Scott Wallace on the Quadruple Homicide of Four Community Leaders in Amazon
It's called the Red Gold Rush. After Brazil declared a moratorium on logging big-leaf mahogany in 2001, Peru emerged to fill the gap as one of the world's largest suppliers. But the rush depleted many of Peru's watersheds, forcing illegal loggers to turn their attention to Indian lands, national parks, and territorial reserves.
But some community leaders, like Edwin Chota who was murdered last week, took action.
Scripps Fellow Scott Wallace traveled with Chota while last year. He described him as a "wiry man with unruly jet-black hair and a winsome, gap-toothed smile, Chota had a gift for motivating his people to persevere despite the evident risks."
Chota opposed drug traffickers and criminal timber syndiates operating with a sense of near-total impunity in Peru's isolated borderlands.
On Thursday, Wallace published reflecting on the illegal timber trade.