Luis Daniel Prieto, a 34-year-old worker and public opponent of corporate job cuts from the town of Lagos de Moreno in central Mexico, reported to the World Socialist Web Site that thugs sought to break into his home at 1:40 a.m. on February 14.
This is not the first time Prieto has been the victim of attacks which he believes were organized by company thugs. Earlier in February, the WSWS reported that two people beat him bloody in 2018 with a metal pipe outside his house and that the inside of his car was later torched. Prieto believes these attacks were in retribution for his efforts to organize protests against job cuts by Sevige, a private security contractor hired by major companies like Nestlé and German auto-parts maker Draexlmaier.
Now Prieto has come under attack again. The latest provocation comes just 9 days after the WSWS shared his video greetings to the February 9 demonstration in Detroit against GM plant closings.
The Socialist Equality Party (US) condemns these attacks and demands the criminal prosecution of those responsible.
Luis Daniel indicates that he was watching a movie at the time with his partner when they “heard a loud noise, as if a neighbor had fallen upstairs.”
Prieto told the WSWS, “I stood up, checked and saw a hole in the window of the door. I looked through it but didn’t go out since someone could be there to beat me up. My impression, given how loud the thump was, is that they tried to break in, but the door didn’t yield.” He then called 911. Two police officers arrived 40 minutes later and dismissed his concerns that the attacks were politically motivated. “Oh, that’s normal, people want to beat us up all the time too,” Prieto says police told him.
There is evidence indicating the break-in was politically motivated. A few hours after the attempted break in, at 6 a.m., a prosecutor, several lawyers and masked police officers paid a provocative visit to the home of a worker who Prieto had helped defend when Sevige fired her without severance pay.
Prieto organized protests outside of Nestlé after Sevige, Nestlé’s sub-contractor, unjustly fired her. Nearly two years after her case was settled in her favor on April 3, 2017, the company, which Prieto indicates was founded by a former federal police official, Reynaldo Lara, is suddenly ordering her to pay an $8,000 debt that she claims amounts to extortion. The timing of the two attacks, as well as Prieto’s recent video statement, indicate it was not a random act of criminal violence.
The same morning of the two provocations, at about 2 a.m. on February 14, autoworkers at Fisher Dynamics in Matamoros who had also sent a video to the WSWS in support of the February 9 march were attacked by union thugs. Four days later, police violently broke through a picket line of striking workers at Bright Finishing. As threats and reprisals escalate, thousands have been fired in the city since the strike wave began on January 12.
Prieto told the WSWS that the attack was a threat against the entire working class. “Soon, they will not only be breaking windows. They’ll arrest all who oppose the government. We’ll be looking for a solution on how to even open one’s mouth… We need to see reality and not let this happen.” Prieto cited the crackdown in Matamoros, the plant closings in Detroit and the recent desecration of Marx’s grave in London.
US workers who belong to the Steering Committee of the Coalition of Rank-and-File Committees, which organized the February 9 demonstration with the WSWS Autoworker Newsletter, sent statements denouncing the attack against Prieto.
Kathy, an autoworker from Detroit, Michigan, said “We will and are going to make a stand against the barbaric injustice that has taken place in opposition to the thugs’ barbaric actions recently leveled towards you. A threat to one IS a threat to all!
“I was warmed by the video message you sent in support of us on February 9 as well as many other comrades and, as we continue in this international struggle, we are uniting together as united, working-class brothers and sisters of which we will be standing as ONE! We will and can be the world’s MOST POWERFUL force in history! Continue standing proud as we are so very proud of you!”
Steve, a trucker from New York, said: “I extend my support to Luis Daniel Prieto as well as his efforts in taking a stand against the multinational corporations. The North American and world working class—the most powerful force in society—will become aware of this injustice through the WSWS, and workers will not tolerate the thuggish tactics of those in power, for workers know that they will likely face the same situation with the approaching class struggles.”
Another steering committee member, a Michigan-based auto-parts worker, said: “A harm to one is an injury to all. You thugs have attacked our brother, Mr. Luis Daniel Prieto, for his bravery to defend abused brothers and sisters victimized by corporate and union crimes, thinking yourselves immune to accountability from international, ‘working-class’ justice. How wrong indeed is your fallacy thugs, for we are coming for you!”
The World Socialist Web Site will continue to carefully monitor the situation and inform our readers of any further threats and reprisals by corporations, their thugs and political and union hirelings against Luis Daniel, who greeted the messages by the steering committee members saying, “the support is reciprocal.”