Homero Gómez González, who manages El Rosario Sanctuary in the mountains of Michoacàn, Mexico, hasn’t been seen since January 13. His family reported him missing the next day and have received calls demanding money for his safe return.
Relatives of Mr Gómez told local media that the conservationist had received threats from an organised crime gang.
Rights groups had earlier said they feared that Mr Gómez may have been targeted because of his fight against illegal logging, one of the activities that criminal gangs in the area are involved in.
Mr Gómez is a tireless campaigner for the conservation of the monarch butterfly and the pine and fir forests where it hibernates.
Two hundred volunteers searched for him and found no clues. Another search team is using rescue dogs. Michoacàn state is notorious for violent criminal gangs that often coerce the police into working for them.
Prosecutors said they had detained the entire police forces of Ocampo and neighbouring Angangueo for questioning.
Prosecutors have not said why they suspect the local police officers of involvement in Mr Gómez's disappearance.
It is not the first time the police force of Ocampo has been detained for questioning. In June 2018, 27 officers were arrested on suspicion of involvement in the murder of a local politician who was running for mayor.
People in Rosario suspect illegal loggers kidnapped him. They know that people who are desaparecido (disappeared) rarely are seen again.
An official with Michoacán’s human rights commission, Mayte Cardona, said that although the circumstances of his disappearance are still unknown, it is likely that it was related to his conservation work.
“He was probably hurting the [business] interests of people illegally logging in the area,” she told Reuters.
Those who have worked with Gómez said that his efforts have been invaluable to the monarch butterfly species….
Gómez, previously the ejido (mayor) of Angangueo now the manager of the Sanctuary, was instrumental in developing El Rosario for eco-tourism. He has led reforestation efforts in the overwintering area and, with volunteers, has replanted a million oyamel fir, the tree favored by monarchs for roost sites.
Illegal logging (and climate change) is the main threat to the monarchs’ winter habitat high in the Sierra Madre mountains.
In September [2016] a special unit of the Mexican police — 220 policeman and 40 forestry inspectors with a helicopter — raided and shut down seven sawmills near Ocampo. They seized 231 cubic feet of wood and estimated that closing these mills saves 116,538 cubic feet of wood annually, the equivalent of 300 logging truck loads. No one was arrested as mill operators ran off before the police arrived, suggesting they had advance warning. In countries like Mexico, local people often know when raids of any kind are approaching. For generations their safety has depended upon being alert. It isn’t that people don’t want the monarchs to survive, it’s that their own lives are hard although their village is in a lovely valley setting below the mountain crest. What is now the Reserve was and still is their land, but now they are restricted in how they use the land.