Mexican prosecutors have launched a probe in opposition to troopers over the taking pictures deaths of six individuals 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-about considered one of Mexico’s most harmful states as a result of 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 underneath investigation,” an official with the lawyer common’s workplace advised 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 autos.
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 had been sentenced to 40 years in jail for the killing of 5 civilians in 2023 in Nuevo Laredo, a crime-plagued metropolis bordering the US.
Public officers have additionally been focused within the area. In August, Mexican investigators pointed to organized crime within the killing of a prime federal official in Tamaulipas, saying it was probably retaliation for the authorities’ latest seizures of stolen gas there. Gunmen killed Ernesto Vásquez Reyna, the Lawyer Normal’s Workplace Tamaulipas state delegate, in broad daylight in the midst of the busiest avenue of the border metropolis of Reynosa alongside the Texas border.
Reynosa has been affected by escalating violence since 2017 as a result of inside disputes amongst teams vying for management of drug trafficking, human smuggling and gas theft.
In Could, the our bodies of 5 musicians, members of a Mexican regional music group who had gone lacking, had been discovered within the metropolis. Prosecutors mentioned 9 individuals arrested had been believed to be a part of a faction of the Gulf Cartel.
