He continues having meetings with exiles and personalities in Costa Rica.
Chronology
He stays in Costa Rica to seek support for the insurrectional plans.
He holds several meetings in Costa Rica where he seeks support for the fight against Batista’s dictatorship.
He goes back to Mexico from El Coco Airport in San Jose, Costa Rica.
He meets with María Antonia Figueroa, a teacher from Santiago de Cuba province, and Treasurer of the 26th of July Movement in the Eastern part of the country. She had arrived that same day in Mexico City, to provide Fidel with some documents and nearly four thousand dollars which had been collected in the Eastern province.
He meets with the combatants who were under military training at Rancho de Chalco to discuss some discrepancies which had arisen among them.
He sends a letter to Juan Manuel Márquez, in Miami, via Jesús Chuchú Reyes. He indicates him to support El Cuate in the purchase and transport of weapons to Mexico.
- He sends a message to Armando Vázquez, from the Miami Patriotic Club, via Antonio del Conde, aka El Cuate, in which he asks him to give 500 dollars to the bearer of the letter for the preparations of the revolutionary action.
- He meets with the combatants who had returned from the training base to Mexico City and were accommodated in a house at calle Képler No.26.
- He is detained by Mexican police agents, together with Universo Sánchez and Ramiro Valdés, and they are taken to the Immigrant Detention Center of the Secretariat of the Interior.
He is photographed at the Federal Security Directorate of Mexico together with the other detained combatants, and his fingerprints are taken to open the police file. The file of each of them states that they have been detained for arms smuggling and, in some cases, for carrying them.
The Mexican press publishes the first news of the arrest of Fidel Castro and his comrades in the Federal District. The Excelsior newspaper publishes the story under big headlines: "Siete comunistas cubanos presos aquí, por conspirer contra Batista, recogen armas” (Seven Cuban Communists imprisoned here for conspiring against Batista, they are collecting weapons).
Upon learning that Rancho de Chalco has been discovered by the Mexican Federal Police, he gets concerned about the safety of his comrades, and decides to go personally to the site with the police, in order to avoid an armed confrontation. He is accompanied by a large group of federal policemen who are under the command of Luis Baret Marín. The 13 combatants found at the site were arrested and taken to the Immigrant Detention Center of the Secretariat of the Interior at calle Miguel Schultz No. 136; the seven combatants previously arrested had been transferred to the same station.
- The Mexican press continues addressing the detention of Fidel and his comrades and speaks of a possible deportation to Cuba.
- He is called to testify that night before officials of the Mexican General Prosecutor's Office. He affirms that it is his civic duty to fight against the dictatorship that rules his country, and that in view of the total lack of guarantees and the elimination of legal channels, the only way forward is to overthrow it through the use of weapons. He stresses that he has always been careful of Mexico’s international responsibilities.