Imagine being in court facing an accusation for murder, without understanding a single word of the process. Imagine that they condemn him to 25 years in prison without having understood what evidence they incriminate him, what arguments defend him or what possibilities he has to be saved. That was the reality of María Celestina Tumax Chaclán. Originally from Totonicapán, Tumax Chaclán moved to Sololá, where he administered a small store with his sister. On April 29, 2015 it seemed any day. Two men entered around 3 in the afternoon, requested two beers and, at the end, they offered a cell phone as a form of payment, saying they had no money.
Maria refused to accept it, but they insisted and left him on the counter before leaving. He did not imagine that phone would change his life forever. A couple of hours later, his home was surrounded by four patrols. “Hands up!” Several agents shouted. Maria, a woman who only spoke K’iche ‘and a few words of Spanish, did not understand what was happening.
He tried to interpret the signs and gestures of the police. “They talked to me, they told me things, but I didn’t understand why they took me. I just saw that they grabbed the cell phone,” recalls Tumax Chaclán with the low voice. She was taken to the court without knowing what they accused her. There, a lawyer approached to tell him that he would assume his defense and, luckily, he spoke his language. It was then that Maria knew that she faced positions for murder, kidnapping and plagiarism. The only test against him was the cell phone that the men had left in their store and the testimony of a person who claimed to have seen her in the company of a man at the time of crime.
“When the lawyer told me what they accused me, I couldn’t believe it. They asked me where I had left the body, if I had buried or thrown it into the water. And I, as I could, told him not, that I did not know that lady, who was only working in the store,” he says with anguish. Tumax Chaclán was sentenced to 25 years in prison. Since then he fulfills his sentence at the Women’s Orientation Center (COF), Fraijanes. He learned to speak more Spanish during his confinement, but he still can’t read or write. “It’s hard. You imagine spending a lifetime here without understanding what they said, without knowing what I signed, without knowing how to read or write,” he laments.
Justice does not listen
Marta Juana Tojín, coordinator of the Intercultural Approach of the Institute of Criminal Public Defense (IDPP), has closely followed cases such as Tumax Chaclán. “Many indigenous women are apprehended without anyone inflying them.
The linguistic barrier in the judicial system is one of the greatest violations of rights for the indigenous population. In Guatemala, 25 different languages are spoken, but the State only guarantees interpreters in seven. The IDPP has 17 venues with performers and offers services in languages such as K’iche ‘, Kaqchikel, q’eqchi’, mam, achi ‘, Chuj and Poqomchi’. “The problem is that the language is not enough to speak. An interpreter must have three key skills: listen, speak and write correctly in both languages. In addition, he needs basic legal training to be able to correctly interpret a judicial process,” explains Tojín.
The judicial body (OJ) argues that it has advanced in that matter. “There are currently 118 performers, who cover 18 indigenous languages. In 2024, 17 thousand 351 interpretations were carried out in different judicial processes. For the first semester of 2025, six thousand 246 interpretations have already been provided,” the institution replied to a request for information. However, they recognize that there is still no coverage for languages such as Xinca, Garifuna, Sipakopense, Tektiteko, Mopan and Itza ‘. They justify the omission for “lack of demand”, although experts warn that the absence of interpreters often prevents the demand from being visible.
To that are added budget restrictions. “The most serious structural problem is financial. The budget for this service is not consistent with the magnitude of the need,” says Juan Manuel Castillo, technical advisor of the penitentiary system. But perhaps the greatest symptom of collapse is the saturation of the system. Prisons have a 329% occupation for men and 422% for women. The Criminal Public Defense has 654 lawyers, who must attend an average of 44,874 cases a year, that is, about 69 cases per lawyer.
“That seriously affects. A lawyer can have a work table with 40 deprived of liberty, but sometimes they assign up to 150. Thus you cannot provide a decent defense,” says Castillo
A life condemned to oblivion
Tumax Chaclán has already turned 10 years of his sentence and waiting for a miracle. “I ask God to take me out of here. I did nothing,” he says while rubbing my hands nervously. Her family abandoned her. Her husband disappeared and her children stopped visiting her. “The first year one of my daughters came and an uncle came twice. Then, my parents got angry with me, and nobody returned,” he said with a knot in his throat. Today survives cleaning the room of their companions, washing clothes and dishes. Weave tables that a friend, ”he exconvicta – sells outside. Hopefully, he wins between Q10 and Q20 a week, which serves to buy coffee, toilet paper, sugar and personal use items.
Five years ago he managed to get his mother’s number, a blind woman. He called her with fear. “I apologized for being here. I told him that I trusted God, that one day everything would be known.” His mother replied that he forgave her and hope they would find himself again. But due to its age and lack of resources, it has not been able to visit it. Maria dreams of hugging her again. He dreams of recovering something from the life that the system removed. After that call, Tumax Chaclán felt that he returned to life, because now he had a purpose, which is “to see his mother again.”
He assures that having spent so many years feeling the weight of oblivion and that when he would be completely alone he caused him a lot of sadness and that only the strength of his faith in God has kept her alive. Some time ago, he learned, through an acquaintance, that his children have already become parents and that he is possibly grandmother. He does not know with certainty, but now believe that he has grandchildren, even if he does not know them or have seen them in photographs, he also excites her. “Sometimes I imagine how my grandchildren are while weed. I would love to be able to make some detail with my hands and give them,” he said with tears.
He does not know how many grandchildren are and if he will give him the opportunity to meet them, but the love that she already has their hope of one day to hear them call her grandmother. With how little he earns, he tries to gather something every week. Her greatest yearning is having money for the passage that takes her back to her home, the day she manages to leave. If her mother is still alive, she wants to get to her and hug her. He does not know if he can do it, but he continues to keep each currency for that purpose. This report is not intended to determine whether Tumax Chaclán is innocent or guilty, but exposing what happens when a person is judged without understanding the language of the process.