EL PASO, Texas (Border Report) – The nightmare in a Mexican town a two-hour drive south of Columbus, New Mexico, is not over.
Chihuahua state police and forensic experts returned this week to a community called “El Willy” south of Casas Grandes where they pulled 56 bodies and skeletal remains out of the ground last month.
On Wednesday, they located four additional graves with a still-decomposing body, two full sets of skeletal remains, some partial remains and a buried head, the Chihuahua Attorney General said in a statement.
That brings the total number of victims to 61 in El Willy alone, plus 16 others found earlier in Janos, Ascencion and another site near Casas Grandes since mid-December.
“This Office is committed to continue looking for missing persons to allow their families the peace of mind of finding them,” the Attorney General’s Office statement said, “And continue the investigation to find those responsible (for their deaths) and bring them to justice.”
Mexican authorities earlier said some of the bodies had been dismembered and that bullet casings were found near the sites, leading them to believe the deceased were murdered.
Autopsies of the bodies, forensic exams of the bones and DNA sampling are ongoing.
In a related development, Mexican news media reported on Thursday that the officers involved in the search received threats and found improvised explosive devices they believe were placed on roads by members of organized criminal groups. Two of their vehicles had their tired punctured by homemade spikes, El Diario reported.
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