As an investigative reporter and editor at the weekly newspaper Zeta, Francisco Ortiz Franco knew better than most how deep crime and corruption run in this country. Still, say friends and family, he never lost faith.
His sister-in-law, Socorro Ramírez, says she once challenged Mexico's steadfast opposition to the death penalty, showing Mr. Ortiz a gruesome newspaper photo of a woman's body that had been cut into pieces and left on the street.
''I told Francisco, 'Why not the death penalty? That would stop killers like this,''' she recalled. ''He told me that he did not want to see our society return to that level of barbarity.''
On Tuesday, Mr. Ortiz, 48, a quiet man whose columns read like thunder, was shot to death here at point-blank range in front of his two small children. It was the latest in a series of brutal killings that has stirred mass outrage across this crime-ravaged nation. On Sunday, hundreds of thousands of people in at least 10 Mexican cities filled the streets to make clear to government authorities that they have had enough.
The epicenter of the protests was Mexico City, where people marched in numbers not seen in more than a decade. A human flood of more than 200,000 people flowed through the capital's main boulevards to its central plaza, the Zócalo, dressed in white. It was supposed to be a silent march, without the chants or speeches that are signatures of Mexican dissent. But some participants could not contain themselves. There were those who chanted ''Enough already!'' Others shouted for justice in the serial murders of women in Ciudad Juárez.
Many carried photos of loved ones lost in street crimes. Thousands waved banners calling for the death penalty.
In a nation divided by gaping economic disparities and scathing political scandals, the marches on Sunday were led by upper-middle-class conservatives, but drew people from all walks of life, religions and party affiliations. Their anger was not based on police statistics, but on experience. Many were victims of crimes. Those who were not knew one.
Among the marchers were relatives of Sebastián and Vicente Gutiérrez Moreno, brothers and professionals who were kidnapped commando-style last May and found dead in a trash hauling bin, even after their family delivered $600,000 for their safety. There were relatives of 60-year-old Roberto Cummings Ibarra and his son Guillermo, 27, shot to death two weeks ago by car thieves who panicked while stealing their Volkswagen Beetle.
There were friends of Lizbeth Itzel Salinas Maciel, a 26-year-old economist who was beaten and thrown from a speeding taxi last month and died from her injuries.
Then there were survivors, like Marcela Hinojosa and Enrique Latapí, new parents who were kidnapped on their way home from a rare night out at the movies and released after a making a major withdrawal from a cash machine.
The couple is planning to leave Mexico. ''I am going to the march with a desire to scream,'' Ms. Hinojosa said.
Few think the marches on Sunday, organized largely through Internet exchanges among crime victims and their families, mark the start of a new civil rights movement. But it is a clear demonstration of broad disappointment in the government.
The march comes near the fourth anniversary of the election of President Vicente Fox, the first opposition politician to rise peacefully to power. His election on July 2, 2000, ended seven decades of authoritarian rule and raised high hopes for the end of official corruption and rampant lawlessness.
But optimism has worn thin. Most of the people taking part in the marches on Sunday said they felt no better off today than they were four years ago. Impunity, they said remains a fact of Mexican life. Police are just as often predators as they are protectors. Government officials acknowledge that an overwhelming majority of crimes go unreported, and the justice system resolves less than 5 percent of reported crime.
Enrique Canales, a columnist for the newspaper Reforma, wrote that the march was a ''strong warning to the authorities.''
''The marchers want to express our disgust to kidnappers and assassins, but also we want to accuse authorities of being inefficient for not giving us the security they promised,'' he wrote.
Mexico's political leaders initially expressed skepticism about the march. Andres Manuel López Obrador, the leftist mayor or Mexico City and a leading presidential hopeful, argued that crime is no worse now than before. But, he said, the national media and powerful business interests had inflamed public outrage in an effort to discredit his government.
On Friday, after it became clear that the march was going to be very large, Mr. Fox embraced it, saying, ''Society is right to affirm that governments have only reached partial solutions in the fight against crime and that we have to do much more.''
Tijuana is the place where Mr. Fox has taken the strongest action to stop violent crime. His government has cracked down hard on the so-called Tijuana drug cartel, which reportedly controlled one quarter of the cocaine entering the United States.
In 2002, the cartel was crippled by the arrest of its leader, Benjamín Arellano Felíx, and the death of his brother, Ramón, in a shootout with police. Since then, the government has made it hard for the Tijuana cartel to regroup by continuing arrests of top lieutenants.
But the arrests typically provoke violent reactions. Many people believe that Mr. Ortiz was the latest casualty.
He is the third journalist at Zeta to be attacked in the last 16 years. In 1997, the editor of the newspaper, J. Jesús Blancornelas, survived being shot five times by suspected drug gunmen. A decade earlier, gunmen killed Hector Félix Miranda, a columnist and founder of Zeta.
Three months ago, Mr. Ortiz joined an investigation by a committee of international journalists into the murder of Mr. Félix.
Zeta believes that Mr. Félix's killing was ordered by Jorge Hank Rhon, a scandal-plagued scion of one of Mexico's most prominent political families and candidate for mayor of Tijuana for the once-dominant Institutional Revolutionary Party. Now, the paper suspects him in the murder of Mr. Ortiz.
During an interview on his cushy campaign bus, Mr. Hank denied any involvement.
Meanwhile, relatives of Mr. Ortiz marched Sunday to demand justice, though they admitted they held little hope.
Adriana Sosa, another sister-in-law of Mr. Ortiz, said, sighing, that his killing is likely to be ''another unsolved mystery among many.''
