Four Ecuadorian boys left home to play soccer. They were found beaten, naked and charred
SOURCE:ABC Australia|BY:Tessa Flemming
In the weeks before Christmas, four boys under 16 left home to play a game of soccer. Their forced disappearance at the hands of Ecuador's military has been labelled a national "turning point".
Like most boys their age in Ecuador, brothers Ismael and Josué Arroyo dreamt of becoming great soccer players.
Ismael, 15, aspired to be like Neymar. Josué, 14, preferred Kylian Mbappé.
It was not an uncommon occurrence for the pair to wander from their home in the port city of Guayaquil for a game.
On December 8 last year — alongside friends Steven Medina, 11, and Nehemías Arboleda, 15— that is exactly what they did.
WARNING: This story contains details that some readers might find distressing.
But that night, their sporting dreams were prematurely snuffed out.
The pair never returned home.
Instead, weeks later, their bodies were discovered kilometres away — beaten, naked and charred.
Now, 11 soldiers have been sentenced to jail over their disappearance, in a case that has reignited wounds of racism and brought Ecuador's military crackdown into question.
Mourners attended a vigil for the four boys. (Reuters: Santiago Arcos)
The walk home and a doomed encounter
The four Afro-Ecuadorian boys lived in Guayaquil's Las Malvinas neighbourhood — one of the region's poorest and, at the time, under tight military control.
Earlier in 2024, Ecuador had been plunged into a state of emergency after powerful Los Choneros gang leader Adolfo "Fito" Macías escaped prison.
Still, life persisted and the boys wanted to play soccer.
They were around 10 minutes from their homes when they were detained by the soldiers.
Relatives look at the casket of Steven Medina, 11. (Reuters: Santiago Arcos)
Defence Minister Gian Carlo Loffredo Rendon later told reporters the children were stopped by agents who "observed eight people who were allegedly robbing a woman".
A group of boys are seen running from men in uniform before two are taken and placed face-down in the back of a white ute with tinted windows.
One of them is seen getting punched in the head.
The vehicle had a flashing siren, no licence plate and a black bench in the back — a design similar to those used in military patrols.
The uniformed men also wore badges resembling those of the Ecuadorian Air Force (FAE).
The footage ends, but the military mistreatment of the boys allegedly continued.
Prosecutors have alleged the four boys were beaten further, forced to remove their clothes and then abandoned naked in Taura, a dangerous rural community some 30 kilometres south of Guayaquil.
There, one of the boys managed to call his father to tell him they had been abandoned by the soldiers, according to witness testimony.
But when authorities arrived, they found no sign of the four boys.
Silence before a new year tragedy
In the following three weeks, grieving families sought answers from the government — to no avail.
The father of Ismael and Josué, Luis Arroyo, filed a complaint almost immediately with Ecuador's prosecutor’s office, but the investigation was labelled as a kidnapping rather than an enforced disappearance.
Only when the families came forward to local media did more information begin to trickle out.
This included that the security footage had been handed into authorities a day after the children went missing.
The resulting anger — in a case now dubbed the Guayaquil Four or the Las Malvinas case — saw demonstrators flood the coastal city's streets demanding answers.
As ire grew, President Daniel Noboa assured "all those responsible" would be found but stopped short of criticising the military.
A tearful relative protests against suspected military involvement. (Reuters: Santiago Arcos)
Then, on December 24, four charred bodies were found in a marshy area of Taura, outside an air force base.
The bodies were so badly burnt that their faces and fingerprints were unrecognisable.
Forensic examination also revealed several of the corpses had gunshot wounds to the head and bore evidence of torture.
As the country went into the new year, DNA testing confirmed the remains belonged to the four boys.
Relatives react after the attorney-general's office confirms DNA testing as the four boys. (Reuters: Santiago Arcos)
The judge who charged 16 soldiers with their disappearance also compelled the defence ministry to apologise to the devastated families.
While the ministry initially denied involvement, it now argued the soldiers had apprehended the boys but released them alive in Taura, blaming their deaths on gang violence.
In his public apology, Mr Loffredo offered his condolences before seeking for the judge in the case to be sanctioned.
He also condemned what he deemed was the "use of the narrative of human rights as an instrument of political persecution".
As the case evolved, prosecutors brought those initial military claims into further question.
Preliminary hearings heard there was no evidence to support the alleged robbery, or official record of the boy's detention.
A poster for the boys reads "'neither forgiveness nor forgetting". (Reuters: Santiago Arcos)
Case marks a national 'turning point'
For many, the case became emblematic of the racialised violence that haunted Afro-Ecuadorians, and an increasingly unregulated military deployment.
Despite only making up 7.2 per cent of the nation's population, Afro-Ecuadorians make up 40 per cent of people living in poverty, according to the latest statistics.
The boys' home of Las Malvinas has a predominantly black population.
As funerals for the four took place, their community led a chigualo down the suburb's streets — a funeral ritual rooted in Afro-descendant tradition and an inherent reminder of their roots.
"We have endured all of this simply because we are Afro-Ecuadorians and live in Las Malvinas,” Mr Arroyo told The Guardian at the time.
On the one-year anniversary of their deaths, Steven's father Ronny Medina also spoke of the prejudice the families had faced as others tried to link the boys to organised crime groups.
"Many discriminated against us and spoke badly of our children, but the only one who judges is God," he told local media.
"We come from a humble neighbourhood, but that does not make us criminals."
International nonprofit, Black Alliance for Peace (BAP), said the case highlighted the systemic violation of Afro-Ecuadorian rights as part of Mr Noboa's ongoing internal armed conflict.
"The Ecuadorian state has rarely recognised let alone protected the fundamental human rights of Afro-Ecuadorians," Ajamu Baraka, director of BAP’s North-South Project for People(s)-Centered Human rights said.
"But this case represents a line in the sand for the Black peoples of that nation."
Ronny Medina marches on the December 8 anniversary of his son's disappearance. (Reuters: Santiago Arcos)
As the case lagged, families grew frustrated as to why they were still being left in the dark.
Mother of the Arroyo brothers, Katty Bustos, begged for justice as she commemorated the one-year anniversary.
"I have a nine-year-old daughter that cries every night asking me "Mama, why did the military do all that to my brothers?" she said.
"We need to know the truth, why they did it."
Katty Bustos mourns her sons on the one-year anniversary of their disappearance. (Reuters: Santiago Arcos)
The drawn-out fight also underlined the military's impunity at a time when its presence is more heightened than ever.
Since his initial security crackdown, Mr Noboa has vowed to reduce crime under his "Plan Fenix" — a ploy consisting of successive states of emergency and increased military patrols.
But crime remains at a high in Guayaquil, where 1,900 murders were recorded between January and September.
Human rights advocates have argued the crackdown has instead emboldened arbitrary detentions and risks serious human rights violations.
Ana Piquer, Americas director at Amnesty International, said the Guayaquil Four case proved Mr Noboa had to reverse his approach.
"Enforced disappearances are multiplying in Ecuador while the government insists on a militarised strategy that not only has not reduced crimes, but has increased human rights violations," she said.
Ecuador's military has increasingly patrolled the streets since the start of 2024. (Reuters: Vicente Gaibor del Pino)
UNICEF and the UN's Human Rights Representative in South America Jan Jarab equally showed concern over the reported violations.
"This tragic event should mark a turning point in the way public security policy is conducted in the country,"
Mr Jarab added.
Sentence caps off 'tortuous year'
This December — more than a year after their deaths — 11 of 17 soldiers were found responsible for the abduction and torture of the boys.
The soldiers were sentenced to 34 years in prison and ordered to pay $US10,000 fines to the families.
The conviction of the 11 soldiers came more than a year after the boys first disappeared. (Reuters: Santiago Arcos)
The court also jailed five soldiers who collaborated with the prosecution over the case to two and a half years behind bars.
The 11 convicted men are now expected to face a murder trial next year.
And while the Defence Ministry said it would comply with the ruling, it also may not be its last.
Amnesty International says there are dozens of further cases of potential military enforced disappearances — including that of fellow Afro-Ecuadorian Leonardo Minota Nieves.
A woman cries over the coffin of one of the four boys. (Reuters:Santiago Arcos)
As the verdict was announced, lawyers for the families said the convictions did not erase the pain of a "very tortuous year".
Most were left without concrete answers as to why their boys were singled out that night.
Luis Arroyo was the only one to speak to photographers as he left behind the courtroom that laid bare his sons' brutal, final moments.
Two boys who had only left home to play a game of football with friends.