María Herrera Magdaleno, also known as Doña Mary, is a Mexican businesswoman and human rights activist. In 2014, she founded a national network of local

collective A collective is a group of entities that share or are motivated by at least one common issue or interest, or work together to achieve a common objective. Collectives can differ from cooperatives in that they are not necessarily focused upon an ...

s to educate families on how to investigate disappearances after four of her eight children went missing. The network now includes almost 200 groups spread across 26 of

Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...

's states.

Life

Herrera is from

Michoacán Michoacán, formally Michoacán de Ocampo (; Purépecha: ), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Michoacán de Ocampo ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Michoacán de Ocampo), is one of the 32 states which comprise the Federal Entities of ...

and is the mother of eight children and grandmother of two stepchildren. She was born . By 2008, she had founded a business after leaving a husband whom she suspected had been unfaithful. Herrera made clothes and sold gold jewelry, at first in her home state of

. Her business later expanded to

Guadalajara Guadalajara ( , ) is a metropolis in western Mexico and the capital of the list of states of Mexico, state of Jalisco. According to the 2020 census, the city has a population of 1,385,629 people, making it the 7th largest city by population in Me ...

. In 2008, Herrera's sons, Raúl (19) and Jesús Salvador (24) took a trip with five colleagues to Guerrero, near Atoyac de Álvarez. Her sons and their colleagues never returned. Two years later, her sons Gustavo (28) and Luís Armando (24) vanished during a work trip in eastern

Veracruz Veracruz (), formally Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave (), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave), is one of the 31 states which, along with Me ...

. She suspects her sons disappeared as a result of

drug cartel A drug cartel is any criminal organization with the intention of supplying drug trafficking operations. They range from loosely managed agreements among various drug traffickers to formalized commercial enterprises. The term was applied when the ...

violence. In 2014, Herrera founded a national network of local collectives to educate families on how to investigate disappearances. She also plans conferences and gives workshops in universities on this same topic. In May 2022, Herrera met with

Pope Francis Pope Francis ( la, Franciscus; it, Francesco; es, link=, Francisco; born Jorge Mario Bergoglio, 17 December 1936) is the head of the Catholic Church. He has been the bishop of Rome and sovereign of the Vatican City State since 13 March 2013. ...

. In November 2022, Herrera sued the

Mexican State The states of Mexico are first-level administrative territorial entities of the country of Mexico, which is officially named Mexico, United Mexican States. There are 32 federal entities in Mexico (31 states and the capital, Mexico City, as a sepa ...

in the

Inter-American Court of Human Rights The Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR or IACtHR) is an international court based in San José, Costa Rica. Together with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, it was formed by the American Convention on Human Rights, a huma ...

in Washington, for its failure to investigate her sons' disappearance . In April 2023, she was included on the ''Time'' 100 list of the most influential people in the world for her activism.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Herrera Magdaleno, Maria Living people Year of birth missing (living people) People from Michoacán Children's rights activists Mexican women human rights activists Mexican human rights activists 21st-century Mexican businesswomen 21st-century Mexican businesspeople