is a Mexican
university student who is accused of stabbing his
ex-girlfriend, Érika Peña Coss, and killing her two
young siblings in the City of Monterrey on March 2,
2006. He was captured by police on March 7, 2006, at
a roadblock in Oaxaca.
The
Case
According to Érika, she had
broken-up with Diego for personal reasons, but he
kept calling and seeking her, unable to accept it.
In March 2, 2006, she woke up early in the morning
and found Santoy inside the house wearing a mask.
She said he silenced her and started beating her
with a hammer in the parietal.
He told her he had already killed
her two little siblings and the servant was about to
die from a drug overdose. He supposedly laid by her
side, claiming he wanted to die next to her, but
after thirty minutes nothing happened. This was
later completely refuted by Diego himself. Then, he
asked her to stab him, which she refused to do, so
he threatened to kill her and then commit suicide to
"catch up" with her. He proceeded to stab her in the
neck and the back. Érika was almost dead when Santoy
left.
Allegedly badly hurt- since later
it was stated that her injuries were severe and
required a six hour surgery to save her life- she
crawled to the office in the back of her house and
asked the secretary to call for an ambulance. Diego
had indeed killed her younger siblings and had badly
beaten the servant. While all of this was happening
during a lapse of five hours, during which Azura,
one of Érika's older sisters, assured she didn't
know what was going on.
Nevertheless it has been proved
that if all the above statements had happened, she
would have heard something. Four days later Santoy
was captured by the police at Oaxaca, where he was
found in a bus along with his brother.
While imprisoned, Santoy
confessed to the murders confirming Érika's story.
However, after a few weeks he retracted the
confession stating that he was forced by the
officers to make up the whole story. His version of
the murders points Érika as the killer. According to
Diego, he had a sexual encounters with Erika's
mother. He also claimed that Erika's father offered
him and his daughters marijuana.
Another statement that he has
mentioned is that he was sure the killed children
were of a other father. That, along with many other
accusations and rumors involving abortion and family
fights, have been made to accuse Erika as his
accomplice.
In his confession, she wanted to
kill her siblings in order to take revenge on her
mother and because of material matters, since they
were born to a multimillionaire, owner of a
television company. Santoy said she called him a day
before and asked him to meet at her house at 4:00AM,
as they usually did since her mother was out of
town. Once there, she asked him for help to
exact revenge upon her mother by killing her younger
siblings.
He described to the authorities
the way she stabbed her little brother and
asphyxiated her sister with a rope. After that, they
made a "suicidal pact" which was violated by both.
Erika allegedly asked Diego to kill her, kidnap the
servant, who was locked in the bathroom at the
moment, and kill himself by throwing both himself
and said servant from the Puente Atirantado. He
tried to hit her in the head with a hammer but
didn´t the courage to hit her hard enough. Then he "stabbed"
her (Now it is known that her injuries were so
severe that she most probably would have died) and
was about to do as she told him. But then he
declared that he lacked the courage to kill the
servant and released her from her imprisonment and
even gave her change to take a bus.
Inconsistencies
At the very beginning of the
case, Santoy was seen as the sole suspect of the
crime, but then the focus of the media changed to
include the Peña Coss family too. The public
appearances of the Peña family revealed conducts
typical for a "victim", as many psychologist have
commented on the case.
Many of them asseverate that in a
case of that nature in which a surviving victim had
a relationship with the aggressor, the reaction
would be feeling angry against the aggressor. This
was their current position.
On the other hand, the assertions
they've made, such as Erika's father's affirmation
of "Diego was crazy because of the stars" and
"I saw it all coming and warned Erika; 'This boy
is going to kill you' " weren't quite helpful.
None of them has been seen as "trustworthy" in any
of the interviews since they often contradict each
other, specially the exact time of the crime, as
Erika constantly changed her allegations as her
previous ones claimed she woke up at 7:30AM, as
opposed to her latest declarations that say it was
at 12:00PM, the day of the crime.
Also, both Erika and the servant
claimed to have seen Diego holding a gun and having
a mask covering his face. Neither the gun, the mask
nor the actual weapons that were used have been
found. Thus this, is the fact that a hit inflicted
by a hammer should be able to kill someone, and
someone cold enough to kill two defenseless children
should be able to kill the source of is assumed rage.
Another fore mostly incongruous
statement in all of her acknowledgments is the
appearance of the secretary. Erika firstly said that
she "crawled" into her office -which was located in
her house, as the secretary worked for Teresa Coss-
and pleaded her to call an ambulance.
Contrary to that, Diego declared
that he himself offered Erika to call an ambulance
when he was infructuously trying to kill her. Yet,
the secretary told the authorities that Erika came "normally
walking into her office" and "casually asked her to
call an ambulance" and waited for its arrival by her
side, telling her supposed details on what had
happened. It is also suspicious that she was already
out of the hospital only thirteen days after the
crime was committed.
In January 2007, Santoy
confronted the whole Pena family, the servant and
the secretary during a trial. During said
confrontations it was made public many of the above
statements on the family life-style. Santoy once
again accused her of being the killer and asked her
family to tell the truth about the case.
The Pena Coss family still denies
the allegations and insist it was Diego who killed
the children, while many local Santoy supporters
gathered outside the prison, claiming he is innocent
and denouncing Érika.
Rumours
Uncertain as it is, many people
claim that the children's mother, Teresa Coss has
engaged in sexual relationships with influent people
being Aldo Fasci, Assistant State Prosecutor.
Media attention
Santoy has gained notoriety due
to high levels of media interest in the case and the
even higher rarity of the case. He has been
nicknamed el asesino de Cumbres (the murderer
of Cumbres), Cumbres being the area of Monterrey
where the killings happened.
