By Bora Reed

When Layda Negrete stood before the group of Mexican judges and attorneys, she was confident of success. She had received her master’s degree in 1997 from the UC Berkeley and had returned to Mexico to work in judicial reform. Her research had been extensive, based on solid methodology. She clicked through her presentation: 80% of defendants are tried and convicted without ever seeing a judge; 70% of all defendants do not have access to a lawyer. She was sure that her listeners would be convinced. After all, she had statistics on her side.

The response was not what she had expected.

“It was like a bomb had gone off in the room,” she recalls. “[The audience] was enraged. They screamed at me and called me a liar.”

Rather than being deterred, Layda and Roberto Hernandez adopted an alternate strategy. The couple, both doctoral candidates at the Goldman School, began to use film to connect their research to real people and their stories.

“It’s easier to talk about a problem with stories than with abstraction,” says Layda. “It adds a human dimension.”

Their first major project was El Túnel, a 20 minute documentary about the absence of due process fundamentals in the Mexican judicial system. The documentary, written and directed by Roberto, was viewed by an advisor to then President Vicente Fox. Soon politicians and policy makers from all 31 Mexican states and the Districto Federal had made it a key part of the debate on Mexican judicial reform. Eventually, the debate led to an amendment to the Mexican constitution (passed 2008) that included basic due process rights, including presumption of innocence.

Now Roberto and Layda have set their sights on taking their message of judicial reform to a broader audience. They have produced a feature length documentary, Presumed Guilty, which chronicles the story of Antonio “Toño” Zúñiga.

“Toño had been convicted of first degree murder, despite having an airtight alibi,” says Roberto. “He had appealed his case and lost. By the time we met him, he was desperate.” While scrutinizing the case file, Roberto became suspicious that the lawyer who had originally represented Toño had forged his license to practice. Further investigation revealed that Roberto’s hunch had been correct. Based on this new information, Toño was granted a new trial, and Roberto and Layda were granted permission to film the proceedings.

Presumed Guilty debuted at the International Documentary Film Festival in Amsterdam to great acclaim. Roberto and Layda expect the film to find national distribution in Mexico.

“Despite the overwhelming crime problem in Mexico, the average person understands very little about the everyday workings of the system,” says Roberto.

Presumed Guilty not only presents Toño’s story and the day-to-day failures of the Mexican judicial system, but also presents a solution.

“The answer is quite simple, actually,” says Layda. “A transparent trial system, presumption of innocence … countries like Chile have had good success in undertaking judicial reform.”

Roberto agrees. “We want to equip and mobilize, as well as inform,” he says. “The film is our policy memo.”

The project was undertaken with the support of Goldman School of Public Policy Professors Robert MacCoun and Michael O’Hare and was funded by the Hewlett Foundation, the Center for Latin American Studies, UC Berkeley’s Human Rights Center, RENACE ABP, The Jan Vrijman Fund, Fundación Manuel Arango and Beca Gucci Ambulante.

The Center for Latin American Studies supports Presumed Guilty as a part of the center’s feature program: U.S. – Mexico Futures Forum. The Center is organizing a broader public events program, developing of a web portal for Presumed Guilty, and producing publications engaging the issues the film raises.

Now in its eighth year the U.S. – Mexico Futures Forum continues to provide important opportunities for scholars, policy-makers, journalists and non-profit stakeholders to engage in conversation about a variety of issues of critical importance to the United States and Mexico. Forum topics will include transparency, renewable energy, economic integration at a time of crises, and drug policy. For more information please see the U.S. – Mexico Futures Forum Event Series website.