Honduran Gay Erick Martinez
The murder of Honduran gay advocate, investigative journalist and resistance fighter Erick Martinez Avila attracted a decent amount of media coverage - from the BBC to American gay blogs and newspapers - and this was the photo most-used to illustrate stories:
Martinez is wearing a red tee shirt and red is the color of the Frente Nacional de Resistencia Popular organization, but I'm not sure if the logo on his shirt is that of the FNRP, while holding a rainbow flag. He was thirty-two years-old at the time of his slaying and strangulation was the method used to kill him.
What the colors of the tee shirt and flag potentially illustrate is the union of the resistance movement and the LGBT community of Honduras, reminding us that the effort to restore democracy and respect the rights of gay people Honduras are of equal importance.
What I didn't see are the disturbing photos below that I only discovered this week, in doing additional research stemming from writing reports here and here about solidarity events in several U.S. cities last week, marking the third anniversary of the coup.
The images appearing in the Honduran press in May after Martinez's body was found in a ditch in the capital of Tegucigalpa show the horror of his murder. There isn't anything pretty or happy in this photo from La Tribuna:
What you see below of a woman tending to his corpse ran on the Tiempo site:
Tiempo also used this photo of Martinez when he was still alive, wearing a red tee shirt and holding the FNRP:
These photos need to be shown to better remember Martinez and call for a full investigation into his killing, along with solving the murders of all the other LGBT people, peasants, union leaders and investigative reporters in Honduras since the coup on June 28, 2009.
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