April 30^th, 2019, marked four years since Miguel Peralta’s arrest in Mexico City by men dressed in civilian clothing. He was held incommunicado for more than twenty hours, and taken to the prison in Tlaxiaco, Oaxaca. On May 7^th, 2015, his formal order of imprisonment was dictated. Currently he is in prison in Cuicatlán, Oaxaca.

On October 26^th, 2018, Miguel was sentenced to fifty years in prison by Judge Juan León Montiel of the Mixed District Court of Huautla de Jiménez, Oaxaca—the same judge who five months later granted the release of four of Miguel’s imprisoned compañeros due to lack of evidence. However, these four compañeros remain in prison.

Today, we await the appeal of Miguel’s sentence in the Supreme Court of Oaxaca and we continue to demand that he be released.

#llamadaporlalibertad

#MiguelPeraltaLibertad

Fb: MiguelPeraltaLIbre

Message from Miguel

While last night was very slow, I listened to the song of a cricket from afar, in very much a cricket’s style, spssss, spssss, spssss. I looked at the fences of the corridor. I walked toward the window. I stealthily followed the sound. I looked to the right and I found the watchtower. Approximately 45 meters away, concrete, aluminum and a little bit of glass. And a henchman always standing there, casting flashes of light with his flashlight. I looked back. I looked forward. The wall imposed its fragile strength, adorned with its finely measured paper streamers, a dose of electricity, and some very white eyes that never let down their gaze, neither day nor night.

A sigh left my bowels. I disengaged for a moment. I continued searching for the sound of the cricket, but now there were two. I saw that one of them was more eager than the other. They were off to the left. One of them did a balancing act on the mesh that divides the safety belt from the wall. The other was climbing the wall very quietly and almost too easily.

Sometimes I am the night that slips away into dreams, converting into the bark of a dog, into the song of the crickets carrying out their balancing act, into a prolonged embrace, into the song of a rooster at dawn. We are the waves that flee into the sea. I am the howl of a wolf burning the night. I am the water that drains down from the hills and occupies the trails. We are the wind that blows at night with the fluttering of the trees, creating the storms.

Message transferred: In the last few years, lies and injustice have become the norm in our community. Frenzy, uneasiness, lack of hope? Although we stumble in the fog, the tender moon is a necessity for our community; a community that suffers from fear but will soon enlighten the night. We roam the hills and mountains to water the flowers of freedom…

Miguel Peralta

April 30^th, 2019