The prosecutor's office in Mexico announced that it is withdrawing the case against a woman who was sentenced to six years in prison for killing a rapist while he was attacking her.
In a ruling last Sunday that sparked public outcry, the court said that while it agreed the 23-year-old woman was raped in 2021, it found her guilty of murder for "excessive use of legitimate defence" and ordered her to pay more than 16.000 dollars in compensation to the family of her attacker.
Feminist groups that supported the woman protested angrily at the time, saying that the verdict criminalizes the victims of sexual violence and protects the perpetrators in a country with a high level of gender-based violence and femicide.
Demonstrators in Mexico City carried banners saying "Defending my life is not a crime."
Responding to public anger, Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopes Obrador told reporters on Saturday that he would pardon the woman.
But her lawyers said accepting the pardon would mean admitting she committed a crime even though she is completely innocent.
Then, on Saturday evening, the State Prosecutor's Office announced that it had reviewed the case and determined that the woman was "exonerated" and that the Prosecutor's Office believes that she acted in self-defense.
Almost half of Mexican women have experienced sexual violence, state data show.
In 2022, the Mexican government registered a total of 3.754 murders of women - an average of 10 per day, which is a significant jump compared to the previous year.
Only a third of the murders were investigated as femicide.
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