AUTHORITIES in Peru have ordered the arrest of two suspects in the killing of a Canadian man whose graphic death by a lynch mob was captured on a mobile phone.
Shocking footage appears to show Sebastian Woodroffe begging for mercy while being dragged by the neck between thatch-roofed homes, before being left motionless on the muddy ground.
Mr Woodroffe travelled to the Amazon rainforest to study hallucinogenic medicine.
Residents of a remote village accused him of killing an 81-year-old medicine woman a day earlier, a spokesman for the attorney-general’s office said.
Olivia Arevalo, a traditional healer of the Shipibo-Conibo tribe, was shot twice and died on Thursday near her home in the Amazonian region of Ucayali, said Ricardo Palma Jimenez, the head of a group of prosecutors in Ucayali.
Some villagers had blamed Ms Arevalo’s murder on the 41-year-old Canadian citizen who lived in the region and was believed to have been one of her clients.
Police found Mr Woodroffe’s body buried about 1km from Arevalo’s home on Saturday after a video recording of the lynching was shared on social media, Mr Jimenez said.
HARROWING VIEWING
The video shows a man groaning in a puddle near a thatched-roof structure as another man puts a rope around his neck and drags him with others looking on.
Mr Jimenez said prosecutors were exploring several hypotheses related to Ms Arevalo’s murder and that it was too early to name suspects in the case.
“We will not rest until both murders, of the indigenous woman as well as the Canadian man, are solved,” he said. Mr Jimenez confirmed the man in the video was Mr Woodroffe and that an autopsy of his body showed he died by strangulation after receiving several blows across his body.
Ms Arevalo’s murder had prompted outrage in Peru following other unsolved murders of indigenous activists who had repeatedly faced death threats related to efforts to keep illegal loggers and oil palm growers off native lands.
“Canada extends its deepest condolences following the reported assassination of Olivia Arevalo Lomas, an indigenous elder and human rights defender,” Global Affairs Canada, which manages Canadian foreign relations, said in a statement.
“We are also aware that a Canadian was killed in a related incident. Consular services are being provided to the family of the Canadian.”
DEADLY DRUG
Mr Woodroffe, from British Columbia, was one of thousands of foreign tourists who travel to the Peruvian Amazon to experiment with ayahuasca, a bitter, dark-coloured brew made of a mixture of native plants.
The hallucinogenic cocktail, also known as yage, has been used by indigenous tribes in Brazil, Peru, Ecuador and Colombia as a cure for numerous ailments.
But it’s also increasingly consumed by Western tourists looking for mind-altering experiences, sometimes with deadly consequences, The Sun reported.
— Reuters, with AP, news.com.au
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