They told him he was begging for scraps, but the support never came
En las calles de Iztapalapa, un agente de policía que actuó para proteger a una trabajadora durante un robo se convirtió, en cuestión de meses, en acusado de homicidio agravado. El caso del oficial Pedro Buendía ilustra la fragilidad de la heroicidad institucional: lo que un día es valentía, al día siguiente puede ser reencuadrado como abuso. Un juez ordenó su reinstalación tras ocho meses de suspensión sin goce de sueldo, pero la maquinaria legal sigue en marcha, y la pregunta que queda flotando no es solo jurídica, sino profundamente humana: ¿qué le debe una institución a quien actúa en su nombre?
- Un oficial que disparó contra un ladrón en pleno robo fue primero celebrado como héroe y luego acusado de homicidio agravado con hasta cincuenta años de prisión, todo en el lapso de unos meses.
- La fiscalía revirtió su evaluación inicial en septiembre, reencuadrando el uso de fuerza como un abuso de ventaja sobre un sospechoso menos armado, dejando a Buendía sin empleo, sin salario y sin respaldo institucional.
- El video del interior de la tienda mostraba con claridad lo ocurrido, pero las mismas imágenes que construyeron al héroe fueron usadas para construir al acusado.
- Un juez del Reclusorio Oriente ordenó la reinstalación de Buendía al determinar que las pruebas para continuar el proceso eran mínimas, aunque el proceso penal no se detiene.
- Con un plazo de 45 días para el cierre de la investigación complementaria, Buendía enfrenta la paradoja de haber recuperado su puesto pero no su certeza: aún no sabe si volverá a un trabajo que ya le costó ocho meses de su vida.
Pedro Buendía estaba en el baño de una tienda de conveniencia en Iztapalapa cuando un hombre rompió las puertas de vidrio en febrero de 2025. El ladrón venía por la caja. Buendía salió, disparó, y el sospechoso murió. El video lo mostraba todo: había una trabajadora, había un robo, había una respuesta. Por un momento, el oficial fue un héroe.
Luego todo se invirtió. En septiembre, cuatro meses después del incidente, la fiscalía cambió su calificación: ya no era uso justificado de la fuerza, sino homicidio agravado con ventaja, un delito que puede acarrear hasta cincuenta años de prisión. Lo suspendieron sin goce de sueldo. La misma institución que debía respaldarlo le dio la espalda.
Ocho meses después, un juez del Reclusorio Oriente ordenó su reinstalación a la Secretaría de Seguridad Ciudadana, al considerar que las pruebas para sostener el proceso eran insuficientes. Su abogado, Mario Solís, explicó la decisión en términos procesales. Pero Buendía la vivió en términos humanos: ocho meses sin salario, sin apoyo institucional, convertido públicamente de defensor a acusado.
El oficial habló con el cansancio de quien ha sido deshecho ante los ojos de todos. Dijo que había entrado a esa tienda para proteger a la trabajadora, que había pedido respaldo a la dependencia y que le respondieron que estaba mendigando. La reinstalación llegó, pero llegó tarde, después del daño. Ahora tiene cuarenta y cinco días mientras los investigadores cierran su pesquisa, y una pregunta abierta: si volverá a un trabajo que ya le cobró tanto.
Pedro Buendia was inside a convenience store bathroom in the Iztapalapa neighborhood of Mexico City when a man smashed through the glass doors. It was February 2025. The robber had come for the register. Buendia, a police officer, emerged and fired his weapon. The suspect died. For a moment, the officer was a hero—the video from inside the store showed exactly what happened, frame by frame. A worker was there. A robbery was happening. He responded.
Then everything reversed. Eight months later, in May, a judge at the Reclusorio Oriente courthouse ordered Buendia reinstated to the Mexico City Security Secretariat, but the reversal came too late to undo what had already broken. The prosecutor's office had changed its mind about what the shooting meant. In September, four months after the incident, they upgraded the charge from a justified use of force to aggravated homicide with the aggravating circumstance of advantage—a crime that carries a sentence of up to fifty years in prison. They suspended him without pay.
Buendia's lawyer, Mario Solís, explained the judge's decision in the careful language of criminal procedure. The judge determined there was minimal evidence to proceed, yet proceeded anyway. The reinstatement order meant Buendia could return to work and remain free while the case continued. A forty-five-day window had been set for investigators to close their supplementary investigation. The legal machinery would keep turning.
What happened in those eight months was a particular kind of institutional violence. Buendia had done what police are trained to do—protect someone in danger. The video proved it. But somewhere between February and September, the same facts that made him a hero became evidence of a crime. The prosecutor's office reframed the shooting not as defense but as an abuse of power, arguing that Buendia had an advantage over an unarmed or less-armed suspect and used it fatally. The distinction mattered enormously. It meant the difference between vindication and fifty years in prison.
Buendia spoke about those months with the exhaustion of someone who had been publicly unmade. He said he had been inside that Oxxo to do his job, to cover the worker, to protect her. He had asked for support from the department—institutional backing, presumably, or at minimum clarity about whether he had done wrong. Instead, he said, they told him he was begging for scraps. The support never came. The suspension without pay meant eight months of financial freefall while the case moved through the system.
When asked about returning to the Security Secretariat, Buendia said he would think about it. He had been stripped of institutional protection at the moment he needed it most. The reinstatement order was technically a victory, but it arrived after the damage was done—after the suspension, after the upgraded charges, after the public narrative had shifted from hero to defendant. He was being offered his job back, but the job had already cost him eight months of his life and the prospect of fifty more if the prosecution succeeded. The question now was whether he would take it.
Notable Quotes
That moment I was in that Oxxo, covering and defending the cashier— Officer Pedro Buendia
They removed my support, I asked for help, but nothing came—just for doing my job as a police officer— Officer Pedro Buendia
The Hearth Conversation Another angle on the story
Why did the prosecutor change the charge four months after the shooting?
The video was always there. What changed was how they chose to read it. They reframed it from self-defense to abuse of power—arguing he had an advantage and used it fatally. It's the same facts, different story.
But he was a police officer responding to a robbery in real time. How is that an advantage?
That's the question nobody answered for him. The law says you can't use force if you have an advantage. But a police officer in a store during a robbery—that's the entire point of having police. The prosecutor's office decided the advantage was disqualifying.
What did the reinstatement actually mean for him?
Technically, he could go back to work and stay out of jail while the case continued. But he'd been suspended without pay for eight months. The department had abandoned him. Being told you can return to a job that abandoned you is a hollow victory.
Did he say he would take the job back?
He said he'd think about it. He was weighing whether to stay in a system that had already shown him it wouldn't protect him when it mattered most.
What happens next?
The investigation has forty-five days to close. Then the case moves forward. He remains under prosecution for a crime that, depending on who's telling the story, was either heroism or homicide.