The Story of Vincente, Who Murdered His Mother, His Father, and His Sister: Life and Death in Juarez

Mexican investigative reporter Nieto takes a grim look at a brutal triple murder in this depressing true crime narrative. After recounting the 2004 discovery of a burnt-out truck containing three corpses in Mexico's Ciudad Juarez, just south of the U.S. border with Mexico, she explains who they were, and how they got there. High school student Vicente Leon Chavez, angry at his parents for their preferential treatment of his younger sister and their adverse attitude toward him , convinced two friends to help him to murder his family. Vicente's inept efforts to conceal the killings, including an obviously false story about a ransom demand for his missing family members, quickly led to his arrest. Nieto contends that Vicente's crimes were motivated in part by his belief that there would be no genuine investigation by corrupt police forces who were themselves responsible for multiple murders. Her searing introduction to the dysfunction of the Juarez government over the last decade will help educate readers unfamiliar with the situation, but the lack of an explanation of her methods makes it unclear how much of her description of Vicente's state of mind is fictionalized. (Nov.)