Yucatán has a reputation for being the safest state in Mexico. Its intentional homicide figures are consistently the lowest in the country, and the state government proudly repeats this distinction in every government report.

However, there is a category of violence that does not fit into this comfortable narrative: sexual abuse. A federal report released by the Executive Secretariat of the National Public Security System (Sesnsp), featuring data from January to April 2026, places Yucatán as the eighth entity with the highest rate of emergency calls for sexual abuse incidents in the country, with 2.71 cases per 100,000 inhabitants—a figure that exceeds the national average of 2.08.

In absolute terms, the number may seem small: 69 calls to 911. But behind each one, there is a person who picked up the phone, dialed the emergency number, and said that something terrible had happened to them. And what occurred next reveals another equally serious problem: out of those 69 calls, the State Attorney General’s Office opened only 38 investigation files, meaning that 31 reports of sexual abuse—almost half—did not result in any ministerial case file.

The gap between the cry and the response

The difference between calls to 911 and open investigation files is not a minor technical detail. It is the measure of how many people asked for help and did not get a response. In practice, every call that does not turn into a file represents a victim left without a process, without support, and frequently, facing the same aggressor.

In January 2026, crimes against sexual freedom and security in Yucatán closed with 20 case files, compared to 13 from the previous year, representing a 53.8% increase. Sexual abuse topped the list with 11 cases, followed by simple rape, sexual harassment, and stalking. The increase in complaints could be interpreted as a positive sign—more people deciding to speak up—but it also evidences that the problem is growing.

This May, the Attorney General’s Office reported that a man was sentenced to eight years in prison for the sexual abuse he committed against a 14-year-old girl at a house in Kanasín on April 3, 2024: two years elapsed from the events to the sentence, and that occurred in an abbreviated trial, meaning the defendant confessed his guilt. In a different case, also in May, a judge bound a man over to trial, accused of sexually abusing a 9-year-old girl in Progreso on two distinct occasions; the events date back to 2025. Justice arrives, but it takes time.

Children: the most invisible victims

The most disturbing data from the Yucatecan landscape of sexual abuse points toward childhood. The association Estudio 4 Alto Rendimiento revealed that over the last three years in Yucatán, around 354 complaints for child sexual abuse were filed, although this figure might only be an approximation since most cases go unreported. And the trend is upward: the Municipal Women’s Institute (IMM) reported that at the close of 2025, it provided support to approximately 200 minors, but in January 2026 alone, 240 new complaints of potential sexual abuse in minors were recorded. In a single month, the number of cases handled exceeded the total for the entire previous year.

The most alarming aspect is where the abuse occurs. According to the president of the Fundación Amar del Sureste, Georgina Ortega Joaquín, most minors who arrive at the institution enter due to mistreatment or violence. Still, as psychological support progresses, histories of sexual abuse are detected—a situation that is very common and typically happens within the family nucleus itself. The home, the space that should be the most protected, is frequently the place where the damage begins.

Until October 2025, 255 crimes for sexual abuse were recorded in Yucatán, within a context where the victims’ struggle against fear, revictimization, and threats remains arduous.

Sexual harassment: normalized and unanswered

If sexual abuse has a worrying gap between calls and files, sexual harassment and stalking present an even greater abyss. According to the same Sesnsp report corresponding to January–April 2026, Yucatán records a rate of 3.62 emergency calls for sexual harassment or stalking per 100,000 inhabitants, a figure higher than the national average of 3.36, with 92 victims reported during that period. However, the State Attorney General’s Office opened only nine investigation files for sexual harassment and two for stalking during those four months. Out of 92 people who called 911 reporting harassment, only eleven cases activated a ministerial file.

The data gains a particular significance when crossed with information from the Endireh, which indicates that 30.5% of Yucatecan women aged 15 or older have experienced violence in educational settings, with classmates as the main aggressors (48.2% of cases) and teachers responsible in 15.3% of the events. Sexual harassment is not a problem that comes from the outside: it is installed within the very institutions where the next generation is educated.

A case that reached the courts this year illustrates the dimension of the problem. A control judge placed a man in preventive detention, whom the Attorney General’s Office accused of committing rape, sexual abuse, and sexual harassment against two girls on multiple occasions between 2019 and 2024, taking advantage of the fact that he was a dance teacher in Mérida. The events spanned five years. No previous complaint stopped him.

Rape: underreporting and a justice that falls short

In matters of rape, the federal report records 16 victims of emergency calls for that crime in Yucatán between January and April 2026, with a rate of 0.63 cases per 100,000 inhabitants, slightly below the national average of 0.67. But the Attorney General’s Office opened 13 files for simple and statutory rape during that period, meaning that three reports did not generate a formal investigation.

Among the cases that did reach the judicial system is that of a man bound over to trial in May 2026 for statutory rape, accused of assaulting a 45-year-old woman with permanent intellectual disability at a house in Kanasín on May 7. The victim belongs to one of the most vulnerable groups with the least capacity for self-defense: people with disabilities, who face additional barriers to reporting and to being believed by institutions.

The uncomfortable mirror of statistics

The 2026 data draws a Yucatán with a central contradiction: it is the state with the lowest homicidal violence in the country, but at the same time, it exhibits rates of sexual abuse, harassment, and gender violence that exceed national averages, with an institutional response that processes barely a fraction of the reported cases.

Most abuse cases are not reported, implying that official statistics represent only a fraction of the real phenomenon. This underreporting is explained by multiple factors: the fear of reprisals, the propensity of other family members to protect the aggressor, economic dependence on the aggressor, and distrust in institutions.

The image of a safe state does not lie completely: homicides are low, and the rate of family violence is below the national average. But it coexists with a reality that the published federal figures make it impossible to ignore: dozens of people call asking for help due to sexual abuse or harassment. Girls and boys are abused inside their own homes by people they should trust. Teachers, family members, partners. The danger is not on the street. It is behind closed doors.

TYT Newsroom

The post Yucatán ranks eighth in sexual abuse in Mexico first appeared on The Yucatan Times.

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