In 1980, César Roberto Fierro Reyna was sentenced to death for the murder of an El Paso cab driver. Roberto is the oldest Mexican citizen condemned to death in the USA. He has awaited his execution date for over 30 years, always insisting that he is innocent. There is evidence proving that the police coerced his confession. Even the International Court of Justice has pronounced that he deserves a new trial. This documentary is a reflection on the implementation of justice, punishment, imprisonment and its consequences. The César we meet in Esteinou’s film, though a charismatic, intense personality, seems to have lost all hope, resigned to having missed the chance to raise his daughter and hold his grandchildren. One of the most painful effects of César’s incarceration was the separation from his younger brother, Sergio, whose life derailed the day César was imprisoned, and who now wanders homeless in Ciudad Juárez. The Years of Fierro poignantly tells both brothers’ stories, demonstrating how this miscarriage of justice resonates beyond one wrongfully imprisoned man. Esteinou approaches his subject with subtlety and care, balancing the Fierros’ points of view with details of the case presented by César’s lawyers and the arresting officer. The Years of Fierro portrays a decayed and dehumanizing legal system, governed by bureaucracy rather than by any imperative to uphold justice.
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