Daniel Dion targeted because of his connections: family

MONTREAL – Daniel Dion’s family members did quite a bit of detective work on their own before making the gruesome discovery of the missing Quebecer’s body stuffed in the trunk of a burnt-out car near Acapulco, Mexico.

They used a Global Positioning System and help from a GPS tracking company to find the car rented by Dion, 51, a Sherbrooke native and Ottawa resident missing since Oct. 22 in Mexico, where he was on a business trip, Alexandra Dion, 27, explained yesterday.

The tracking company located the car Oct. 24, but it wasn’t until days later that the family was able to obtain the exact location of the car, 115 kilometres northeast of Acapulco.

"The Mexican police helped us somewhat, but it was our family that found him," Dion said. The victim’s wife, brother, sister and nephew travelled to Mexico Tuesday and spearheaded the investigation because police and the Canadian consulate "were not being very active on the case," she added. "At least we found him. If he had just stayed missing there would have been questions for years."

The relatives ran into language translation issues, confusion from the Hertz rental car company about the car’s location, red tape from the local police -and they got little help from the Canadian consulate, she added.

The car had been ditched in a remote, off-road area near Chilpancingo, along the country’s southwestern coast, where Dion had been expected for a business meeting. In a statement released by the Dion family last night, they said that, with an armed police escort, they came upon the charred vehicle several days after it was first found by the tracking company.

"Everything in the auto had melted -the dash, the windows. Through the holes where the turn signal lights were, we saw what seemed to be bones." Dion’s watch was found at the scene. The human remains are being tested to make sure they are in fact Dion’s.

Alexandra Dion said she believes her father was the victim of a planned execution, perhaps because of his connections with Mexican government officials. One of his companies is Ecopurse, which makes purses from recycled materials and employs 2,300 full-and part-time employees, some of them prisoners in Mexican jails and some poor labourers in the Mexican countryside.

"Maybe someone wasn’t happy with what (Dion) paid them or maybe it’s an official somewhere in the police or the government," Dion said. "Either way it is a vicious thing to do. All he did was help people."

Dion started Ecopurse five years ago and travelled frequently in Mexico. He was well aware of the drug cartel violence centred in Mexico’s north, near the border with the United States, that has killed more than 28,000 people since 2006. But Dion said her father sensed that violence in general and attacks on foreigners were increasing in the southern and resort areas. Dion is the second Canadian murdered in southern Mexico since 2007. Another was killed in a hit-and-run during that period and, earlier this year, a Canadian couple were wounded in a robbery attempt.

"He wouldn’t let that stop him" from doing his business, Alexandra Dion said. "He was a colourful guy, a hard worker and the type of guy who plunged right into projects." Through a construction company he owned, Dion was also involved in building housing in Haiti in the aftermath of January’s earthquake, she said. "He wasn’t afraid of any challenge."

As for the Canadian consulate, Dion said they did help, but not very much. The consulate at one point refused to help until the family provided them with rental car’s license plate number, the family said. "It feels like there should be a process for when things like this happen, but there doesn’t seem to be," Dion said.

The last photos posted by Dion on his Facebook page, on Oct. 17, show some baby turtles scampering down the beach -highlighting Dion’s passion for Mexico and for the environment. His daughter said he should be remembered for his strength of character and his work to improve Mexicans’ living standards.

And many friends of Dion were doing just that yesterday on a Facebook page dedicated to him.

"I would like to salute you, Daniel," wrote Julie Labrosse. "You were a great unifier, a visionary, a cannon of energy and goodwill. You were a great ambassador for creative people, for Canadians and for humanity."

Dion’s family members were still in Mexico yesterday, working with Mexican police on the case and preparing to bring his body back to Canada. "We hope they will solve the case, but we are being realistic. We just want to bring him home."

Postmedia News contributed to this report