Mum Goes On Taken-Style Mission To Avenge Her Daughter's Death

A mum in Mexico spent three years on a Taken-style mission to avenge her daughter's death.

Miriam Rodriguez went searching for answers after her 20-year-old daughter, Karen Alejandra Salinas Rodríguez, disappeared.

Karen's captors sent Miriam ransom demands in exchange for her to be released, however the young woman was never returned safely. Instead, her body was discovered on an abandoned ranch in 2014.

Miriam's mission has been brought to light by The New York Times, which has explained the bold and dangerous mission she undertook to hold those responsible for Karen's death accountable.

An early incident in Miriam's campaign saw her pleading with a gang member to release her daughter.

The gang member insisted his cartel did not have her, but offered to find her for a fee, which Miriam paid - however, during the conversation, she heard his name uttered on a radio: Sama.

That sparked a frenzied search on social media, as Miriam sought to find someone by that name. She eventually found the profile of someone she recognised and zeroed in on his location, an ice-cream shop two hours away in Ciudad Victoria.

The 56-year-old then spent weeks waiting by the shop until Sama came along. She followed him to his home and even pretended to be an election official while interviewing neighbours to get more details about him.

Miriam then set course for finding other people involved in Karen's murder, which led her to change her appearance and pretend to be other people so that she could get closer to the culprits belonging to the Zeta cartel.

She even created excuses to meet their families and casually ask 'unsuspecting grandmothers and cousins' about the people's addresses.

The mother cornered one man involved in the murder in an alleyway and put a gun to his back and warned him: "If you move, I'll shoot you."

Despite some of the culprits starting new lives with respectable jobs, Miriam rounded up nearly everyone and handed them over to authorities. In total, she was able to get 10 members of the Zeta cartel arrested.

Sadly though, her mission came at a cost.

On Mother's Day in 2017 as she was chasing down one of her last targets, she was shot 12 times in front of her home and was killed.

The tireless effort to bring people to justice resulted in a bronze plaque being erected in her city of San Fernando, as many were inspired by her mission.

Featured Image Credit: Facebook

Topics: World News, Mexico

Stewart Perrie

Stewart Perrie is a Trending Journalist at LADbible. His first job was as a newsreader and journalist at the award winning Sydney radio station, Macquarie Radio. He was solely responsible for the content broadcast on multiple stations across Australia when the MH17, Germanwings and AirAsia disasters unfolded. Stewart has covered the conflict in Syria for LADbible, interviewing a doctor on the front line, and has contributed to the hugely successful UOKM8 campaign.

@stewartperrie