MEXICO CITY — Federal prosecutors claim that Mexico's top immigration official was negligent in failing to prevent the disaster that killed 40 migrants in Ciudad Juarez last month, despite earlier signs of issues at the agency's detention facilities. He will now face criminal charges in connection with the incident.   

Francisco Garduo, the head of Mexico's National Immigration Institute, will face charges, the federal Attorney General's Office announced late on Tuesday.

It came in response to repeated requests from Mexico and some Central American countries to continue the case against the five low-level officials, guards, and Venezuelan immigrants already charged with murder.

When the fire broke out on March 27, two guards were initially the target of ire because they were seen running away without unlocking the cell door to let the migrants out. But earlier on Tuesday, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador claimed that they lacked the keys.

According to the Attorney General's Office, several other Garduo's agency officers will also be charged with misfeasance in office, though prosecutors did not specify the charges or name the officers.

Authorities claimed that the case demonstrated a "pattern of irresponsibility."

Garduo's immigration agency's press office did respond to messages and phone calls seeking comment.

According to the prosecution, the immigration agency was aware of issues that needed to be resolved after a fire at another detention facility in the Gulf Coast state of Tabasco in 2020 resulted in the deaths of one person and 14 injuries. but claimed they did nothing.

Long-standing grievances about corruption and poor living conditions at Mexico's migrant detention facilities have never received serious attention.

On the same day that the bodies of the 17 Guatemalan migrants and the six Hondurans killed in the fire were flown back to their homelands, López Obrador made remarks about the security guards involved in the fire that occurred last month in the border city of Ciudad Juarez.

It was unclear how López Obrador's remarks might affect the guards' trial, who had previously been detained due to the fire.

Because the keyholder was not present, the door was closed, according to López Obrador.

Guards can be seen leaving the building in a security camera video taken inside the building when the fire broke out inside the cell housing the migrants in late March.

As smoke fills the facility, the guards can be seen hurrying away while making no attempt to free the migrants.

Three Mexican immigration officials, a guard, and a migrant from Venezuela are all being held while the cause of the fire is being investigated. They are accused of murder.

To protest what he allegedly believed were plans to relocate or deport the migrants, the migrant allegedly set fire to foam mattresses at the detention facility.

In order to commemorate their return, family members of the victims gathered at an air force base in Guatemala City with flowers and pictures of the deceased.

A woman's voice could be heard calling out, "My son, my love," as the coffins were unloaded, lined up, and relatives were allowed to pay their respects.

Six migrants' bodies were flown to Honduras and 17 to Guatemala by military aircraft from Mexico. Authorities claim that 19 of the 40 fatalities were Guatemalan, but the identities of two bodies were still being verified.

Eleven more Guatemalans suffered injuries as a result of the fire.

The bodies were to be transported overland to their hometowns in nine different provinces, and Mario Bcaro, the foreign minister of Guatemala, was with them.

Last week, some bodies of migrants from El Salvador were sent back. 31 bodies have already been returned to their native nations.