EL PASO, Texas (Border Report) – The mayor of Juarez is blaming weekend mass shootings on rival drug cartels fighting for control of crystal methamphetamine sales in that border city of 1.5 million people.
An 11-year-old boy was among five people killed Friday night at home in the Heroes de la Revolucion neighborhood where the funeral for a man shot to death last Wednesday was being held. Police said three vehicles arrived at the home on Calle Alanis, with several men getting out and shooting indiscriminately at those attending.
Police identified three of the victims only by their first names and initials: Juan Carlos H.A., 34; Daniel Eduardo H.A., 30; and Heriberto C. The names of the child and the fifth victim have not been released; a sixth person was shot and remains in critical condition at a Juarez hospital, police told a KTSM/Border Report camera crew.
Early Sunday, Juarez police responded to a second shooting with multiple dead inside a home on Calle Zacatenco in the western portion of the city. Two men and a woman were killed during an apparent home invasion.
Juarez as of Monday has recorded 116 homicides during January, local news media reported.
In a news conference broadcast on Facebook Live, Mayor Cruz Perez Cuellar said municipal, state and federal law enforcement officials in the city are addressing the violent spike.
“We are trying to collect information to understand what is going on. All the data we have points to a conflict between organized criminal groups for the sale of crystal (meth),” Perez Cuellar said.
The mayor also referenced Saturday’s find of a man’s body, several containers allegedly packed with crystal meth, fentanyl, heroin and other drugs, and a banner with a message by the perpetrators accusing police of collusion with a rival group.
The body was left under an overpass at the southern entrance of Juarez. The banner said the drugs were “seized” from another group to illustrate how easily authorities in the state of Chihuahua could seize drugs if they wanted to, and accused them of protecting drug sales inside state prisons.
“They left several kilos (of drugs) there. We have to shore up our communication [….] with our Municipal Public Safety Secretary, the state and federal (governments),” Perez Cuellar added. “It has been a complicated month when it comes homicides that, fundamentally, have to do with organized crime.”
The banner states 319.24 kilograms of drugs were in the plastic boxes and warned police “don’t steal it or say you don’t know how to count.”
Juarez, across the border from El Paso, Texas, recorded an average of three homicides per day last year. Mexican authorities say two drug cartels and at least four major gangs operate in the city and that most murders now have to do with street drug sales.
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