Assailants ambushed and shot dead a state legislator who was driving to a radio and television station for an interview in the Pacific resort city of Acapulco, city officials said. Jorge Bajos Valverde, a member of the National Action Party of President Felipe Calderon, was blocked in his path by a white van without number plates in the center of the city, said Gloria Mendez, a spokesman for Acapulco's Public Safety Department, on Thursday.
Assailants stepped out of the van and shot the legislator several times killing him instantly, Mendez said. The motive for the attack was not clear, she said. Although a conservative, Bajos Valverde was known to be a political ally of Guerrero State Gov. Zeferino Torreblanca, of the leftist Democratic Revolution Party and had defended him in several recent interviews.
In the last two years, Acapulco has been a hit by a wave of execution-style killings blamed on rival drugs gangs fighting over lucrative smuggling routes and a budding local drug market.