EL PASO, Texas (Border Report) – Police in Juarez, Mexico, on Tuesday pulled three bodies buried under the floor of an abandoned house next to a downtown auto parts store. It was the latest clandestine grave found in a city where an average of three people a day are dying as authorities say criminal organizations are fighting for control of drug sales in neighborhoods.
Chihuahua state police took a canine unit to an address on Calle Hospital in the downtown Barrio Alto neighborhood early Tuesday afternoon. The police dog alerted handlers to the floor of two rooms inside the home and officers began digging.
Three decomposed bodies were found under ceramic tile floors, the Attorney General’s Office said.
Last February, members of a criminal gang hung a banner from an overpass alleging a rival had buried 30 bodies in a north Juarez home. Police only found five cadavers at three different homes in the area, but tips about clandestine graves continued to pour in.
In early March, police located six bodies in the Portal del Valle neighborhood – where another eight bodies were found last September. Tuesday’s find brings the number of cadavers pulled from clandestine graves in Juarez to 20 so far this year.
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