Case 327: Rodrigo Rosenberg Marzano

*** Content warnings: Gun violence ***Early on the morning of Sunday, May 10 2009, corporate attorney Rodrigo Rosenberg Marzano left home to take a bike ride around his neighbourhood in Guatemala City. Within minutes, he’d been shot dead.
Rodrigo’s friends and family were left reeling by the violent murder, but their shock would only increase when a video emerged one day later of Rodrigo predicting his own murder… and naming the killer…
---
Narration – Anonymous HostResearch & writing – Erin MunroCreative direction – Milly RasoProduction & music – Mike MigasAudio editing – Anthony Telfer
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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
A Cast recommends Hello, this is blind By.

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Please see the show notes for this episode on your
app or on our website. In early May of two

(01:29):
thousand and nine, a prominent Guatemalan attorney named Rodrigo Rosenberg
Marzano began receiving threatening phone calls. The call started on Tuesday,
May five, and always played out the same way Rodrigo's
cell phone would ring, He would answer, and the person
on the other line would issue a menacing message before

(01:50):
terminating the call. These calls came through once or twice
a day and were typically between ten to fifteen seconds long,
just enough time to deliver a death threat. Sometimes the
caller said nothing at all, They just left a heavy,
drawn out silence before hanging up. Most disturbingly of all,

(02:13):
sometimes Rodrigo's phone would ring as soon as he returned
home to his apartment after leaving work for the day.
Just as he answered his phone, the person on the
other end would hang up. The caller didn't block their number,
and Rodrigo could see its unfamiliar digits appear on his
phone screen. Each time they called. He jotted the number

(02:36):
down and passed it on to a longtime friend and mentor,
explaining that he was being stalked and his apartment was
likely under surveillance. Other friends and family members of Rodrigo's
noticed how nervous he seemed during this time. His adult son, Eduardo,
observed how Rodrigo had started looking over his shoulder every

(02:59):
time he got into his car. On Saturday May nine,
five days in to the threatening calls, Rodrigo invited Eduardo
to take a day trip with him to the pretty
colonial city of Antigua, which was popular with tourists. Eduardo
noticed how nervous his father seemed, dithering over which car

(03:19):
they should take for the hour long drive from Guatemala City,
and then constantly glancing anxiously around him when they arrived
at their destination. The final threatening calls from the mysterious
phone number came through early the following morning of Sunday,
May ten. Within minutes of receiving the carps, Rodrigo would

(03:41):
be Dad. The Republic of Guatemala is a Central American

(04:10):
country located immediately south of Mexico. Rich in history and
natural resources, Its striking landscapes are dotted with volcanoes, rainforests,
and sprawling plantations that grow coffee beans, cacao, bananas, and
sugar cane, but the wealth of its land is not

(04:30):
shared by the majority of its people. While Guatemala is
relatively small in terms of size, its population is one
of Central America's largest, and in two thousand and nine,
roughly half of that population lived below the poverty line.
Colonization and exploitation of the country's natural resources have led

(04:51):
to generations of Guatemala's suffering violence, political turmoil, and racism.
In nineteen fifty four, the country's second ever democratically elected
president was overthrown in a coup d'etar orchestrated by the
United States Central Intelligence Agency and a multinational corporation called

(05:12):
the United Fruit Company. They didn't approve of the employment
and agrarian reforms being made by Guatemala's then president. The
United Fruit Company's profits from bananas produced and harvested in
Guatemala were being impacted by the country's softening of exploitive
labour practices. Believing Guatemala's administration was too left leaning and

(05:36):
therefore communist in nature, the CIA installed a right wing
military dictatorship in the foreign country. This ultimately triggered a
four decades long civil war between the military and leftist
rebel groups. More than two hundred thousand Guatemalans were killed
during the civil war and more than seventy thousand disappeared

(05:59):
without a trace. At least ninety percent of the killings
were committed by state military forces or paramilitary death squads,
and every single Guatemalam was affected either directly or indirectly.
By the violence. The military dictatorship finally ended in nineteen
eighty five, with the civil war concluding a decade later,

(06:21):
and a peace accord reached between the government and the
rebels in nineteen ninety six, but life didn't improve for
many Guatemalans. The conclusion of the war had sidelined soldiers
and paramilitary units, so they transitioned from state sanctioned violence
to the illegal kind. They formed organized crime gangs known

(06:44):
as illegal clandestine security apparatuses or sea acts, which trafficked
to drugs, facilitated illegal adoptions, crafted fake passports, kidnapped victims
for ransom, embezzled and launded money, and provided murder for
high services. These criminal networks even infiltrated government and law

(07:05):
enforcement agencies, leading to corruption and chaos at the highest levels.
Instead of violence reducing after the war, it increased. In
two thousand and nine, almost fifteen years after the civil
war ended, the country's homicide rate peaked with forty six
murders per one hundred thousand people. Ninety eight percent of

(07:29):
these crimes would go unsolved, with no arrests or resolution
via the country's justice system. In two thousand and seven,
one United Nations official remarked, Guatemala is a good place
to commit a murder because you will almost certainly get
away with it. The citizens who suffered the most from

(07:54):
Guatemala's instability and discord were members of the indigenous Mayan population,
experienced the brunt of the violence and criminality. Many Mayans
also lived in impoverished conditions, suffering from income inequality, chronic malnutrition,
and lack of education. Guatemala's upper class is mostly made

(08:15):
up of European immigrants and their descendants. In two thousand
and nine, forty seven year old corporate attorney Rodrigo Rosenberg
Marzano was a member of this elite group. Rodrigo was
born six years after the CIA's installation of a dictatorship
toppled Guatemala into chaos, and his parents were very wealthy.

(08:39):
His mother had inherited her money, while his father was
a highly successful businessman. Their wealth allowed Rodrigo to attend
the country's best schools and then later study at England's
University of Cambridge as well as Harvard in the US.
But even as a highly privileged individual, Rodrigo was impacted

(09:01):
by the violence that was so prevalent around him. When
he was eighteen years old, his brother Bobby, was kidnapped
for ransom after being targeted as the child of a
wealthy couple. Before Rodrigo's parents could exchange money for Bobby's release,
his body was found off the side of a road
outside of Guatemala City, the nation's capital, where the family resided.

(09:26):
Bobby's captors were never arrested or charged for his murder.
Despite this family tragedy, Rodrigo went on to obtain his
bachelors and Masters in law. In nineteen eighty seven, when
he was still in his twenties, he co founded a
prestigious corporate law firm, making him well known in business

(09:46):
and legal circles. He also raised a family, marrying twice
and fathering four children. Yet by the spring of two
thousand nine, both of his marriages had entered in divorce
and he was living alone in a luxury apartment located
in Guatemala City's affluent A Zone fourteen neighborhood. Life was comfortable,

(10:09):
if not entirely smooth sailing. Rodrigo was still going through
a difficult custody battle with his second wife, and his
mother had recently died, but on the whole He was
the picture of success when he started receiving threatening phone
calls in early May two thousand and nine. The calls

(10:32):
over six consecutive days had left Rodrigo visibly rattled and
impacted a day trip to Antigua with his son Eduardo
on Saturday, May nine. He was back home at his
apartment in Guatemala City that night and called a longtime
friend to chat. Rodrigo told his friend, Haziza Musa, about

(10:54):
the latest of goings on in his life, adding that
he planned to go on a long bike ride the
next morning to clear his head. The next morning, he
woke early. At six point thirty, he received yet another
threatening call from the unknown caller. Like all of the others,
it was short and unsettling. Still, Rodrigo went about his

(11:18):
morning as planned and called his personal driver at seven
fifty eight am to let him know he was headed
out on a bike ride. At about eight oh five,
he wheeled his bicycle out of his apartment building, mounted
the bike, and cycled away along the two lane tree
lined street. Dressed in navy shorts, a navy T shirt,

(11:39):
and white adedas runners, he listened to music on an
iPod as he rode several hundred meters down the street
before turning onto a service road. Shortly after this, a
chauffeur named Luis Lopez Florian made his way over to
Rodrigo's apartment. Luis had been Rodrigo's personal driver for a

(12:02):
long time, and their relationship went beyond that of an
employer and employee. Rodrigo considered Louise a trusted frant and
a confidante, and the two were very close. As Louise
drove down a service road near Rodrigo's home, he noticed
a number of paramedics and police officers crowded around a

(12:22):
figure lying on the ground. It was Louise's boss, Rodrigo
Rosenberg Marzano. He had been shot five times with a
nine millimeter handgun, three times in the head, once in
the neck, and once in the back. Louise phoned Rodrigo's son,
Eduardo and told him to go immediately to his father's apartment.

(12:47):
He didn't want the young man stumbling upon the grizzly
crime scene. Luise refused to tell Eduardo what had happened,
but made it clear there was an emergency. Eduardo hung
up and began dressing in a panic before calling Louise
back and demanding answers, is my dad dad? Eduardo asked, yes,

(13:10):
replied Luis. The Rosenberg family was devastated by the sudden
and brutal murder of Rodrigo, but quickly set about making
plans for his funeral. The service was held the following
day of Monday, May eleven, at a cemetery on the

(13:30):
outskirts of Guatemala City. May is the beginning of the
rainy season in Guatemala, and heavy clouds gathered overhead as
the mourners made their way across the cemetery's trimmed green lawns.
Organizers played Blues for Salvador, a song by the American
rock band Santana that Rodrigo had always said he wanted

(13:53):
to play at his funeral. His son Eduardo gave a
moving eulogy, wherein he thanked everyone for its time and
helping the family as they began their grieving process. Towards
the end of the funeral, as Rodrigo's casket was being
lowered into the ground, a man named Luis Mendozabel stepped
forward and requested permission to speak. Luise Mendosabel was a

(14:18):
longtime friend of Rodrigo's as well as his mentor and confidant.
The older man had known Rodrigo since he was a
boy and had helped find Rodrigo's brother's remains after he
was kidnapped. Louise was holding a bag filled with the
DVDs in blank cases. He announced to the crowd of mourners,

(14:41):
all of us who are here loved Rodrigo very much,
and all of you are wondering why someone like Rodrigo,
who never harmed anyone, was murdered. Well, Rodrigo left me
with the answer. If you want to know the truth
about what happened to him, then here is he testimony.

(15:03):
He held up the DVDs, adding that anyone who wanted
a copy could take one. Many onlookers took Luise up
on the offer, grabbing a DVD in the hopes that
it might answer the mystery of Rodrigo's murder. Those who
took one and watched it. Upon returning home were first
met with the side of Rodrigo, alive and well and

(15:25):
seated behind a desk. A microphone was set up on
the desk, and a dark blue sheet or curtain had
been hung up behind Rodrigo. It looked like an amateur
set up, but Rodrigo had clearly taken care with his appearance.
Dressed in a navy suit, a white shirt, and a
pale blue tie, his dark hair boarding on top was

(15:48):
neatly combed. As soon as the video began, the forty
seven year old lawyer gave a quick nod, then began
to speak, good afternoon. My name is Rodrigo Rosenberg Marzano,
and unfortunately, if you are currently watching or listening to
this message, it's because I was murdered by President Alvaro Colomb.

(16:18):
Fifty seven year old President Alvaro Colomb had been the
leader of Guatemala for just over a year after winning
the nation's presidential election in November two thousand and seven.
He took office the following January. Colomb's election was a
significant moment for Guatemala. It was the first time that
a left leaning politician had been in charge of the

(16:40):
country since the nineteen fifty four Coup d'eta. Colomb had
won by focusing on winning votes from Guatemala's poorer rural areas,
ultimately defeating his opponent, a former general who had overseen
military intelligence. The election had been violent and fifty local

(17:01):
candidates and party activists were killed throughout the campaign, and
President Colomb's own campaign manager almost to diet when several
grenades were thrown at his motorcade. After taking office, Colomb
had vowed to wand Guatemala's long standing problems with violence
and corruption, but his own administration had also been plagued

(17:23):
with corruption allegations. Two of his interior ministers were indicted
on corruption charges, while a third was killed in a
mysterious helicopter accident. Colomb's wife, Sandra, Guatemala's first lady and
a politician in her own right, was even suspected of
corruption and money laundering after she refused to allow the

(17:45):
auditing of social programs she oversaw. Nevertheless, Rodrigo Rosenberg Marzano's
declaration that if he were to die, then the president
was to blame was shocking. The testimony he'd recorded before
his murder continued, Rodrigo explained why he had been targeted.

(18:07):
He had knowledge of a far reaching conspiracy that had
resulted in others being killed as well, including one of
his own clients. Khalil Mussa had been a wealthy client
of Rodriguo's and a member of Guatemala's elite. He had
immigrated to Guatemala from Lebanon in nineteen forty nine when

(18:30):
he was just seventeen years old, and initially worked as
a laborer picking coffee beans alongside Mayan peasants. Over the years,
Khalil learned Spanish, married and started a family, before later
opening a textile factory and becoming a coffee producer. His
businesses took off, and Khalil Mussa became a captain of

(18:52):
industry who was well known and respected for his honesty
and integrity. By two thousand and eight, it was in
his mid seventies and in the process of handing over
his business to his two daughters, Aziza and Marjorie. Khalil
wanted to spend more time enjoying the life he'd built
and bonding with his young grandchildren, but an opportunity to

(19:16):
keep contributing to Guatemala more broadly arose when Khalil was
offered a position on the board of Anna Cafe, Guatemala's
national coffee association. Khalil had spent many years working alongside
the laborers who picked at Guatemala's coffee beans and was
eager to take on the role. The only problem was

(19:37):
that he'd also have to serve on the board of
ban Rurel, Guatemala's rural development bank. Ban Rourel provided funds
for the rural and micro enterprise sector in Guatemala, and
while it was a private business, thirty percent of its
shares were owned by the government, giving them three seats
on the board of directors. Bill was far less enthusiastic

(20:02):
about this part of the offer. While he was eager
to serve Guatemala's coffee sector, he had a little interest
in Ban Rurel. Khalil had discussed the matter with his lawyer,
Rodrigo Rosenberg Marzano in December of two thousand and eight
and sought his advice. Rodrigo was opposed to getting involved

(20:24):
with Guatemalan politics and told Khalil as much. Plus, there
were rumors that Ban Rourel was rife with embezzlement and
money lautering scandals. Nevertheless, Khalil accepted both nominations, seeing it
as his duty to give back to the country that
had given him so much. On Tuesday, April fourteenth, two

(20:48):
thousand and nine, Khalil got up early and went to
his textile factory as was his routine. Every day, he
would return home to eat lunch before heading back to work.
Usually his oldest daughter, Aziza drove him home, but on
this particular day, she was in the middle of a
long distance phone call to Labanon. She asked her sister,

(21:11):
forty two year old Marjorie, to drive their father instead
while she wrapped up her call. Khalil and Marjorie, who
was a married mother of two and her father's favorite,
headed down to Marjorie's green station wagon at twelve fifty
p m. They both got in and Marjorie drove them
out of the factory parking lot. They haded down a

(21:35):
busy street that was full of traffic and dotted with
street vendors. About five blocks from the factory, Marjorie braked
at an intersection. Suddenly, a motorcycle sped up to the
passenger side of the car and pulled over. Its rider
hopped off the bike and walked straight up to the
car window. Without hesitation, He pulled out a gun and

(22:00):
fired nine shots through the passenger window in the vehicle.
Then the rider jumped back on his motorbike and sped away.
Khalil Musa had been hit by each of the nine
shots and was dead. One of the bullets had traveled
through him and then struck Marjorie in her order, killing

(22:21):
her too. When Rodrigo Rosenberg Marzano heard of the execution
style slayings that same day, he was devastated. It was
clear Khalil had been the target of the attack and
Marjorie was collateral damage. Rodrigo was certain Khalil had been
murdered to prevent him from joining Van Rurel's board, where

(22:44):
he would have no doubt uncovered embezzlement and government corruption.
Khalil Musa was renowned for his integrity and would not
have stood for such abuses of power. Rodrigo deeply regretted
not urging Khalil more strongly against accepting the nominations. Rodrigo

(23:05):
wasn't the only high profile Guatemalan who was outraged and
distraught by the double homicide. Shortly after the muses were murdered,
business leaders held a press conference declaring that the public
execution of the father and daughter was another sign of
how helpless Guatemalans were. They demanded a thorough investigation of

(23:26):
the murders by the authorities. Rodrigo had no faith in
Guatemala's judicial system and told family and friends that the
case would never be solved. He had no doubt that
powerful forces were behind the crime. This meant that the
criminal organizations that had infiltrated Guatemala's government would block any

(23:50):
attempted investigation and destroy evidence. Determined that the case wouldn't
go unresolved like the majority of Guatemalan murders, Rodrigo decided
to launch an investigation of his own case. File will

(24:13):
be back shortly. Thank you for supporting us by listening
to this episode. Sponsors a Cast recommends.

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Hello, this is blind By. Around every two years or so,
I'm contractually obligated to record an advertisement for my own podcast,
The blind By Podcast. I'm a writer and I like
to use the podcast space for writing. I write with
my mouth for you to read with your ears. I
write about curiosity, and I've delivered an episode every week

(24:45):
for the past eight years. I love doing it. If
you want to listen to If you don't, I'm sure
we'll be grand, but most importantly, mind yourself. The blind
By podcast.

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Crime World, The Other Hand, and the one you're listening
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Thank you for listening to this episode's ads. By supporting
our sponsors, you support case File to continue to deliver
our quality content. Rodrigo approached his friend and mentor, Luis
Mendozabel and asked for his help in trying to solve

(25:32):
the case. Louis agreed he was well placed to assist Rodrigo,
as Luis also happened to have been Guatemala's most infamous spy.
He owned a clothing shop called Boutique Emilio, out of
which he operated a clandestine intelligence unit he dubbed the
Little Office. Luise would later tell people he worked to

(25:57):
solve kidnappings and murders that the officials failed to investigate,
just as he'd helped find Rodrigo's murdered brother decades earlier.
He had also advised several Guatemalan presidents, including the most
recently elected, Alvao Colomne. Louis had contacts everywhere. Louise and

(26:19):
Rodrigo were able to obtain security footage from the Mussa's
textile factory so they could replay what had happened. Immediately
preceding the killings, They noticed that a truck had been
parked in front of the factory, and the driver kept
getting out of the vehicle to look down the road.
He was clearly acting as a lookout. After cameras captured

(26:41):
Khalil and Marjorie getting into Marjorie's car and a driving away,
they also caught a hit squad following closely behind on motorcycles.
Rodrigo spoke with Khalil Muss's surviving daughter, Aziza, who was
also a friend of his. She told him that her
father had received thinly veiled threats from powerful individuals after

(27:04):
being offered the board nominations. Officials connected to Ban Rouel
and Anna Cafe strongly and repeatedly advised Khalil Mussa against
accepting the positions. One individual sent him a link to
a story about a coffee farm that had been burnt
down after its owner started meddling in bored dealings. Eventually,

(27:28):
the threats became more overt and violent, as Khalil received
text messages and phone calls threatening his life. Rodrigo gained
access to Khalil's personal papers and found the documents relating
to the appointments. One was a copy of a letter
Khalil had sent to a group of people associated with

(27:48):
ban Rurel, in which he stated that he would not
tolerate messages filled with double meaning, writing I protect myself
from my enemies. As Rodrigo continued digging into the Musa case,
he started receiving death threats of his own. In early May,

(28:09):
less than a month after the murders, he decided that
he needed to record a statement that could be shared
in the event of his death so that the public
would know what he had uncovered. While seated at his
desk he had set up to be filmed out, Rodrigo
explained that during the course of his investigation, he had

(28:29):
found a documents and evidence proving that the Musa murders
went all the way to the top. The President Alvao Colomb,
his wife Sandra, and the president's private secretary Gustavo Olajos
had been embezzling and laundering money from ban Rureal alongside
other members of their administration. Knowing that Khalil Musa would

(28:52):
speak out against this corruption if he joined the board,
they had orchestrated his murder. In total, the video Rodrigo
had recorded went for eighteen minutes, as well as being
an explanation for why he might be killed. It was
an impassioned plea to Guatemalans to fight for change in

(29:14):
their country by speaking out against its long entrenched corruption.
It's the same story we've been hearing and repeating in
recent years, Rodrigo stated, and us Guatemalans continue to do
nothing because there's nothing left to do, because we can't
do anything. What can I do? We say, but we

(29:36):
have to do something, and the only way to do
something is to say what we already know. Rodrigo repeatedly
demanded President Alvaa Colomb's resignation and imprisonment, and urged the
country's vice president, whom he said was honorable, to take
over the leadership. We can't allow Guatemala to keep falling

(29:59):
into the hands of these people, he said. It's our country.
It belongs to us, not to thieves, killers, and to
drug dealers. Guatemala is not theirs. Let's not keep giving
it to them. He concluded with the prediction that the
government would try to conceal the truth he was revealing, stating,

(30:23):
ladies and gentlemen, my death has a first and a
last name. They will try to sully the name of
Khalil Mussa. Marjorie Mussa and will try to make up
whatever they feel like making up. The one and only
truth that matters is that if you're watching and hearing
this message, it is because I was killed by Alvaro

(30:44):
Colombe and Sandra de Colombe. Guatemalans. It's time, please, It's time.
Good evening. It didn't take long for the video to
spread from those who'd received Cop Rodrigo Rosenberg Marzano's funeral.

(31:04):
It was broadcast on every television news channel that evening
of Monday May eleven, just hours after Rodrigo was buried.
At ten twenty nine that night, it was uploaded to
the YouTube account of Guatemala's leading newspaper, El Periodico. By
the next day, it had gone viral, and so many

(31:24):
people went online to watch the video that servers crashed.
The reaction was immediate. By the afternoon of Tuesday May twelve,
protests had erupted in the streets of Guatemala City in
response to Rodrigo's claims. Thousands of people, most of them
young adults from Guatemala's conservative upper class, gathered in squares

(31:48):
and shouted chants directed at President Alvaro Colombe, such as murderer,
murderer and resign resign. The protesters wore white T shirt
as a symbolic statement against the dirty politics. They held
up signs that read I am Rodrigo, we want justice, Rodrigo,

(32:10):
thanks for waking us up. No more violence, and Sandra
and Colombe to resign. The leader of Guatemala's opposition party,
General Otto Perezmalina, spoke to journalists, saying, we are here
to demand justice. We want a transparent investigation. The only

(32:32):
way for that to happen is if the president agrees
to stand down. Others agreed with him, arguing that Rodrigo's
murder couldn't be properly investigated while its main suspect remained
leader of the country. The demonstrations grew over the following days,
with thousands and thousands of people cramming into Guatemala City's

(32:56):
largest public square. Rodrigo's video was projected onto a large
movie screen that someone had set up and played repeatedly
on a loop, with the sound turned up loud enough
so that the entire crowd could hear his voice. A
shrine was erected at the site where he was murdered,
with a large wooden cross flowers and photos of the

(33:17):
deceased lawyer. Handwritten notes and signs were also left, including
one that read you didn't die in vain. The Internet
became a space to protest, too, with posts spreading across
Facebook and Twitter denouncing the Guatemalan president as a murderer.

(33:38):
One young man was arrested after tweeting the first concrete
action should be to take cash out of ban Rurel
and bankrupt the bank of the corrupt. As the protests grew,
so did the Guatemalan government's panic. Just days earlier, one

(34:00):
day May eleven, President Alvaro Colomb had been in the
middle of a meeting that was suddenly interrupted by his
private secretary, Gustavo Olaos. Gustavo had just received a call
from his cousin, who had been at Rodrigo Rosenberg Marzano's
funeral that same day. Gustavo's cousin told him how a

(34:21):
friend of Rodrigo's had claimed that the lawyer knew the
reason for his own murder and had video evidence to
prove it. The cousin had taken one of the DVDs
being handed out and was rushing to the President's office
at that exact moment. President Colomb and his inner circle
all gathered in his office to view the recording. All

(34:44):
of them were left stunned by the end. Gustavo Aleos,
who was one of the administration members Rodrigo had accused
of murder, called his wife and told her to leave
the country with their son, then offer his resignation to
the president. The president refused to accept it, assuring Gustavo

(35:06):
they would survive any ensuing storm. Issuing a short statement
via two aides who delivered his words to reporters, the
president denounced Rodrigo's accusations as false. The brevity of his
response and the fact that the president hadn't even appeared
himself seemed to enrage the public further. Within forty eight hours,

(35:31):
Guatemala was engulfed by chaos. President Colomb agreed to give
a televised interview with the news network CNN, but looked
scared throughout the entire appearance, often blinking rapidly. He didn't
look like someone who was being honest. The editor of
the newspaper El Periodico wrote in response, I can't help

(35:55):
but express the repugnance I felt during the declarations of
President La Colomb. The only thing missing now is for
the President and his henchmen to say that it was
Rodrigo himself who immolated himself Kamikazi style in order to
discredit the government, and that he himself paid the assassins

(36:16):
to murder him. Nobody trusted Guatemalan authorities to investigate the
very crime they were accused of committing. The US ambassador
to Guatemala urged President Colomb to hand over the investigation
to the International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala or se SIG,

(36:37):
a UN backed organization created just three years earlier. Se
SIG was formed as a way to fight Guatemala's rampant
corruption and systemic violence problem. Its members were judges, prosecutors,
and law enforcement officers from all over the world who
investigated high profile crimes. They worked within Guatemala's legal system

(37:01):
to prosecute members of organized crime and to remove their
presence from the government. On Tuesday May twelve, just two
days after Rodrigo's murder, the case was referred to s SIG.
They had a mammoth task on their hands, with publications
such as The New Yorker and The Economist declaring that

(37:23):
the fate of Guatemala's democracy depended entirely on Rodrigo Rosenberg
Marzano's true murderers being identified and brought to justice. SEESIG
was led by fifty one year old Carlos Castresana, a
Spanish former prosecutor and judge who would be responsible for

(37:45):
the investigation. Carlos had moved to Guatemala to head up
SEESIG and had barely seen the country since arriving. Due
to the nature of his work, his life was often
at risk, and he had a team of internationally recruited
bodyguards who accompanied him everywhere. Carlos resided in a room

(38:06):
above his office in Czig's compound, and whenever he left,
he had to travel in armor plated vehicles. Carlos took
his job seriously and was aware of its risks. Every
morning and evening, his office was checked for covert surveillance
equipment just in case there was a mole inside CECIG

(38:27):
leaking information. He would only discuss sensitive matters while a
white noise machine was operating to muffle any audio if
he was being secretly recorded. After being assigned to Rodrigo's case,
Carlos Castresana met with Rodrigo's son, Eduardo, assuring the young man,

(38:47):
I give you my word that if we have to,
we will bring down the president and impeach him. Eduardo
trusted Carlos and willingly handed over his father's office computer
and his US laptop for examination. Carlos Castresana selected about
a dozen of szig's top investigators to work closely alongside him,

(39:11):
telling them this is the most important case of this commission.
Almost three hundred other officials would operate as functionaries in
the investigation as well. They came from countries all over
the world, including Canada, France, Costa Rica, Italy, and Sweden.

(39:32):
One of the first things the investigative team did was
Czech CCTV footage from cameras operating in the area where
Rodrigo had been on the morning of his murder. As
Rodrigo resided in a wealthy neighborhood with plenty of security cameras,
there was lots of footage to check. In total, four
separate cameras had footage of the events leading up to

(39:55):
the crime. While reviewing this footage, the investigator's noticed that
a number of vehicles were clearly circling the block for
around thirty minutes prior to the attack against Rodrigo. At
about eight am, they seemed to assume positions. A black
Mazda six idled out the front of Rodrigo's apartment building.

(40:20):
The car's number plate wasn't visible, but it had several
distinctive features. It had red markings on its hub caps,
a rear spoiler, and a sticker over the petrol cap.
At around eight oh five am, Rodrigo emerged from his
apartment building and cycled away on his bike. The car followed.

(40:42):
At eight oh seven, a camera filmed Rodrigo cycling past.
The black Mazda followed one minute and thirty six seconds later.
Then another camera captured Rodrigo again cycling past a parked car,
Asda appeared one minute and twenty six seconds later, getting closer.

(41:06):
The Mazda continued to tail Rodrigo until he turned onto
the service road where his body was later found. As
there were no cameras along that service road, the murder
itself hadn't been recorded, nor had any eye witnesses come forward,
but presumably the Mazda had dropped off after radioing a

(41:27):
co conspirator an update on Rodrigo's location that co co conspirator
had then driven into the service road and delivered the
five fatal shots. When Rodrigo's body was discovered, he was
lying on his back on a grassy embankment that flanked
the right side of the road, his ankles dangling over

(41:49):
the curb. His bike lay abandoned on the road. It
was on its side, facing the other way from Rodrigo,
with its handlebars towards the street. This positioning indicated that
at the time Rodrigo was shot, he'd no longer been
riding his bike. If he'd been shot while cycling, then

(42:10):
the bike would have fallen in the same direction as him,
backwards instead of forwards. Rodrigo's position was consistent with him
having hopped off the bicycle and sitting on the curb,
perhaps to take a phone call. He had also been
listening to his iPod at the time. Near to where

(42:30):
Rodrigo's body was found were several deep grooves in the
dirt next to the road. They looked like tire tracks.
With a clearer idea of the crime scene, the investigators
turned their attention to the video Rodrigo had recorded. It
was clear he hadn't filmed it alone. At the end

(42:54):
of the video, a second person who was off camera
could be heard switching off the recording equipment. Not long
after the murder, two men came forward and admitted to
helping Rodrigo film the testimony. One was his longtime friend
and mentor, Luis Mendozabel, the man who had handed out
copies of the testimony at Rodrigo's funeral. Luis's boutique had

(43:18):
been used as the set for the video. Another man
who had assisted with the recording was a journalist and
a former presidential candidate named Mario David Garcia. Both men
vehemently denied having anything to do with the crime. They
said that Rodrigo had come to them with his accusations

(43:40):
against the government and they had merely helped him. Mario
David Garcia even noted that Rodrigo had planned to appear
on his radio show on Monday, May eleven to go
public with the allegations against President Colombe, but his murder
had prevented that appearance from happening. Meanwhile, Carlos Castresana was

(44:06):
beginning to suspect that President Colomb's administration was interfering with
the investigation. When Carlos had taken on the case. He'd
told the President that he would need complete independence in
order to complete a thorough investigation, but Carlos suspected the
President was ignoring his demand. On one occasion, C SIEG

(44:29):
agents had been canvassing Rodrigo's neighborhood when they noticed an
unmarked vehicle following them. One of the car's occupants was
taking photographs of them. Several weeks later, agents were meeting
with a possible witness in the lobby of a hotel.
Their meeting was abruptly interrupted by swarms of police officers

(44:50):
bursting into the lobby and attempting to arrest the witness.
The C SIEG agents managed to quickly usher the witness
into one of the hotel's rooms. They feared that if
the police arrested him, he might never be seen again.
Half expecting the police to open fire in their desperation

(45:10):
to take the witness, one of the agents called out,
you will have to kill us all. As they attempted
to manage the situation, Carlos Castresana was able to call
the Vice president and the head of the National Police,
who told the police to withdraw. It turned out that
the potential witness knew nothing of note, but it was

(45:34):
clear someone had thought that he did. CCIG agents soon
caught wind of another possible witness when a government minister
notified Carlos Castresana that he knew someone who could blow
the case wide open. Investigators met with this new witness
at a soccer field near the Mexican border. He claimed

(45:56):
to be associated with a gang called Pittagoras, which had
been hired to kill Rodrigo for one hundred and eighty
thousand U S. Dollars. The witness said he was close
to the gang's leader and was terrified for his life,
adding I do not want to continue to kill people.
This will explode because there are politicians involved. The politicians

(46:23):
the witness implicated were not from the colomb administration but
from the opposition. The vice presidential candidate to General Otto Perezmalina,
who had lost to President Colomb at the previous election,
was named as being involved. As the agents continue to
speak with the witness of the soccer field, a crowd

(46:45):
of journalists suddenly appeared and interrupted the interview. They published
articles about the witness's allegations that it was actually the
opposition party and not the government, who had murdered Rodrigo.
The unexpected appearance of reporters at the secret meeting was
frustrating to Carlos Castresana, especially as he told President Colomb

(47:08):
to ensure no one from the media knew about it.
When the CC agents looked into the witness's allegations, his
entire story quickly fell apart. There was no evidence to
support his claims, and he eventually admitted that he'd made
it all up, stating, I received a call from a
member of the government saying I have a job for you,

(47:32):
and he offered me money to give false evidence. He
alleged that Colomb's spokesman and the First Lady were part
of the scheme. All of this misdirection only made Carlos
Castresana more suspicious that the government was trying to cover
something up. He sent a formal complaint to the government

(47:58):
about their meddling and also forwarded it to the United Nations.
From that moment on, the c segagents were left alone
to complete their investigation. They turned their attention to the
BLACKAMASDA six that had been captured on security cameras trailing
Rodrigo Rosenberg Marzano on the morning of his murder. The

(48:20):
vehicle had several notable features, including red rims on the hubcaps,
a rear spoiler, and a sticker over the petrol cap.
C siegagents obtained a record of all black Mazda sixers
registered in Guatemala. There were only fifty in the entire country.
Over the next few weeks, C SIEG agents tracked down

(48:43):
each and every one and carefully photographed them looking for
the right car. They finally found it at a home
just outside of Guatemala City. The car had the exact
same distinctive features as the vehicle captured on camera. It
was registered to a thirty three year old named William

(49:04):
Hilberto Santos Deva. Notably, Santos was a former member of
the National Police, which seemed to be a certain indicator
of some kind of conspiracy. C SIG agents gained access
to Santos's mobile phone records and found that on the
morning of Rodrigo's murder, Santos' phone had been making and

(49:26):
receiving numerous calls within the vicinity of the shooting. Now
that they had the name of a suspect who might
have been involved in the hit, agents got to work
a gathering evidence. They set up a wire tap on
Santos's mobile phone so they could listen in on all
of his calls. It was the first time ever in

(49:47):
Guatemala where a wire tap was legally implemented. Prior to
c SIG's investigation, they'd only ever been used by unauthorized organizations.
It it turned out that William Hilberto Santos Diva was
part of a crime gang. Investigators were able to identify

(50:07):
ten members of the criminal network by surveilling Santos and
recording his conversations. All of the members were men aged
between twenty and forty, like Santos. Eight of the others
were either current or former police officers. The final member
was a military veteran. This kind of corruption within Guatemala's

(50:31):
armed and law enforcement agencies wasn't unusual. C SIEG agents
gained access to the other gang members phones as well.
For several months, the CCIG agents listened in on Santos
and his affiliates, mapping out their relationships to one another
and decoding the language they used to communicate. The agents

(50:53):
recorded twelve thousand phone calls. It became clear from the
group's communicating that they were involved in all sorts of
criminal activity, ranging from robberies to kidnappings for ransom. They
were also professional hitmen who killed targets in exchange for money.

(51:14):
One phrase the agents became accustomed to was to knock
over a big stick, a secret phrase the criminals used
to refer to killing a significant individual. One of the
big sticks they referred to was Rodrigo Rosenberg Marzano, with
one of the gang's leaders remarking on one occasion that

(51:34):
he wanted to hear zero comments about the Rosenberg job
because there were extremely powerful people involved in that particular hit.
The CCG agents checked the gang's phone data for the
time of Rodrigo's murder and were able to place many
of them at the scene of the crime. Carlos Castresano

(51:56):
and his colleagues knew they had identified Rodrigo's killers, they
just didn't know who had hired them or why. Sometimes
the CCIG agents overheard the gang discussing impending crimes they
were preparing to commit, like a bank robbery and a

(52:16):
kidnapping for ransom. SIZIG subtly intervened by alerting the intended
targets the bank the group had planned to rob, increased
their security, a Korean businessman the group wanted to kidnap
abruptly left to Guatemala. As their crimes were foiled, the
gang began to worry that there was a rat amongst

(52:39):
them who was leaking their plans. They had a suspect
in mind, the one former military officer in the group
who hadn't been recruited from the same police force as
the rest. On Tuesday, September eighth, two thousand and nine,
five months after Rodrigo's murder, C SIEG agents overheard a

(52:59):
compass between two of the gang's leaders in which they
discussed the possible mole in their group. We have a problem,
one said, he's going around talking about Rosenberg. The two
leaders agreed that the member they'd identified as a mole
had to be killed. They planned to murder his girlfriend

(53:21):
as well, who was under age and pregnant. Although Carlos
Castresana hadn't yet learnt enough to figure out who had
ordered the gang's hit against Rodrigo, he realised they would
have to step in immediately to prevent the double homicide.
At six a m. On Saturday, September eleven, C SIEG

(53:41):
agents launched fourteen simultaneous raids at homes across Guatemala City
and two other cities. By six ten, all ten members
of the gang were arrested and in custody. More than
thirty cell phones were seized in the raids, along with
other evidence. The arrests were hugely publicized, with the suspects

(54:05):
being paraded in front of news cameras. As Carlos Castresana
assured reporters and the public that the killers of Rodrigo
Rosenberg Marzano had been apprehended, it was only a matter
of time until they identified the person who'd hired them.

(54:26):
When ccgagents examined the phone seized in the raid, they
noticed that there was a phone number that had been
in consistent contact with the gang members on the day
of Rodrigo's murder. It belonged to a man named Tezus
Manuel Cardono Medina, who went by the alias of Mamin Medina,

(54:46):
was another crooked X cop involved in criminal activity. C
sigagents brought Medina in for questioning, and he eventually agreed
to confess to his involvement in the murder for hire
in exchange for a red reduced sentence and a new
identity in the country's witness protection program. Two of the

(55:06):
other gang members followed suit, and investigators soon had a
detailed picture of the days leading up to Rodrigo's murder,
as well as the crime itself. Medina was the intermediary
who had approached the gang with the murder request after
being hired by somebody else. Medina said that person was

(55:29):
a professional bodyguard whose bosses were having problems with an extortionist.
The bosses wanted to get rid of the extortionist, ultimately
identified as Rodrigo Rosenberg Marzano. Medina agreed to take on
their job and met with the bodyguard's bosses. They would
give him a bonafone he was to use to speak

(55:51):
with a man on the inside who would provide further
details about the target, Rodrigo, his movements, where he lived,
and what he looked like. It was his suggestion that
the hitman attacked Rodrigo as he left his apartment building.
The inside man would pay forty thousand US dollars in

(56:12):
exchange for their hit, and Medina outsourced the murder to
the organized crime gang. On Friday May eighth, two days
before Rodrego's murder, the gang met up at a Burger
King restaurant in an upscale neighborhood to plan the hit
for that Sunday morning. Then they scoped out Rodrego's apartment building,

(56:34):
checking it out from all angles and planning the logistics
of the crime. Two days later, the gang rose early
and met at a gas station At six point thirty.
They were traveling in four different cars. By six point forty,
they were at Rodrigo's building. The early morning streets were silent,

(56:57):
with no one to be seen. Ready in place, the
gang members just had to wait for the inside man
to give them the signal to go. At eight a m.
The inside man called Medina, the intermediary, to give him
a heads up that Rodrigo was about to go on
a bike ride. The gang members were to follow him

(57:20):
and to carry out the hit then and there. Medina
in turn notified William Santos Deva, who was parked by
the apartment building in his black Mazda six. Within five minutes,
Rodrigo left the building on his bicycle and rode away.
Santos followed him until Rodrigo turned onto a service road.

(57:43):
Then Santos radioed another gang member named Lucas Santiago, who
was waiting in a white truck and handed over the
job to him. The white truck turned into the service
road and Santiago spotted Rodrigo, who was sitting on the
curb listening to music on his iPod. Santiago jumped out

(58:04):
of the truck, shot Rodrigo five times with a nine
millimeter gun, then got back in the truck and sped away.
The hit now complete, the gang met up again at
the same burger king where they'd gone days earlier, and
had to breakfast together. Medina tried calling the inside man

(58:26):
to confirm that the job was done, but he didn't
answer the phone. Case file will be back shortly. Thank
you for supporting us by listening to this episode's sponsors.

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Thank you for listening to this episode's ad. By supporting
our sponsors, you support case File to continue to deliver
our quality content. The phone number belonging to the inside
Man was one that the CCGA gents recognized. It was

(59:56):
the same number behind the threatening calls Rodrigo had rec
in the week leading up to his murder. Records showed
that the inside Man's phone had only ever interacted with
two other numbers. One was Rodrigo's cell phone and the
other was the Berna phone. Medina had been given by
the powerful bosses who said they needed an extortionist taken

(01:00:19):
care of. It hadn't been used since making the eight
a m. Call to Medina on Sunday May ten, alerting
him that it was time to kill Rodrigo. This bernaphone
was never found. Carlos Castresano knew that identifying who this
phone belonged to was key to solving the case. They

(01:00:43):
tried to trace the owner by looking into when and
how it was purchased. The phone had been brought from
a shopping center on Monday, May four, just one day
before the threatening calls to Rodrigo began. The buyer hadn't
used a card to pay for the phone in Stad,
opting for cash. This meant the purchase couldn't be traced

(01:01:05):
to a bank account. However, investigators caught a lucky break
when they found a sales tax form for the purchase
that featured a faded signature. The signature belonged to Luis
Lopez Florian Rodrigo Rosenberg Marzano's personal driver. CCTV footage from

(01:01:28):
the store confirmed that Louise had bought the phone. This
revelation didn't make sense, as Luise was known to be
a devoted employee and close confidante of Rodrigo. Investigators couldn't
understand why he would be behind the scheme that resulted
in his boss's murder. Investigators approached Luis, but he refused

(01:01:51):
to talk. The driver remained tight lipped until Rodrigo's son Eduardo,
made contact with him. Duardo couldn't believe that his father's
trusted driver could have anything to do with his death
and promised Luis that he would stand by him. Eduardo
just had one condition. If Louise had made any promises

(01:02:14):
to Rodrigo before his murder, he had to break them
now for the sake of the case. When investigators reached
out to Louise again, he began talking. He admitted that
he had purchased the phone, but insisted that he had
done so under strict instructions. On Monday, May four, Rodrigo

(01:02:37):
had taken an unofficial leave of absence from work. He
then got in touch with Louise and asked him to
run some errands for him. Rodrigo wanted Louise to go
out and buy two prepaid cell phones from two separate
shopping centers. Louise was to pay with cash and provide
no form of identification when making the purchase. Luis did

(01:03:02):
as his boss asked, but slipped up when he accidentally
signed the sales tax form for one of the phones
with his name as secretary at Rosenberg's law firm subsequently
confirmed that Luise had hinded in receipts for the phones
for reimbursement, seemingly verifying his claim that he believed the
purchase was work related. Surely, if Luise were conspiring to

(01:03:27):
commit murder, he wouldn't have made this mistake. Louise said
that he'd taken the phones to Rodrigo, who had kept
to one of them. He asked Luis to deliver the
other one to a close friend of his named Francisco
Valdez pires Once again, the driver did as he was told.

(01:03:53):
Francisco Valdez Pirez had known Rodrigo since childhood. Francisco and
his brother Estuado owned one of Guatemala's largest pharmaceutical companies,
and their cousin, Rosa, had been Rodrigo's first wife. Even
though Rodrigo and Rosa had long since divorced, the Valdezpaya's

(01:04:14):
brothers still considered Rodrigo a member of the family, referring
to him as their cousin. On Sunday, May three, the
day before Rodrego asked his driver to buy two beronafones,
Rodrego asked Francisco to visit him at home. When Francisco
arrived and sat down with Rodrigo, the latter made a

(01:04:37):
startling confesssion he had been madly in love with Marjorie
Mussa and her murder less than one month earlier had
utterly devastated him. That coming Thursday, May seven would have
been their third anniversary. The couple had been secretly seeing
each other for a long time. They'd first met while

(01:05:00):
dropping their children off for school at the same bus
stop near the apartment building where they both lived. Over time,
a romance blossomed between them, even though Marjorie was married.
Marjorie had been the one to recommend Rodrigo's legal services
to her father, Khalil, and that was how Khalil had

(01:05:20):
become his client. The business relationship also allowed Rodrigo to
spend more time with Marjorie. Rodrigo's romance with Marjorie brought
him a lot of joy. The twice divorced father, afore
believed he had finally met his soulmate. The couple desperately

(01:05:41):
wanted to be together, but the situation was difficult. Marjorie
wanted to obtain a divorce before going public with another relationship. However,
her father was very traditional, and there were rumours that
he disinherited his eldest daughter, Aziza following her own divorce.

(01:06:01):
For years, Rodrigo and Marjorie had to remain content with
seeing one another In secret, They sent one another adoring messages,
with Rodrigo calling Marjorie, Marjorie d Rosenberg and my tinker Bell.
Every Tuesday they shared a romantic lunch together at Rodrigo's apartment.

(01:06:22):
He had his driver, Luis fill the apartment with rad
Roses prior to each date when Marjorie hadn't arrived for
their long standing lunch plans. On Tuesday, April fourteen, Rodrigo
had known something was wrong when he heard that two
people were killed in a shooting nearby. He had screamed

(01:06:43):
desperately at a friend over the phone. They killed her,
They killed her. Friends and family had witnessed Rodrigo's intense
grief over the ensuing days. He had cried for two
hours straight after the murders were confirmed. His son, Eduardo,
described Rodrigo as completely destroyed. The reaction had seemed disproportionate

(01:07:10):
until Rodrigo confided in Eduardo and several others about his
true relationship with Marjorie. In a letter to one friend,
Rodrigo admitted that he felt like he was disintegrating little
by little. After Marjorie's death, Rodrigo received a call from
a jeweler informing him that Marjorie had ordered a wedding

(01:07:33):
ring for him shortly before her death. The pair had
frequently discussed marrying when the time was right. Rodrigo wore
the ring daily after that, telling a friend this is
the message she sent me. He can be seen wearing
it in the eighteen minute video testimony to be released

(01:07:54):
in the event of his murder. Despite being unmarried at
the time, When Rodrigo summoned his friend Francisco Valdez Pias
to his home on Sunday May three, he told him
that Marjorie had been planning to leave her husband on
May seven, the date of their third anniversary. According to Francisco,

(01:08:17):
during that same conversation, Rodrigo had said he was very
scared that his life was in danger. He asked for
Francisco's help in finding a bodyguard who could protect him.
Rodrigo said he would send Francisco a phone to pass
along to the potential bodyguard. He didn't want the bodyguard

(01:08:37):
making contact using his usual device because Rodrigo was worried
he was being surveiled. This version of events is at
odds with the confessions made by hired intermediary Medina and
the hitman. They identified Francisco and his brother Estuado as
the two powerful bosses who said they needed an extortionist killed.

(01:09:02):
Investigators believed Francisco and Estuardo knew Rodrigo was hiring hitman
to kill someone, a person they believed to be a blackmailer.
They hadn't known that the true victim was Rodrigo himself.
After the gang members carried out the hit, they had

(01:09:24):
repeatedly tried to call the number of the inside man
who had provided them with all of the information necessary
to murder Rodrigo. The phone was never answered again. The
gang members began to worry that they weren't going to
be paid, so they contacted the bodyguard who had originally
set up the hit for his two powerful bosses. He

(01:09:48):
informed them that his bosses were currently unavailable due to
a family emergency, but the gang insisted that they needed
to be paid, so a meeting was set up later
that day at the the boss's workplace, the headquarters of
their pharmaceutical company. Medina went on behalf of the gang
and was greeted by Francisco and Estauardo Valdez. Pires Both

(01:10:13):
were visibly shaken as they informed Medina that the wrong
person had been murdered. The gang had killed their cousin, Rodrigo.
The Sisig's complex investigation had led them to a shocking revelation.

(01:10:33):
The person who had orchestrated the hit against Rodrigo Rosenberg
Marzano was none other than Rodrigo himself. Although this seemed
too bizarre to be believable, it also led to some
elements of the crime finally making sins. If Rodrigo had
been fearing for his life, then why would he have

(01:10:55):
gone out for a bike ride on a Sunday morning
in a dangerous city, making him Solf a vulnerable target.
This ride had not been part of Rodrigo's typical schedule.
In fact, his bicycle had actually been damaged for some
time and was in need of repair up until right
before the murder. Rodrigo had asked his driver Luis, to

(01:11:18):
make sure it was fixed by that Sunday morning. The
only way the hitman could have known about Rodrigo's bike
ride that day was if someone in Rodrigo's inner circle
had tipped them off, and the only people who had
known when he was departing were Rodrigo himself and his driver. Moreover,

(01:11:41):
Rodrigo had been shot after getting off his bike and
sitting for several minutes on the curb. Phone records revealed
he hadn't received or made any calls at this time.
It was as though he'd just been sitting there waiting.
Phone data also revealed that the opposed threatening calls he'd

(01:12:01):
received from the same phone he'd had his driver by
were made from inside his own apartment. C cigagents discovered
that just before his death, Rodrigo had issued a check
for forty thousand U S. Dollars and asked his secretary
to deliver it to the valdez Pires brothers. This was

(01:12:22):
the same amount of money promised to the criminal gang
in exchange for the hit. The valdez Pires brothers had
been unwitting pawns in Rodrigo's scheme. Rodrigo had lied to
them to obtain their help in finding hitman for hire.
He had also lied to numerous friends and family members

(01:12:44):
in the week leading up to his death, repeatedly talking
about his fear that he would be killed and how
he was being stalked by sinister forces. Six days before
his murder, Rodrigo told his friend Luis mendozabel that the
president's secretary had overtly threatened him, demanding that he stopped

(01:13:04):
blaming President Colombe for the murder of the Musses, or
the same thing would happen to him. Rodrigo claimed that
he'd replied, neither you or anyone else are going to
shut me up. You are a bunch of shitty murderers.
Rodrigo had then enlisted Luis's help in recording a final

(01:13:26):
testimony to be released in the event of his murder.
Rodrigo had set other plans in motion prior to his death.
Just days before he was killed, he purchased two burial plots,
one for himself and an adjoining one where he hoped
Marjorie would be moved to. He handed over his law

(01:13:48):
firm to his son Eduardo. He gave away several family heirlooms,
and he bought a beach house as a gift for
his family, situated on Guatemala's Pacific coast. All of these
actions suggested he was preparing to die, rather than taking
actions to prevent it. If Rodrigo's driver hadn't mistakingly signed

(01:14:12):
his name on the sales tax form for one of
the Bernafones, then Rodrigo's scheme might have never been discovered.
Carlos Castresana and the other c SIG agents believed Rodrigo
had been motivated by multiple factors. For starters, he had
been in a highly distraught state following numerous stressful events

(01:14:33):
in his life. He was estranged from some of his children,
who were living in Mexico and undergoing a bitter custody
battle with their mother. His own mother had recently died,
and finally, he had been plunged into extreme despair and
feelings of guilt by the violent murder of his girlfriend
Marjorie Mussa. To some extent, he blamed himself for her

(01:14:58):
death due to not having advance zed Khalil Mussa more
strongly against becoming involved in the ban Rual Bank. Rodrigo
seemingly lost the desire to live and also wanted revenge
against the colomb government, whom he blamed for Marjorie's murder.
Rodrigo was convinced that Colombs had killed Marjorie and Khalil

(01:15:21):
Mussa thanks to intelligence he'd mostly received from his friend
Luis Mendozabel, but Louise had told Rodrigo that he didn't
stand a chance against the nation's president and his administration.
Rodrigo agreed, realizing he didn't have strong enough evidence to
take to court, especially in a country where ninety eight

(01:15:44):
percent of murders went unsolved, so he fabricated documents that
implicated the president, as well as putting together an even
more drastic plot. With the help of Louise Mendozabel and
right wing radio host Mario David de Garcia, Rodrigo filmed
a video blaming the government for his murder, instructing Luis

(01:16:07):
to release it if he was killed, then he orchestrated
his own death so he could blame the government from
beyond the grave in the hope that they would be
overthrown by a furious public and political opponents. After eight
months on the case, lead investigator Carlos Castresana was certain

(01:16:31):
he had solved it, but was terrified about making his
findings public. Rodrigo's murder had stirred up so much anger
and passion amongst the Guatemalan people, many of whom believed
their government had engaged in multiple conspiracies. The revelation that
Rodrigo himself had been behind the entire thing might seem

(01:16:54):
unbelievable and could lead to further unrest. On Monday, January eleven,
twenty ten, Castresanna met with Rodrigo's son, Eduardo, and shared
his findings. Eduardo would later say he was initially infuriated
by what he was told. It seemed so convenient for

(01:17:15):
the victim to be blamed, which left nobody really taking
responsibility at all. In a feature article about the case
for The New Yorker, writer David Grant said that Eduardo
subsequently seemed to make peace with the findings. Quote. He
later told me that he had been forced to face
a lot of dark truths in the meeting with Castresana.

(01:17:40):
He made one request. If Castra Sanna believed that his
father had been trying, even if mistakingly, to help his country,
then he should say so at the press conference. Castresana's
press conference announcing the result of the investigation was held
the following day. He and his team had reviewed more

(01:18:02):
than one hundred thousand phone calls, five thousand documents and databases,
and conducted countless interviews. They had left no stone unturned
speaking to the media and the Guatemalan people. Castresana methodically
laid out the evidence before declaring who planned the act.

(01:18:24):
We have to conclude that it was Rodrigo Rosenberg himself.
Nobody else but him is responsible for his own death.
He planned it all. Rosenberg felt guilty about the assassination
of Marjorie Mussa. He began a desperate search all over
to find the Mussa's killers, but he found no proof.

(01:18:47):
He decided to sacrifice his life in exchange for a
change in the country. There can be no other explanation.
Castresana also kept his prompt Touaduardo, adding he was an
honorable person. Those listening to the press conference were left

(01:19:09):
stunned by Castrosana's words. President Alvaro Colomb had not been
informed of the findings prior to Castresana's announcement. He held
his own press conference two hours after Castrasanas, his wife
Sandra standing by his side, as he stated, today, a
sad but very important chapter in the history of Guatemala

(01:19:32):
is closed. May eleventh of last year. We were accused
of causing a tragic death, without proof and without any foundation.
C SIG agents had uncovered no links between the crime
and President Colomb, his wife, or any other members of
his administration accused by Rodrigo Rosenberg Marzano. For some Guatemalans,

(01:19:57):
this was vindication. Although many citizens had believed Rodrigo's posthumous accusation,
they had mostly been members of Guatemala's wealthy elite who
disliked President Colomb and his wife Sandra. Others had always
been suspicious that the video was part of a right
wing plot to overthrow a government that wanted to raise

(01:20:19):
business taxes and improve the circumstances of the country's poverty
stricken Mayan population. Investigators had even looked into whether the
president had any connection to the Valdez Pias brothers who
were responsible for setting up the hit, but found none.
In December of two thousand nine, SISI issued arrest warrants

(01:20:42):
for Francisco and Estauado Valdez Pires, who had since gone
into hiding. They spent almost seven months overseas on the
run before returning to Guatemala and handing themselves over to
the authorities on Monday, June twenty eight, two thousand ten.
The brothers maintained their claim that they'd thought they were

(01:21:04):
simply hiring a bodyguard for Rodrigo. They were transferred to
a military base prison for their own protection. In another
public press conference, Carlos Castresana accused the two brothers of
destroying evidence and sabotaging the state's case against them. In
July twenty thirteen, more than four years after the crime,

(01:21:27):
the chief witness against the brothers, Jesus Manuel Cardona Medina,
suddenly retracted his testimony against them. Medina claimed he had
been coerced into certain statements by Sisig. Four years later,
the charges against the brothers were dropped due to a
lack of evidence. They were released after spending seven years

(01:21:50):
in custody. Although Medina and all ten gang members were
convicted for their role in Rodrigo's murder, no one has
ever been held responsible for planning it. Although the murder
of Rodrigo Rosenberg Marzano had been officially solved, a number

(01:22:11):
of unanswered questions remained. Some people who trusted the result
of Sesig's investigation still wondered whether Rodrigo had been helped
by co conspirators in carrying out his plan. Namely, they
suspected that Rodrigo's longtime friend and mentor Luis Mendozabel and
right wing radio host Mario David Garcia had been in

(01:22:34):
on Rodrigo's scheme the entire time. Luis Mendozabel was a
well known spy who was not a fan of the
colomb government. Mario David Garcia was also opposed to Colomb's administration.
It was speculated that the two who had admitted to
helping Rodrigo film his testimony had been the architects of

(01:22:58):
the murder. However, they completely denied any knowledge of Rodrigo's
plans to have himself murdered. Lead investigator Carlos Castresana told
New Yorker writer David gran that while he wasn't sure
if the two men were in on the plot, he
did believe they had tried to exploit the murder for

(01:23:18):
their own political purposes. They were preparing some kind of coup.
Castresana said, Sisig had managed to find a witness who
claimed Mario David Garcia encouraged Rodrigo to take his own
life and to release the video he'd recorded, stating do
it for your country. There were also claims that the

(01:23:42):
country's vice president had tensioned with President Colomb and ambitions
to become the president himself. According to another witness who
was friends with Luis Mandezabo. One week before Rodrigo was killed.
The Vice President was told about Rodrigo's investor mitigation into
the Mussa murders and asked if he was in a

(01:24:03):
position to take control of the country if necessary. Yes,
was Vice President as Sparda's reply. When asked about this conversation,
Vice President as Sparda denied it. In his recorded testimony,
Rodrigo had encouraged the Vice president to assume power from

(01:24:24):
President Colombe. Although Rodrigo Rosenberg Marzano's case was solved, the
double homicide that had motivated his killing was still open.
Although President colomb had been absolved in the Rosenberg case,
many still blamed him for the murders of Khalil and

(01:24:45):
Marjorie Mussa, but investigators had found little evidence to support
Rodrigo's claims. Surrounding the Mussa murders. It turned out that
the story that Khalil Musa had been asked to join
Ana Cafe's board wasn't even true. It had actually been
Khalil who'd approached the board to make the request himself. Moreover,

(01:25:08):
Khalil Mussa had ultimately turned down the offer to join
the ban Rureal Banks board that matter had been resolved
prior to his death, removing the supposed motive for his
murder that Rodrigo had cited. Sisig were eventually able to
identify the hitmen who had killed the Musses. Several confessed

(01:25:31):
after being arrested and said that the reason for Khalil's
murder was related to his textile business. Although he had
a reputation for integrity, Khalil Mussa was said to be
purchasing contraband fabric for his factory from a criminal gang.
When he got into a dispute with the gang and
refused to pay the agreed upon amount for the fabric,

(01:25:53):
the distributor arranged to have him killed. His daughter, Marjorie,
was collateral damage in the attack. Twelve gang members were
arrested for their role in the Musa murders and taken
to trial. Eight men were convicted for the crime. Although
the court found these hit man guilty, it ruled that

(01:26:15):
prosecutors had not proven a motive. The Musa family, who
had rejected Seesig's reasoning for Khalil Mussa's murder, took out
a full page newspaper advertisement asserting the court's ruling was
proof of the absolute integrity of mister Khalil Musa and
his impeccable business ethic. Se SIG remained confident in their

(01:26:38):
findings and considered the case solved and closed. Khalil Muss's
eldest daughter, Aziza, has since published a book about her
father's life titled A Lebanese from Guatemala. It turned out
that several of the criminals who had participated in the
contract killing also played a part in the murder of

(01:27:00):
Rodrigo Rosenberg Marzano. He had inadvertently hired some of the
men who had killed his beloved girlfriend to end his
own life as well. In his piece for The New Yorker,
writer David Gran reflected on how Rosenberg's mistaken belief about

(01:27:22):
the Mussa murders almost upended the Guatemalan government, writing, Rosenberg,
who in the land of the Blind had seemed like
a one eyed king, had been wrong about who killed
the Muses, triggering a series of tragic events that nearly
rewrote a nation's history based on a lie. After the

(01:27:46):
truth was revealed, the colomb administration was able to continue
running the country. President Colomb completed his four year term
in January of twenty twelve. As Guatemalan presidents are only
permitted to serve a single term, he did not run
for reelection. His wife, Sandra, later ran for president in

(01:28:07):
three separate elections, but never won. In twenty nineteen, she
was arrested on charges of violating campaign finance rules. The
case was dismissed three years later in twenty twenty two.
President Alvaro Colomb died in January twenty twenty three at
the age of seventy one. He had been suffering from

(01:28:30):
a sophageal cancer and pulmonary emphysema. His legacy as president
was significant, with a focus on expanding social programs and
assistance to Guatemala's poorest citizens, who gained increased access to
health services, education, and social security. President Colomb also built

(01:28:51):
a strong relationship with the country's Mayan peoples, making him
one of the first presidents in Guatemala to do so,
but his government was also tainted by a corruption which
made him strongly disliked. Despite some of the accomplishments he
achieved while in office, President Colomb left office with a

(01:29:11):
ninety five point eight three percent disapproval rating. Guatemala today
has much lower violent crime than it did in two
thousand nine. The homicide rate has dropped from forty six
per hundred thousand people to sixteen. The country still faces
challenges with organized crime, drug trafficking, the justice system, and violence,

(01:29:36):
but improvements have been made. In October twenty twenty two,
writer and narrator Edgar Castillo, a first generation Guatemalan American,
launched a ten episode podcast about the murder of Rodrigo
Rosenberg Marzano, titled The Rosenberg Case. It was executive produced
by Hollywood star Oscar Isaac, another Guatemalan American. In the series,

(01:30:02):
Castillo reflects on how this particular murder seemed to usher
in a new era of political conspiracy theories, the likes
of which are far more prevalent today than they were
in two thousand and nine. Castillo credits Rodrigo's video with
giving his story greater impact, and thanks to the then
relatively new social media platform of YouTube, his story was

(01:30:25):
able to reach millions of people who otherwise might never
have seen it. Over the years, YouTube has become home
to a plethora of conspiracy theory content, making such theories
more accessible and seemingly credible than they might otherwise be quote.
YouTube isn't just about uploading and watching videos. It's also

(01:30:47):
the second largest search engine in the world. So what
does this mean for the creation and dissemination of conspiracy theories?
The obvious answer is that it's never been easier to
do both. What no one knew, what no one could
have possibly anticipated, was that the story Rosenberg told was

(01:31:08):
almost completely fictional manufactured. It was as if he had
put it together on a storyboard with a crack team
of writers. Rosenberg, perhaps with the help of Luis Mendozabul
and Mario David Garcia, had effectively created a piece of
content conspiracy as content, and had chosen the perfect platform

(01:31:30):
upon which to disseminate it. And in my opinion, the
whole Rosenberg affair inaugurated a new era of political disinformation.
It served as a prototype for what a conspiracy theory
could do when turned into entertainment and deployed on social media.

(01:31:51):
After the truth about Rodrigo's murder was revealed by Carlos
Castresana and Sisig, vandals destroyed the shrine that had been
built for Lawyer at the sight of his death, photos
and trinkets that had been left. There were thrown about
the street. A cross that had been erected there was
left defaced and crooked. But to many people, Rodrigo Rosenberg

(01:32:15):
Marzano was still a hero who had died because he
wanted to inspire positive change for his country. To those
who knew and loved him, Rodrigo was a respected lawyer,
a doting father, a beloved friend, and a passionate advocate
for Guatemala. In twenty eleven, Rodrigo's son Eduardo wrote a

(01:32:37):
knoped in which he reflected on his father's legacy, writing,
what defined my father was his life, regardless of the
circumstances under which it came to an end, whatever they were.
In that realization lies our peace