García, a reporter for the Mexico City daily newspaper La Tarde, was murdered in the Colonia Guerrero neighborhood by several assailants who ambushed him and shot him in the head five times. García had reported extensively on corruption in the national Attorney General’s Office and among the Federal Judicial Police. In a series of articles published in late 1997, García reported that members of the Federal Judicial Police were collaborating with the Arellano Félix brothers, who run the Tijuana drug cartel.
A few days before the murder, a Federal Judicial Police officer and an army captain interrogated García about his sources, according to an editor at La Tarde. In a 1997 incident, both García and his young son were shot and injured when García’s car was raked with gunfire. Because of widespread suspicion that the Federal Judicial Police may have been involved in the crime, CPJ wrote to President Ernesto Zedillo urging him to appoint a special prosecutor to ensure that the killers are brought to justice.