Mexican prosecutors have launched a probe towards troopers over the capturing deaths of six folks in a northern state the place clashes involving drug cartels are frequent, a judicial supply mentioned Tuesday.
The incident occurred on Monday on a freeway in Tamaulipas, thought of considered one of Mexico’s most harmful states because of the presence of gang members concerned in drug and migrant trafficking.
Quite a few violent clashes involving safety forces in Tamaulipas have prompted accusations of extrajudicial killings.
The troops concerned within the newest lethal incident have been “positioned beneath investigation,” an official with the legal professional normal’s workplace informed AFP on situation of anonymity.
A protection ministry assertion mentioned the group of troopers was touring on a freeway when a white pickup truck “tried to ram” one of many military automobiles.
The troops sensed a menace and “used their weapons,” the ministry mentioned, including that 5 civilians died on the spot and a sixth on the best way to hospital.
In March, 4 Mexican troopers have been sentenced to 40 years in jail for the killing of 5 civilians in 2023 in Nuevo Laredo, a crime-plagued metropolis bordering the USA.
Public officers have additionally been focused within the area. In August, Mexican investigators pointed to organized crime within the killing of a high federal official in Tamaulipas, saying it was likely retaliation for the authorities’ current seizures of stolen gas there. Gunmen killed Ernesto Vásquez Reyna, the Lawyer Basic’s Workplace Tamaulipas state delegate, in broad daylight in the course of the busiest avenue of the border metropolis of Reynosa alongside the Texas border.
Reynosa has been suffering from escalating violence since 2017 because of inside disputes amongst teams vying for management of drug trafficking, human smuggling and gas theft.
In Could, the bodies of five musicians, members of a Mexican regional music group who had gone lacking, have been discovered within the metropolis. Prosecutors mentioned 9 folks arrested have been believed to be a part of a faction of the Gulf Cartel.