The City of Suspects: Crime in Mexico City, 1900-1931 was written by Pablo Piccato, where he focuses on all aspects of crime in the early 20th century. Along with his own reasoning he uses other historians works, as well as court records, police records, and few individual encounters. Piccato organizes his book into three main sections that are comprised of two to three chapters in each section. Section II: “ The Practices” includes chapter four (“Honor and Violent Crime”), Chapter five (“Violence against Women”), and finally chapter 6 (“Money, Crime, and Social Reactions to Larceny”). This section and chapters will be used to discuss crimes of honor. Also this section will be used to answer the questions, how working class and poor Mexicans resolve disputes, as well as, when and why did they resort to the legal system?
Throughout section II, in City of Suspects, crimes of honor is often referred to, so what were honor crimes? A good preface to help understand crimes of honor though would be to understand the principle of honor itself. On page 80, Piccato uses a quote from Julian A. Rivers that defines honor as, “the value of a person in his own eyes, but also in the eyes of his society.” Piccato presents the idea of crimes of honor in a decently broad topic. He approaches his reasonings and inferences from the “criminal” cases and confrontations that actually happened in 20th century Mexico City. After explaining the confrontations or encounters between figures that resulted in violence, Piccato elaborates details from the scenario that would justify the crime to be one of honor.
Honor being considered, crimes challenging a persons readiness to protect his or her honor ranged from light battery, which could be categorized as a fist fight, all the way to murder. One of the more extreme cases that Piccato writes about is about a conflict that started in a movie theater in 1923, where a man by the name of Carlos Susan who was annoying Francisco Torres’s wife. Torres with decency asked Susan to stop and act in a more appropriate manner to respect the families that were there to enjoy the movie. Although Torres’s kind suggestion did not appeal to Susan, Susan proceeded to threaten Torres and his wife verbally along with slapping Torres.
Eventually Susan invited Torres out side of the theater, where he followed and shot Susan dead. The outcome of the trail led to Torres being unanimously acquitted of the homicide chargers because he was acting in “defense of his honor” defending his wife (Piccato 83). The primary argument behind Piccato’s writing about crimes of honor could be understood in the fact that people would commit the honor crime as a way to protect their self value and the reputation they hold. “The penal code of 1871,” Piccato says, “ reinforced the connection between violence and honor” (Piccato 81). With the legal system being lenient towards the understanding of crimes of honor though it allowed people to use their own interpretations of it within restriction.
How did working class and poor Mexicans resolve disputes? Throughout Section II, along with building an understanding of crimes of honor, Piccato while providing information about violence explains to readers how Mexican citizens went about their violence. This section will help answer the question about how working class and poor Mexicans settled disputes. Piccato implements the fact that the working class and poor Mexicans were more interested in solving problems themselves rather than having the police do it for them, the legal system was their last resort.
Piccato says, “from a distance, fight may have seemed quick and confusing events, and their consequences upsetting and undignified, but in Mexico City they had clear patters that participants acknowledged as rules” (Piccato 88). From that quote it can be understood that Piccato is offering the idea that Mexicans sought to solve their disputes in an proper and equal fashion. Piccato says they did this because, “lower-class contenders had to observe proper behavior to obtain a valid outcome, one that the public would perceive as fair (Piccato 88).” For a dispute to be perceived as fair, he explains, a field of equality must be present.
To support this idea Piccato includes several ways that the level of equality for two contenders where met. First he writes “ a neutral, public place had to be used to guarantee that no one had an advantage” (Piccato 89). “Another key rule of confrontation was that contenders use equivalent weapons” (Piccato 90). More or less Piccato is arguing the fact that Mexicans in sense were resolving their disputes with certain equal guide lines. Although Piccato was limited with his sources by using court records of disputes that were brought to a legal the face, but he uses these in an effective way by elaborating the way the contenders went about the disputes.
When and why did Mexicans resort to the legal system? Theft among the working and lower class society was a very common everyday thing for people living in neighborhoods in Mexico City. Again like previously stated, the victims, as Piccato writes about, were more interested in solving their own problems rather than get the law involved. One reason that Piccato states on page 150, is that “when victims, their neighbors, and relatives caught the offenders, they tried dealing with the problem without calling the police, because official intervention could only increase the distance between them and the suspect” (Piccato 150).
The main argument that Piccato establishes about this, dealing primarily theft, is the victim would try to negotiate with the suspect to regain their belongings and if the victim refused or played bluff that is when the legal system was resorted to. To support this Piccato uses cases that were brought to the police when their property was not returned. One case in particular that Piccato uses is when, “ Manuel Martinez saw Manuel Torres in a Pulqueria wearing the sarape that had jus been stolen from Martinez’s house along with a sewing machine. Before bringing the suspect to the Police station, Martinez ‘begged him to confess where he had put the sewing machine,’ but he refused!” (Piccato 151). Although Piccato never gives the readers the outcome of this specific case, he does write that either belongings or reprimands were often paid to the victims in other cases.
Overall in the course of this book Piccato does a very well job describing the characteristics of the society that was present in early 20th century Mexico City. The sources available to Piccato were mostly documents about cases and police intervention that were brought to the legal system in Mexico City. With that being said there were had to been numerous amounts of scenarios and confrontations that had taken place without documentation. Piccato used what was available to him in sufficient ways that he could make accurate interpretations and reasonings about Crimes of honor, how the disputes were settled and when was the legal system used. All things accounted for Piccato depicts what everyday life included in 20th century Mexico City.
