Maria’s Robbery
I went back to class today as Maria was finally able to try resuming her life. After 10 days she is still in a state of shock and fear. Here’s what happened.
Sunday, February 4th at 1 a.m., she was at a stoplight on one of the busiest streets in Buenos Aires, 9 de Julio. Four males ages 15-21, collectively carrying three guns, pointed their weapons at her and proceeded to enter her small car. They then ordered her to drive on the highway in the direction of their town. However, the path of the indicated highway wouldn’t have brought them anywhere near their stated destination. For 30 minutes she continued to drive not knowing if they were going to let her go, rape her, kill her, or rape and then kill her.
Fortunately, at the stoplight where the incident occurred, someone had seen the whole thing and followed Maria’s car while calling the police with their cell phone. When her car reached the toll station on the highway, there was an army of police cars waiting for the robbers. They were taken into custody and Maria escaped the incident unharmed physically. After answering questions for the police and the press, she was finally able to return to her mom’s house in the suburbs at 6 a.m.
While she is fortunate to be safe after this, she cannot go back to life as normal. This event took place on a main street on a Saturday night when it was full of people. She can’t take heart in the fact that it happened in a remote, dangerous location and is constantly afraid of walking the streets or driving alone. The criminals here are becoming increasingly fearless and arrogant. What’s more, three of the four in this case are probably roaming the streets now because they are not punishable due to their age. Please keep Maria in your prayers as I cannot imagine the difficulty of recovering from this. I felt violated after being tricked and subsequently robbed without being touched. This has to be 100 times harder.
The story can be found here in Spanish. Maria told me she was unharmed physically but this report says they touched her in private places while she was driving. I’m not sure which is true or if I should even ask her about it.
