Kidnapping charge tossed out against ex-mayor in case of missing Mexican students

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexico’s president has confirmed that kidnapping charges have been dropped against the former mayor of a southern Mexico town where 43 students were abducted and disappeared in 2014. José Luis Abarca will remain in prison for other, earlier kidnappings. He had been considered one of the key figures in the infamous case. The students from a rural teachers’ college at Ayotzinapa had hijacked buses, a common method for students from poor schools to obtain transportation. They were in Iguala when municipal police were among the first authorities to stop the buses and take the students off.