The Red Note podcast profiled in Zeta, the legendary Tijuana weekly newspaper

The reporters at the Tijuana-based newspaper Semanario Zeta are legends in the world of border journalism, so it was a true honor for The Red Note director, Craig Whitney, and producer, Estefania Bonilla Hernandez, to speak with them recently about the mission of the podcast.

A translation of the interview with Craig and Estefania about The Red Note podcast is posted below.

Click on the following link to read Semanario Zeta's profile of the podcast is available through the following link: Busca “La Nota Roja” abonar a la conciencia sobre los feminicidios en México

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"The Red Note" seeks to raise awareness of femicides in Mexico

By Lourdes Loza Romero / Semanario Zeta

Until September 2020, Ciudad Juárez ranked first nationwide in femicides with 18 cases, followed by Tijuana with 17, according to the statistics from the Executive Secretary of the National Public Security System.

Historically Ciudad Juárez has been portrayed negatively on the issue of violence against women, as reflected in the emblematic case of "the dead women of Juárez", a series of violent homicides that were registered and marked the 90s in this border city, and to which new cases continue to be added to this date.

Film producers Estefanía Bonilla and Craig Whitney came together with the intention of creating a feature film that portrays the history of this problem in order to create a project that would bring together the historical context of three decades of women who have died violently on the streets of Ciudad Juárez.

But after starting a dialogue with the North American production company Imperative Entertainment, it was decided that the project would be in podcast format narrated by journalist Lydia Cacho and that it would bring together the voices of the families of the victims, as interviewed by the Juarez journalist, Alicia Fernández.

Prior to 25N, or the International Day for the Eradication of Violence against Women, the last chapter of the podcast "La Nota Roja" was released, a name that reflects that this problem "is a much bigger phenomenon than just a city or its femicide numbers,” Whitney explained.

The podcast is available in English and Spanish on different platforms such as Spotify or Google Podcasts; there are ten chapters of between 35 and 40 minutes each. Estefanía Bonilla commented to this Weekly that the main objective is to raise awareness of such a complex issue by addressing it in a general way and connecting the different stories that have emerged.

“This is not the first time that the subject has been discussed in audiovisual media, there are extraordinary documentaries and endless literature, but they deal with cases in isolation, without connecting them to the global context of what has to do with our context. It was very important for us to start connecting each of the points, so that it is understood that the murders and disappearances of women in Juárez are not an isolated matter,” explained Bonilla.

The chronology of "The Red Note" ranges from the series of murders that occurred in the 1990s, with the testimony of relatives and former officials who became involved in the issue, to the present day with the murder of activist and artist Isabel Cabanillas, murdered on January 18.