Going out with a bang

The death of Guatemala City lawyer Rodrigo Rosenberg came close to toppling his country’s government. In a video recorded just days before his death and posted to YouTube, Rosenberg not only predicted his looming assassination, he blamed it on the Guatemalan president. "If you are watching this message," he intoned, "it is because I have been murdered by Alvaro Colom." Turns out, Rosenberg’s apparent murder wasn’t a murder at all, but an elaborate suicide. Depressed over turmoil in his personal life, Rosenberg hired assassins to ambush him near his home and posted the video online, figuring it would render him a martyr. Conservatives in Guatemala rallied against the government, but Colom nonetheless held onto to power.

The Guardian