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Nearly 100 low-income families have decided to take over land that belonged to a United States farmer who was killed in Costa Rica. According to a news report recently filed by Alexander Mendez of daily tabloid Diario Extra, the squatters have moved into a farm in Coloradito a remote village located near the border with Panama.

The farm in question is apparently part of the Ramon Rafael Machado estate. As reported by The Costa Rica Star in September:

The body of an 85-year-old Cuban-American man was found inside a barrel over the weekend at his house in southern Costa Rica. The victim [lived] in Coloradito de Corredores, a town in Puntarenas province, near the border with Panama.

 

Mr. Machado lived alone and was reported missing by a friend on Friday. On Saturday, “an extensive search of his house was conducted and the body was found inside a steel barrel, but the types of wounds could not be determined with a simple visual inspection due to the advanced state of decomposition,” the [Office of Judicial investigations] said. Mr. Machado “had a ranch and hired foreigners as workers, with whom he apparently had constant personal problems. It is presumed that one of them attacked him and then fled to Nicaragua.”

The squatters are claiming rights to the land based on agrarian law, which can be loosely interpreted as giving ownership interest to tenants who farm unclaimed land in Costa Rica. Nonetheless, the late Mr. Machado reportedly has a son who lives in the United States; even in case of intestacy, the decedent’s farm would pass to the surviving son, who would have the right to evict the squatters.

The report by Diario Extra includes a statement from a group of squatters, who say that they are occupying the land because the government of Costa Rica has effectively abandoned them. Police officers are said to be monitoring the situation.