Four decapitated and mutilated corpses were strung from a bridge, in a popular getaway outside the Mexican capital Sunday, the latest atrocity as the country battles an escalating drug war.
The bodies of the four young men were discovered early on Sunday, hung upside down by their feet from a bridge near a wealthy area of Cuernavaca, a leafy city about an hour outside Mexico City, where many of the nation’s elite own homes.
According to the Morelos State Attorney General’s office, the victims’ genitals, index fingers and heads had been cut off and left alongside the highway with a handmade sign which read: “This is what will happen to all those who support the traitor Edgar Valdez Villareal”
Cuernavaca has become a battleground for control of the Beltran Leyva cartel since its leader, Arturo Beltran Leyva, was killed there in a December shootout with marines.
Authorities said the four young men, between the ages of 25 and 30, had been kidnapped days earlier in the vicinity of Jiutepec. Police found their vehicle abandoned in Cuernavaca.
Cuernavaca has become a battleground for control of the Beltran Leyva cartel since its leader, Arturo Beltran Leyva, was killed there in a December shootout with marines.
Mexican authorities say the cartel split between a faction known as the South Pacific Cartel(CPS)led by Hector Beltran Leyva, brother of Arturo, and another led by Edgar Valdez Villareal, a U.S.-born kingpin known as “the Barbie”.
Between Thursday night and Friday morning, in a ten hour lapse, two other men were found executed and a house set on fire between the municipalities of Jiutepec and Cuernavaca.
According to police reports, the first case occurred on Thursday night, at approximately 21:00 hours, on the street corner of Citlalli and Centennial Avenue, where they found the body of 35 year old Carlos Antonio Reyna Ramos inside a gray Nissan Pickup truck. Police report he had two .38 Super lethal gunshot wounds.
Friday morning, at the junction of Avenida Vicente Guerrero and km. 82 of the Mexico-Acapulco highway, police found the headless body of a man whose torso had been completely wrapped in clear plastic and duct tape and covered by a blanket. His assassins also wrapped the severed head in clear plastic and tape before leaving it alongside another narco message which warned people of supporting “the Barbie”. The message was signed CPS.
