the days after her murder because she had not received any instructions from the Public Prosecutor’s Office. The Public Prosecutor’s Office has reportedly failed to request a search of a suspect’s house or summon the witnesses to provide information that could be used to construct a visual profile of the individuals believed to be responsible for her abduction and subsequent murder.