WEBVTT - Part 2: A Dangerous Woman 0:00:03.160 --> 0:00:09.319 Date on time of autopsy March third, two sixteen. The 0:00:09.440 --> 0:00:14.440 calabric corresponds to one adult female. Three bullets, all fired 0:00:14.480 --> 0:00:17.959 from a Smith and Wesson thirty eight special. It ripped 0:00:18.000 --> 0:00:26.960 through her body complexion average body condition, intact height one 0:00:27.400 --> 0:00:33.760 and sixty three cimes, rigidity complete. One bullet entered her 0:00:33.840 --> 0:00:38.080 left arm and continued into her side. It pierced her 0:00:38.200 --> 0:00:43.520 left lung before lodging in her right one alterations observed 0:00:44.159 --> 0:00:49.200 de curtive tattoo on left upper third of back. Another 0:00:49.280 --> 0:00:52.960 bullet entered her left shoulder at an upward angle. It 0:00:53.040 --> 0:00:57.400 continued toward her neck, bursting the jugular vein and an artery. 0:00:58.200 --> 0:01:01.880 A third bullet entered her her upper back. It tore 0:01:02.000 --> 0:01:06.399 through her left lung, then her diaphragm, then her stomach, 0:01:07.120 --> 0:01:12.520 her adrenal gland, and finally fractured one of her vertebrae. 0:01:13.720 --> 0:01:17.760 Singer Print examination revealed that the corps registered as autopsy 0:01:17.880 --> 0:01:25.880 three two thousand and sixteen belongs to perte Ses. The 0:01:25.959 --> 0:01:29.840 medical cause of death was obvious to the coroner, but 0:01:29.959 --> 0:01:33.720 you'd never find the real cause by tracing those bullets. 0:01:34.440 --> 0:01:36.959 To do that, you have to follow the path of 0:01:37.040 --> 0:01:42.240 Berta's life as an activist. It starts in her childhood home. 0:01:47.840 --> 0:01:52.840 I'm monte Reel, an investigative journalist for Bloomberg Green. This 0:01:53.600 --> 0:02:27.919 is Blood Rivermento. Barretta's mother's name is Austra Flores. She's 0:02:27.919 --> 0:02:31.080 showing me around the family home in La Speranza, a 0:02:31.160 --> 0:02:35.720 small city in western Honduras. The rooms where bear To 0:02:35.800 --> 0:02:38.760 slept and worked for years remained pretty much as she 0:02:38.840 --> 0:02:42.440 left them. Her mother shows me Berta's old work files, 0:02:42.760 --> 0:02:45.880 her high school awards, and some of the rag dolls 0:02:45.919 --> 0:02:53.919 she liked to collect, including a little brown one Barretta's favorite. 0:02:55.040 --> 0:02:58.200 Austro wears her gray hair long, pulled back in a 0:02:58.240 --> 0:03:02.720 loose ponytail. Her eighty seven years have been full of challenges. 0:03:03.600 --> 0:03:08.600 She mothered twelve children. More recently, she suffered three strokes 0:03:09.160 --> 0:03:13.160 and a brain hemorrhage. But she's still sharp, and her 0:03:13.200 --> 0:03:17.320 memories of Berta are especially vivid. She was the youngest 0:03:17.520 --> 0:03:21.880 of the twelve, and Austra calls her Bertita an endearing 0:03:21.919 --> 0:03:30.160 way of saying, little Berta was a tireless fighter, and 0:03:30.200 --> 0:03:34.880 I think that yes, she learned a lot from me. 0:03:35.720 --> 0:03:40.120 Austro was born in nine three. That same year, the 0:03:40.240 --> 0:03:44.640 National Party of Honduras took control of the presidency. That 0:03:44.760 --> 0:03:48.320 party still exists. It's one of the two most powerful 0:03:48.360 --> 0:03:52.760 political coalitions in the country, the more conservative one. The 0:03:52.840 --> 0:03:56.360 National Party has evolved over the decades, of course, but 0:03:56.480 --> 0:04:01.360 some of its early leaders were classic authority arians. They 0:04:01.400 --> 0:04:05.080 cracked down on labor unions and the press. They jailed 0:04:05.120 --> 0:04:10.680 political enemies and even outlawed opposition parties. They denied citizenship 0:04:10.800 --> 0:04:13.840 and the right to vote to women, and they routinely 0:04:14.080 --> 0:04:19.480 exploited indigenous communities for cheap labor. These events in the 0:04:19.560 --> 0:04:23.440 nineteen thirties and forties would shape the destiny of the 0:04:23.520 --> 0:04:28.960 Cassias family for generations. Austra's father was a critic of 0:04:29.000 --> 0:04:32.720 the National Party. He spent nearly five years in jail 0:04:33.000 --> 0:04:37.880 as a dissident. Austra would grow up to work as 0:04:37.920 --> 0:04:42.479 a midwife. She guesses she delivered something like five thousand 0:04:42.560 --> 0:04:46.360 babies over sixty years. Most of them were born in 0:04:46.400 --> 0:04:52.200 the countryside in small indigenous communities in the nineteen seventies 0:04:52.200 --> 0:04:56.360 and eighties. Her youngest daughter often could be found at 0:04:56.400 --> 0:05:03.440 her side, the depicting am Anna from when she was 0:05:03.520 --> 0:05:08.040 little would come with me, sometimes attending their births she'd 0:05:08.040 --> 0:05:11.120 hold a little candle to give me light because there 0:05:11.200 --> 0:05:15.400 was no electricity, and she'd bring me water she boiled it, 0:05:15.880 --> 0:05:18.880 and that's how she became aware that working on behalf 0:05:18.880 --> 0:05:27.400 of women was a necessity. Women, indigenous communities, the poor. 0:05:28.000 --> 0:05:31.280 These had been the underdogs in Honduras, the people that 0:05:31.440 --> 0:05:36.240 history hadn't been kind to. They inspired Austra to get 0:05:36.279 --> 0:05:39.719 involved in politics, and this was at a time when 0:05:39.760 --> 0:05:44.839 women in Honduras almost never did this. Austra became the 0:05:44.920 --> 0:05:50.000 first female mayor of La Speranza, then a provincial governor, 0:05:50.760 --> 0:05:56.080 later a member of the Honduran National Congress. Erta watched 0:05:56.120 --> 0:06:00.960 and learned, and as she got older, her own personality emerged. 0:06:01.680 --> 0:06:05.000 Her mother had raised her Catholic, but as Berta grew up, 0:06:05.400 --> 0:06:10.760 she began embracing Lenka traditions. The Lenka are the largest 0:06:10.800 --> 0:06:15.880 indigenous group in Honduras, but their language and traditions were 0:06:15.960 --> 0:06:22.120 largely lost obliterated by modern mainstream culture. This happened well 0:06:22.160 --> 0:06:26.080 before Berta was born, but an effort to reclaim and 0:06:26.160 --> 0:06:30.800 protect those traditions really started taking off in the nineteen eighties. 0:06:31.000 --> 0:06:35.719 When Berta was a teenager. She embraced that movement and 0:06:35.800 --> 0:06:39.920 it helps shape her identity as a student activist. Her 0:06:39.960 --> 0:06:42.719 older brother says, by the time they were in high 0:06:42.720 --> 0:06:47.240 school together, he knew his sister was a leader and 0:06:47.279 --> 0:06:54.359 a rebel too. Yeah, it was ACiE. She was the 0:06:54.440 --> 0:06:58.240 president of her class and later of an entire school system, 0:06:58.279 --> 0:07:01.080 and if ever they expelled from it unfairly, she was 0:07:01.160 --> 0:07:04.200 always fighting for them. She even let us strike that 0:07:04.320 --> 0:07:06.640 we called against the school directors, who were in a 0:07:06.680 --> 0:07:14.360 way dictatorial. Dictatorial back then, in the eighties and early nineties, 0:07:14.880 --> 0:07:20.000 neighboring El Salvador was torn by civil war. The Cassari's 0:07:20.080 --> 0:07:24.480 family sympathized with the leftist rebels there, the ones fighting 0:07:24.560 --> 0:07:29.760 against the Salvadoran government. The family sheltered refugees in their home. 0:07:30.840 --> 0:07:34.320 After bear To graduated high school, she traveled to El 0:07:34.360 --> 0:07:38.240 Salvador to join the cause. She didn't take up arms, 0:07:38.920 --> 0:07:42.080 but she supported fighting units as a sort of field 0:07:42.080 --> 0:07:47.320 medic and radio operator. Bearts a return to Lasperanza in 0:07:48.880 --> 0:07:52.320 after less than a year in El Salvador. At home, 0:07:52.640 --> 0:07:56.920 she continued to embrace leftist causes. Members of the local 0:07:56.960 --> 0:08:01.640 police and the military now considered her a political agitator, 0:08:02.160 --> 0:08:07.040 and their suspicions extended to the whole Castra's family. Berta's 0:08:07.080 --> 0:08:12.440 brother remembers how encounters that seemed innocent at first could 0:08:12.480 --> 0:08:20.760 take unexpected turns Ama someone knocked on the door here 0:08:20.920 --> 0:08:23.680 and asked Mama if she would come and assist with 0:08:23.720 --> 0:08:29.240 a birth because Austra agreed to go with them in 0:08:29.280 --> 0:08:33.719 a taxi, but it was a trap. Police and soldiers 0:08:34.000 --> 0:08:38.079 surrounded the car and hauled her into the station. Barta 0:08:38.200 --> 0:08:41.360 was just nineteen or twenty years old when she heard 0:08:41.400 --> 0:08:50.760 her mother had been arrested. She snapped into action. Bertita 0:08:50.800 --> 0:08:53.760 started calling around town and the people started to mobilize. 0:08:54.160 --> 0:08:56.800 It was Betta who went to the police station arguing 0:08:56.800 --> 0:08:59.840 for Mama. Fighting for Mama. There was a protest with 0:08:59.880 --> 0:09:02.760 a about three thousand people there. They took over the 0:09:03.080 --> 0:09:06.520 entire police station to the Amanda release of Mama, and 0:09:06.559 --> 0:09:10.160 it was organized by Bertita and my other siblings did. 0:09:18.320 --> 0:09:21.719 By her early twenties, Marita was on her way to 0:09:21.840 --> 0:09:26.160 becoming the loudest voice for indigenous and women's rights in 0:09:26.240 --> 0:09:31.680 western Honduras, and by her thirties she'd become a national figure. 0:09:33.440 --> 0:09:36.880 She often traveled to the capital to goose Galpa to 0:09:37.040 --> 0:09:42.200 lobby for her causes. After President manuel's Eliah was elected 0:09:42.200 --> 0:09:47.280 in two thousand six, her influence grew. She wasn't a 0:09:47.280 --> 0:09:51.080 member of his party, but he sometimes supported her opposition 0:09:51.200 --> 0:09:56.200 to mining and hydro electric projects on indigenous lands, and 0:09:56.280 --> 0:10:01.800 she supported his proposal to rewrite the country constitution, a 0:10:01.880 --> 0:10:07.760 move that caused the Honduran establishment to rebel against Zaliah's administration. 0:10:08.679 --> 0:10:13.400 The Honduran military in particular, considered it a threat to 0:10:13.480 --> 0:10:20.280 the country's traditional order. Then, on June two thousand nine 0:10:20.800 --> 0:10:25.920 on during politics and the trajectory of Berta's life took 0:10:26.080 --> 0:10:30.360 a very sharp turn. It all began at dawn on Sunday, 0:10:30.400 --> 0:10:33.600 when some two hundred soldiers surrounded the president's private home. 0:10:33.920 --> 0:10:36.440 They took him at gunpoint and flew him out of 0:10:36.480 --> 0:10:41.920 the country to neighbor in Costa Rica, soldiers kidnapped President Zeliah. 0:10:42.559 --> 0:10:46.480 They smuggled him out of the country in his pajamas. 0:10:47.200 --> 0:10:51.600 The National Party, the same one that had imprisoned Berta's grandfather, 0:10:52.160 --> 0:10:57.480 took power instantly. Berta became a national leader of a 0:10:57.640 --> 0:11:08.920 new resistance movement. When the military oversaw a new round 0:11:08.960 --> 0:11:13.000 of elections, Barton and others urged the public to boycott 0:11:13.080 --> 0:11:16.640 the vote. She said, the same people who launched a 0:11:16.640 --> 0:11:21.480 coup couldn't be trusted to make the process fair. Hundreds 0:11:21.480 --> 0:11:26.080 of local and national candidates dropped out, but the election 0:11:26.120 --> 0:11:31.200 went ahead anyway. The National Party consolidated its power and 0:11:31.240 --> 0:11:35.359 now fully in control of the presidency and the National Congress. 0:11:35.840 --> 0:11:38.760 The party's leaders wanted to send a message to the world. 0:11:39.520 --> 0:11:42.360 They wanted other countries to know that things would be 0:11:42.400 --> 0:11:48.199 different here from now on. The government adopted a new catchphrase, 0:11:48.760 --> 0:11:52.520 and it was in English, as if composed especially for 0:11:52.600 --> 0:11:59.000 a foreign audience. The slogan was h O B. Honduras 0:11:59.120 --> 0:12:09.280 is open for business. For business in the new Honduran 0:12:09.360 --> 0:12:13.320 government held an international business conference to sell the idea 0:12:13.520 --> 0:12:18.400 to investors. The new leader of Congress, Juan Orlando Hernandez, 0:12:18.840 --> 0:12:22.400 told the audience that Honduras was prepared to cash in 0:12:23.000 --> 0:12:31.360 on one of its most valuable natural resources. We have 0:12:31.400 --> 0:12:34.199 to take advantage of the enormous potential of our rivers 0:12:34.360 --> 0:12:38.200 to build large dams and medium sized dams, and we've 0:12:38.200 --> 0:12:41.720 awarded around fifty contracts for clean energy with a clear 0:12:41.760 --> 0:12:43.720 message that this is the route we want to take 0:12:43.760 --> 0:12:51.520 moving forward. For moments, I had Clara the Honduran business 0:12:51.559 --> 0:12:55.560 elite rallied together to create companies that would build these 0:12:55.600 --> 0:13:01.520 new hydro electric projects. One of these companies was called Dessa. 0:13:01.760 --> 0:13:04.240 The government gave it the go ahead to build a 0:13:04.360 --> 0:13:08.280 dam on the Gualcrate River, a few hours drive from 0:13:08.360 --> 0:13:13.920 Las Bonanza. The project was called I was Zarca, and 0:13:14.000 --> 0:13:18.080 as soon as that project was set, Dessa was on 0:13:18.120 --> 0:13:22.760 a collision course with Berta. The Awa Zarka project was 0:13:22.800 --> 0:13:27.480 considered a small dam by industry standards. The original plans 0:13:27.640 --> 0:13:30.360 called for a damn wall that was about forty six 0:13:30.400 --> 0:13:33.400 ft tall. At its highest point, there was to be 0:13:33.480 --> 0:13:37.400 a mile long tunnel, a reservoir, and a power station. 0:13:38.480 --> 0:13:41.640 Berta and the Rio Blanco residents who opposed the project 0:13:42.280 --> 0:13:46.480 argued that the impacts would be devastating. The dam would 0:13:46.520 --> 0:13:49.439 disrupt the flow of the river and degrade the land 0:13:49.480 --> 0:13:54.160 they depended on for crops. But beyond those environmental impacts, 0:13:54.760 --> 0:13:58.559 they argued that the Rio Gualcrate is sacred to the 0:13:58.640 --> 0:14:02.800 link of people. They say the river is their life blood. 0:14:04.480 --> 0:14:10.120 But almost everything about the project violated Berta's worldview. The 0:14:10.160 --> 0:14:15.000 government was saying that this private company DSA would finally 0:14:15.080 --> 0:14:19.040 bring critical infrastructure to the tiny communities by the river, 0:14:19.920 --> 0:14:25.080 paved roads, electricity, schools. But in a radio interview in 0:14:26.440 --> 0:14:29.680 less than a year before she died, bear to explain 0:14:29.800 --> 0:14:33.160 that she hated that idea. She didn't want to leave 0:14:33.200 --> 0:14:35.880 those sorts of things to a company that was not 0:14:36.080 --> 0:14:44.960 subject to public oversight. This is the obligation of the state, 0:14:45.240 --> 0:14:49.120 of the government. We pay taxes for that. But if 0:14:49.160 --> 0:14:52.760 communities have a school, it's usually only because they fought 0:14:52.840 --> 0:14:55.360 and worked for it. So this is the duty of 0:14:55.400 --> 0:14:57.320 the state. It's not that you have to go to 0:14:57.360 --> 0:14:59.320 a private company for the right to have a road 0:15:00.000 --> 0:15:07.880 the indicated Helona company. So many of Berta's preoccupations as 0:15:07.880 --> 0:15:13.360 an activist came together in this project. Her environmentalism, her 0:15:13.400 --> 0:15:17.760 skepticism that a for profit business could reliably serve the 0:15:17.920 --> 0:15:21.320 public interest, and then there was the politics of it all. 0:15:22.080 --> 0:15:25.160 All of this was backed by the National Party, a 0:15:25.200 --> 0:15:29.640 group her family had been fighting for generations. It seemed 0:15:29.680 --> 0:15:33.520 like Berta's whole life had led her straight toward a reckoning. 0:15:33.760 --> 0:15:47.120 On that river. You can run for it. Oh, I'm 0:15:47.160 --> 0:15:51.200 in a van and it's January. More than three years 0:15:51.240 --> 0:15:55.480 after Berta was killed, a member of Copeine, Berta's activist 0:15:55.600 --> 0:15:58.720 organization is with me, as well as a guide who's 0:15:58.760 --> 0:16:02.480 a friend of the casserous Emily. We're heading towards Rio Blanco, 0:16:02.960 --> 0:16:07.080 a town near the Gualcrate River. The plan for today 0:16:07.160 --> 0:16:10.440 is to meet people who worked alongside Bertha. I was 0:16:10.520 --> 0:16:13.840 warned that this trip could be risky. There's only one 0:16:13.920 --> 0:16:17.360 road that leads to Rio Blanco, the activists say. Locals 0:16:17.360 --> 0:16:20.400 who supported the Agua Zarka project have been known to 0:16:20.560 --> 0:16:25.880 attack people they believe are connected to Copeine. While we're driving, 0:16:26.120 --> 0:16:30.000 it starts to rain, and soon, just a couple of 0:16:30.040 --> 0:16:33.960 miles before we reach our destination, our van gets stuck 0:16:34.120 --> 0:16:38.960 on a muddy road in precisely the worst place to 0:16:39.080 --> 0:16:43.360 get stuck. We're directly in front of a group of houses. 0:16:44.000 --> 0:16:47.360 The activists tell me most of the attacks have happened 0:16:47.440 --> 0:16:53.520 Right here. Inside the van is Raoul, my copine friendly guide, 0:16:53.840 --> 0:16:57.640 and an activist named Dunia. They huddled together trying to 0:16:57.680 --> 0:17:01.640 brainstorm away out of this jam. Okay, so I'm saying, 0:17:01.640 --> 0:17:04.480 what options do we have? Um? She said, and I said, 0:17:04.520 --> 0:17:08.480 what about if we get beasts? And then she says 0:17:08.880 --> 0:17:11.680 the problem will be leaving the car here, because they 0:17:11.680 --> 0:17:15.919 have even attempted to set coping cars on fire, and 0:17:16.000 --> 0:17:18.720 there were only reason they couldn't set it on fire 0:17:18.840 --> 0:17:22.760 was because there was a crowd here like looking at 0:17:22.800 --> 0:17:28.880 the car. That would not be good. One option we 0:17:29.000 --> 0:17:32.600 don't have is calling someone. Our cell phones are not 0:17:32.760 --> 0:17:36.240 getting reception. And as we sit stuck in the mud, 0:17:36.800 --> 0:17:40.320 several people begin coming out of their homes. I see 0:17:40.400 --> 0:17:42.760 someone pacing at the top of the hill. Our van 0:17:42.880 --> 0:17:46.080 wasn't able to climb dune. You grew up around here, 0:17:46.359 --> 0:17:50.359 and she recognizes his face. So here's a guy on 0:17:50.400 --> 0:17:54.240 the hill top kind of walking around here with a machete. 0:17:54.480 --> 0:17:57.720 And she said that that guy his family has been 0:17:58.160 --> 0:18:06.680 harassing her family. It's not looking good. She's a little 0:18:06.680 --> 0:18:13.720 bit concerned about being attacked. It's really hard to stop 0:18:13.760 --> 0:18:17.480 looking at that machete, and pretty soon we noticed that 0:18:17.560 --> 0:18:22.160 he's not the only person carrying one. In rural Honduras, 0:18:22.240 --> 0:18:25.879 machetes are a pretty common sight for farmers here. It's 0:18:25.960 --> 0:18:29.119 just a tool of the trade. But in the conflict 0:18:29.160 --> 0:18:33.440 over the Awazarka Damn, machetes have been a weapon of choice. 0:18:34.400 --> 0:18:38.320 Our driver, Rony, sits still for a moment behind the wheel, 0:18:38.640 --> 0:18:42.879 letting everything sink in. Then he slams his palm onto 0:18:42.920 --> 0:18:47.320 the side of his head three times, almost tass Ronnie, 0:18:48.720 --> 0:18:54.960 almost bass see how he was, and he said stressed. 0:18:56.600 --> 0:19:00.439 So here we are trapped. The vans, we ehels are 0:19:00.480 --> 0:19:05.399 spinning and spraying mud everywhere, but we're not budging. And 0:19:05.440 --> 0:19:08.040 all the while more people keep coming out of the 0:19:08.080 --> 0:19:14.240 houses and they just stand there staring at us. This 0:19:14.359 --> 0:19:24.480 goes on for about forty five minutes. The standoff is 0:19:24.520 --> 0:19:29.119 an appropriate introduction to Rio Blanco. The threat of violence 0:19:29.440 --> 0:19:34.880 has become this community's defining feature. Eventually, some people approach 0:19:34.960 --> 0:19:39.960 the van from behind. DOONI recognizes them, their friends. They 0:19:40.000 --> 0:19:42.320 offer us a ride in a truck that's a lot 0:19:42.359 --> 0:19:45.879 more agile in the mud than our vehicle. We hopped 0:19:45.880 --> 0:19:49.679 in and make it up the little hill, pass the 0:19:49.760 --> 0:20:06.400 staring onlookers and pass their machetes. Safe. Before the damn 0:20:06.480 --> 0:20:09.159 came into our community, this was a community that was 0:20:09.280 --> 0:20:12.240 nice and clean. We were able to go out onto 0:20:12.280 --> 0:20:15.119 the road in the dark. And now we can't, or 0:20:15.160 --> 0:20:18.000 we can't, but we're torn to pieces. So that's why, 0:20:18.119 --> 0:20:21.280 and even now it's still the case. This damn came 0:20:21.320 --> 0:20:28.920 in and tore our community apart. There's this was one 0:20:28.920 --> 0:20:32.399 of the people we'd come to see. Maria Santo Dominguez, 0:20:33.160 --> 0:20:35.800 like everyone else in this tiny village. She lives in 0:20:35.800 --> 0:20:39.879 a cramped cinder block house. Pigs and chickens root in 0:20:39.920 --> 0:20:43.119 the yard by the outhouse. Sometimes they try to wander 0:20:43.160 --> 0:20:47.240 in the front door. When officials from Deessa, the hydro 0:20:47.320 --> 0:20:53.080 Electric company, came here in they promised electricity, new roads, 0:20:53.119 --> 0:20:56.680 and new schools. Some of the locals welcomed that attention, 0:20:57.160 --> 0:21:01.919 but Maria was skeptical. Her family got water from the 0:21:01.960 --> 0:21:06.520 Gualcaque River they grew corn along its banks. When Bert 0:21:06.640 --> 0:21:11.479 Casseres began organizing local opposition to the project, Maria became 0:21:11.520 --> 0:21:17.800 one of her most loyal companions. If we weren't organized, 0:21:17.800 --> 0:21:20.919 we wouldn't still be here, because the damn, it's a 0:21:21.000 --> 0:21:28.560 dam of death. Dessa had hired Sino Hydro, a Chinese contractor, 0:21:28.600 --> 0:21:33.960 to handle construction. In early Sino Hydro established a work 0:21:34.040 --> 0:21:37.480 site a couple of miles from Maria's house. She worked 0:21:37.480 --> 0:21:41.360 with Copeine to help erect roadblocks to prevent construction equipment 0:21:41.440 --> 0:21:45.000 from moving in and out, but some of Maria's neighbors, 0:21:45.520 --> 0:21:51.960 the ones who supported the project took offense. Things come 0:21:52.040 --> 0:21:56.399 to a head that summer. One morning, Maria is walking 0:21:56.440 --> 0:22:01.440 beside a dirt road when several neighbors surround her, three men, 0:22:01.840 --> 0:22:06.320 two women. The men are holding machetes, the women carry 0:22:06.520 --> 0:22:11.280 heavy sticks. They tell her she's strangling the local economy. 0:22:12.440 --> 0:22:20.760 What else, That's why we live in poverty, they told me, 0:22:21.080 --> 0:22:23.080 because I don't allow projects to come in that would 0:22:23.119 --> 0:22:25.680 help everyone. And I told them, no, you're so wrong, 0:22:26.240 --> 0:22:29.399 because what they're doing will only contaminate the water, the land. 0:22:30.320 --> 0:22:32.280 They told me, okay, woman, what we're going to do 0:22:32.320 --> 0:22:34.560 is kill you. And when they told me they were 0:22:34.560 --> 0:22:36.440 going to kill me, that's when I felt the first blow. 0:22:37.000 --> 0:22:38.960 The first strike of the machete hit me in the head, 0:22:39.440 --> 0:22:42.240 and after that another machete hit me here in the chest, 0:22:42.880 --> 0:22:53.040 and then there was another that got my finger. That 0:22:53.080 --> 0:22:57.000 finger falls away, severed. She's bleeding from wounds in her 0:22:57.080 --> 0:23:00.320 chest and her head. As Maria is being attacked, her 0:23:00.359 --> 0:23:04.040 husband arrives on the scene. The attackers turn on him. 0:23:04.160 --> 0:23:07.160 They slash him with a machete, heading into his hand, 0:23:07.440 --> 0:23:17.920 his forehead, and the skin around his left eye. When 0:23:17.920 --> 0:23:20.720 the carnage is over, the two of them are rushed 0:23:20.800 --> 0:23:25.119 to a hospital. They spend eight days they're recovering. Maria 0:23:25.200 --> 0:23:28.800 says they were still healing when a fellow coping activist 0:23:28.880 --> 0:23:33.399 named Thomas Garcia helps organize an impromptu protest at the 0:23:33.400 --> 0:23:37.880 Sino Hydro construction site. Maria refers to Thomas as her 0:23:38.400 --> 0:23:41.480 ermano or brother in the sense that they were fighting 0:23:41.520 --> 0:23:48.840 for the same cause. And yeah, so the day before that, 0:23:48.960 --> 0:23:56.760 the police came and they offered my brother twenty lympidas 0:23:57.240 --> 0:24:00.600 twenty thousand lympires at the time was worth about four 0:24:00.640 --> 0:24:03.760 hundred and fifty dollars. That's a lot of money in 0:24:03.800 --> 0:24:06.560 a place like this, more than a month's worth of 0:24:06.600 --> 0:24:10.440 income for a lot of people, Maria says. Tomas Garcia 0:24:10.720 --> 0:24:14.640 refused the offer. She says he considered it a bribe, 0:24:15.280 --> 0:24:18.680 something to make sure he wouldn't stir up trouble for Deessa. 0:24:19.160 --> 0:24:22.639 She says, the company and the local police seemed to 0:24:22.640 --> 0:24:29.239 be working together. Company officials vehemently deny these allegations, and 0:24:29.240 --> 0:24:32.240 we will fully explore their version of these events later 0:24:32.400 --> 0:24:39.040 in this series. But Maria insists the offer was a bribe, 0:24:37.600 --> 0:24:42.200 and so my brother said that there was no way 0:24:42.240 --> 0:24:45.120 he was ever going to negotiate that he wasn't going 0:24:45.160 --> 0:24:48.160 to go against his partners in this struggle. He said, 0:24:48.160 --> 0:24:51.160 if he dies, it's better to die clean. He could 0:24:51.160 --> 0:24:56.920 never get involved in that kind of negotiating. The next 0:24:57.000 --> 0:25:01.840 day is July, the of the protest, and it will 0:25:01.880 --> 0:25:04.679 define the conflict on the river up until the moment 0:25:04.760 --> 0:25:08.680 where it gets killed. That morning, Thomas and the other 0:25:08.720 --> 0:25:11.439 protesters gathered near the village to make the track to 0:25:11.520 --> 0:25:18.280 the construction site. Thomas's seventeen year old son Alan tagged along. Today, 0:25:18.440 --> 0:25:27.440 Alan is twenty four years old. From there, we started 0:25:27.480 --> 0:25:30.920 to leave at exactly eight o'clock in the morning, and 0:25:31.000 --> 0:25:35.240 we arrived at the site around ten o'clock. There we 0:25:35.440 --> 0:25:39.640 found soldiers and police and some of the officials from 0:25:39.640 --> 0:25:45.760 the company. Just then when we entered the site, they 0:25:45.800 --> 0:25:50.680 shot my father, well, they assassinated him and they shot 0:25:50.760 --> 0:25:53.960 me too. It was a soldier from see what the pick? 0:25:57.880 --> 0:26:08.840 So that easy what the pick. The security force that 0:26:08.920 --> 0:26:11.480 protected the work site was a mix of civilian and 0:26:11.560 --> 0:26:15.600 military guards. Alan disputes the story that the soldier who 0:26:15.640 --> 0:26:18.879 fired the shots later told the guards said he fired 0:26:18.920 --> 0:26:22.240 in self defense because Alan's father was threatening him with 0:26:22.280 --> 0:26:27.080 a machete. Alan survived three gunshot wounds to the chest 0:26:27.359 --> 0:26:33.480 and back. His father was killed instantly. So even now, 0:26:33.840 --> 0:26:38.240 nearly seven years after those incidents, the wounds still feel 0:26:38.280 --> 0:26:43.240 fresh for those who lived through them. After my first 0:26:43.280 --> 0:26:46.800 trip to Rio Blanco with Copaine members, I returned about 0:26:46.800 --> 0:26:50.600 a week later. This time I wanted a different perspective. 0:26:51.240 --> 0:26:54.040 I was with community members who had supported the Damn 0:26:54.040 --> 0:26:58.080 project and Desa. The roads had dried out by now, 0:26:58.760 --> 0:27:01.000 but I was shocked when they drove me to the 0:27:01.080 --> 0:27:04.479 exact spot where the van had been stuck the week before. 0:27:05.400 --> 0:27:08.119 They led me on foot towards the very house that 0:27:08.200 --> 0:27:12.720 Copeine had described as the most dangerous one in Rio Blanco. 0:27:14.080 --> 0:27:16.560 They told me this was the home of the Madrid family. 0:27:17.160 --> 0:27:21.879 I recognized the name. Reports by various nonprofit groups outlining 0:27:21.920 --> 0:27:25.399 the tensions here had mentioned the Madrids. One report I 0:27:25.440 --> 0:27:29.119 had read from said the family had tried to intimidate 0:27:29.160 --> 0:27:34.760 opponents of the Damn through quote constant harassment. It was 0:27:34.800 --> 0:27:37.320 the Madrid's who had sold Dessa the land that would 0:27:37.359 --> 0:27:40.680 become its work site. This was a family that clearly 0:27:41.200 --> 0:27:45.760 and emphatically sided with the company. As I approached the 0:27:45.800 --> 0:27:49.480 Madrid house, coffee beans were drying in the sun. We 0:27:49.560 --> 0:27:52.280 walked around the back of the house. There we found 0:27:52.280 --> 0:27:56.959 the family matriarch, sixty four year old Erinea Madrid. She 0:27:57.080 --> 0:28:00.600 was washing her hair in a cistern she'd held off, 0:28:01.000 --> 0:28:04.919 combed her hair and we sat down to talk a 0:28:04.960 --> 0:28:11.040 Milion Massa Lanco. The family that has been the most 0:28:11.080 --> 0:28:14.880 affected in Rio Blanco has been the Madrid family, all 0:28:14.880 --> 0:28:20.359 because the institution of Copine, that lady Berta Cases came 0:28:20.480 --> 0:28:24.720 here and poisoned the people. These ignorant people, ignorant of 0:28:24.760 --> 0:28:27.840 a project that was going to move this community forward, 0:28:28.280 --> 0:28:33.560 because she was only looking for benefits for herself. Solo 0:28:34.960 --> 0:28:38.280 Aarona was inside this house the day of the tragic 0:28:38.320 --> 0:28:45.720 protest in when the conflict carved permanent riffs in this community. 0:28:47.160 --> 0:28:50.280 The fifteenth of July was a Monday. I can never 0:28:50.320 --> 0:28:55.360 forget it. It was Monday, and they marched by here, yelling, yelling, yelling, 0:28:55.760 --> 0:29:03.840 until they got to the work site Ritundo. No more 0:29:03.880 --> 0:29:07.600 than an hour later, just after Thomas and Alan Garcia 0:29:07.720 --> 0:29:11.920 had been shot, she heard more commotion. It was coming 0:29:11.960 --> 0:29:16.440 from the field directly behind the house. Her grandson Christiane 0:29:16.840 --> 0:29:22.520 had just headed down there and so the boy walks 0:29:22.560 --> 0:29:25.400 down there. We have a pasture and there are cows 0:29:25.440 --> 0:29:30.640 down there that the boy takes care of. Every day. 0:29:31.040 --> 0:29:33.760 Christiane would milk the cows and give some to the 0:29:33.760 --> 0:29:38.040 workers at the Sino Hydro site. They're in that pasture 0:29:38.120 --> 0:29:41.000 with the cows. A group of men returning from the 0:29:41.040 --> 0:29:49.280 deadly protest encountered the boy. Joey. I heard the shots, 0:29:49.480 --> 0:29:52.360 but never did I imagine, Never did it cross my 0:29:52.400 --> 0:29:54.760 mind that these people were going to repay me in 0:29:54.800 --> 0:29:57.600 this way, because I before the eyes of my God, 0:29:57.680 --> 0:30:00.840 I feel that I had freely eaten and drank them freely, 0:30:00.960 --> 0:30:03.840 as with all my friends. Never could I have imagined 0:30:03.960 --> 0:30:06.560 they'd pay me like this by killing that boy who 0:30:06.600 --> 0:30:14.320 had nothing to do with this Copeene denies involvement in 0:30:14.360 --> 0:30:19.080 that killing, but Aarona is convinced that the protesters took 0:30:19.120 --> 0:30:24.200 the boy's life in exchange for Thomas Garcias Christian was 0:30:24.280 --> 0:30:28.760 fourteen years old, his mother had died giving birth to him. 0:30:28.880 --> 0:30:33.000 Erna was technically his grandmother, but she'd raised him as 0:30:33.000 --> 0:30:37.160 her son. As aaron Ea tells me the story, I 0:30:37.240 --> 0:30:39.520 noticed there's a picture of a boy on the wall 0:30:39.680 --> 0:30:43.720 behind her. As she talks He's wearing a blue suit 0:30:43.800 --> 0:30:49.440 and tie. A caption printed above the image reads, Christiane, 0:30:50.240 --> 0:31:03.200 you live in the heart of our family and the Belos. 0:31:03.320 --> 0:31:05.920 I took hold of him eight hours after he was born, 0:31:06.240 --> 0:31:08.760 and so that's why this has cost me so many tears. 0:31:09.480 --> 0:31:11.600 I said to God, leave him for me, because I 0:31:11.640 --> 0:31:22.840 need him in my life, you know, I mean, my boy, 0:31:22.920 --> 0:31:26.360 how can it be? And it hurts me? These things 0:31:26.360 --> 0:31:36.400 they've done are unfair. Yo. I have not been able 0:31:36.440 --> 0:31:39.600 to overcome this, the death of my son. It's already 0:31:39.720 --> 0:32:02.560 six years ago, but for me, it's like it was yesterday. Yeah, okay, 0:32:02.840 --> 0:32:08.160 Number Sergio Roriez. My name is Sergio Rodriguez. I'm a biologist. 0:32:09.280 --> 0:32:12.560 I've been a consultant studying environmental impacts all of my 0:32:12.640 --> 0:32:20.200 life twenty years, and I started working Fordessa in June 0:32:20.320 --> 0:32:26.600 two thousand twelve. Then don't mean if the Awa Zarca 0:32:26.680 --> 0:32:29.920