Was this man murdered?

F: My first question is: how did you get access to your son’s email account?

L: What kind of a question is that? I am his mother, I know his passwords. Well, truth is it took me several attempts but I was always in the general ballpark.

F: What did you find in his emails? Do you think he’d be happy for you to access his emails?

L: Sebastian was murdered! What the hell are you talking about, would he be happy?! There is a conspiracy at work here that extends right across the Americas and the USA. The work of my son is being stolen, or tarnished, or both, in order for people to bring his name down. Besides, I’m his mother, he can’t hide anything from me.

F: It’s interesting that you state his name is being brought down, I hope to get back to that in a moment. But first let’s start at the beginning. Who was your son?

L: You now who my son was, Sebastian Espejo.

F: No, I mean for the record, what did he do and what happened to him?

L: Well, Seb was a sort of genius. A very kind and generous genius. He always wanted to help mankind. Back when he was just young he couldn’t wait to leave Quito. He met a lot of those religious Americans who come down to do charity, they always annoy me if I’m honest, but Seb got on really well with them, always giving them a helping hand and what have you. He was even friends with that guy who made PayPal.

F: Peter Thiel?

L: No, the other one, I can’t remember his name.

F: So after he graduated he set up QuitoFoods?

L: Yes! He always had a million ideas, and farming and cooking were his two big passions so he studied agribusiness and worked his way up to starting a small import-export firm. His big excitement back then was Fairtrade — not that it did him, or anyone else, much good. He moved on to other things and was convinced that he could discover stuff first, before the big international pharmaceuticals could find it. I’m talking here about the Amazon, the jungle, the shamanistic stuff. If I’m honest, I don’t know all the details, he was a genius after all, I’m just his mother.

F: And then in 2016 he died?

L: He was murdered.

F: How do you know he was murdered, tell me about it.

L: The earthquake rocked Quito on December 17, 2015, I’ll never forget it. Our house almost broke apart but thank the Lord Jesus it held, we got out on the street before the fire broke out. The fire burned the whole block to the ground. Anyway, I hadn’t heard from Seb by the next evening, and started to get worried. When I finally got the moment to go around to QuitoFoods’ office depot, I met his assistant Manuela there, crying inconsolably. Good girl, Manuela. I always liked her, she was hard when she needed to be hard, and soft when the world gave her no choice but be soft, you know what I mean? It was then that I knew he was dead.

F: So how did he die?

L: This is where it gets odd. It was announced that he was found dead in the rubble of his depot, but nobody saw any body being taken out of the rubble. There was no emergency team or anything there, even when I was there. So I went over to the morgue, of course it was crazy there, but I found Seb’s old friend Simón there, a doctor, or a nurse, I can’t remember which. And he said: ‘Mama Espejo, I’m so sorry some son of a bitch has shot your son, I’m so sorry. You tell me who did it and I’ll kill them myself,’ he was just saying this kind of think over and over and hugging and kissing me and then he was gone. The place was a mad house. So, you can imagine I was shocked, and went to the police office. That too was a madhouse. They didn’t know what I was talking about. The next morning, boom, more tremors. Simón and his little daughter were killed. So there you have it, the records say Seb died in the earthquake. But I know otherwise. He was shot in the head, like an animal, like some cow.

F: And who do you think shot him then?

L: Ah! Well that’s why I contacted you. In 2017, just after the Trump man got elected, I got a knock on my door from Manuela. She said that she was trying to update the website of QuitoFoods and found a group of emails from a woman called Vivaan Lighari, trying to acquire the name QuitoFoods. Or I mean the website.

F: She was trying to buy the domain?

L: Yes, or at least I’m not sure exactly, that or the name. And anyway, Manuela asked me what she should do, it had been a year and she was moving on to another job. She felt committed to Seb and all they had built up, all the producers, the network — the people in the jungle. She had to contact them all, try and find them other distributors, contacts.

F: So then what?

L: Well then, nothing! I tried to email this Vivaan woman, but heard nothing back. All the while, I kept asking people in the neighborhood of QuitoFoods if they had seen or heard anything just before the earthquake. I was told that Seb had fights, shouting matches, with people every evening in the week leading up to the earthquake. The mechanics across the street, can’t remember their name, but they’re still there if you want to go and interview them, they said they thought it was just some supplier who hadn’t been paid and was pissed off, happens all the time. Anyhow, time passes and I do all I can to find out more but so much damage was caused by the earthquake, many people died, who was I to blame? The world was going to shit: Trump, Venezuela, god even that monster Bolsinaro, where do you start when you live in such a world, huh, you tell me?

F: So then you started to update the blog on the webpage with this information, asking for anything people might know? You also asked the family of Simón Carbonell what they knew and have suggested publically that he and his daughter were also murdered.

L: That’s right. Come on, I’ve read what you’re about, I’ve looked it up. Disaster Capitalism — that’s the name for what’s going on here in Quito. My son discovered one of the most revolutionary foodstuffs ever known to man, he found it right there in the jungle, and was about to patent it or sign a deal or something, then what do you know, he turns up dead in an earthquake! These multinationals, they will do anything, anything, to get ahead of the poor people of this world. Look at what Coca-Cola have done to the water of Central America!

F: What is this foodstuff you’re talking about?

L: I’m not going to go into it. I’m certain that this discovery is what got my son murdered.

F: You mentioned earlier that you thought there was a campaign to tarnish your son’s name. You share that name: Espejo. You yourself have quite a history, do you not?

L: What do you mean, quite a history? What are you getting at?

F: Well I have read that you were born in the Galapagos, and that you brought Sebastian up there in, well, a religious environment before moving to Quito.

L: What of it? I married my late husband, Seb’s father, Estampa Espejo and yes, we brought Sebastian up on some of the islands. They were very exciting times, I miss my time on the islands…

F: Is it true your family can be traced back to Floreana?

L: What has this got to do with Seb’s murder? I don’t see what you’re getting at. The line to investigate is to California, not to the Galapagos. Nothing works in this country, I spend my days trying to patent my son’s work, meanwhile the police don’t do anything about the fact that my son’s body went missing after being shot. What is a mother supposed to do? May God have mercy on us.

F: His body is missing?

L: You know that, I told you that already on the phone. The earthquake caused so much damage, so much was lost. Including my son’s body. Now if you don’t mind, I hope you can go and find this Vivaan woman, she’s the person you need to interview.