A total of 10 individuals, eight of whom were from the same family were found dead or were killed in armed confrontations in Durango state since Saturday, according to Mexican news accounts.
In a news report which appeared in El Diario de Coahuila news daily, eight siblings were found shot to death in Pueblo Nuevo municipality Saturday.
According to the report the dead were from the Duran Chamorro family and were found in the village of Balontita, which is near the border with Santa Rosario municipality in Sinaloa state. A few of the dead were identified unofficially as Eusiquia, Bernardo, Erika, "Chuya", Cruz, Cecilia, Hermelinda and Samuel.
Also in Pueblo Nuevo, although the news report failed to state when, an individual identified as Fidel Ortega, 44, was shot to death in the village of Los Naranjos.
A Mexican Army road patrol engaged and killed one armed suspect near the village of La Puerta in Pueblo Nuevo. Another man, identified as Lamberto Sarabia Cabrera, 20, was wounded in the encounter.
The 10 dead in Pueblo Nuevo municipality is the worse death toll since 2012, when a total of six armed suspects were killed in an intergang shootout in 2012. A total of nine individuals were killed in that municipality in 2012.
Pueblo Nuevo sits astride Mexico Federal Highway 40, which links the Pacific seaport of Mazatlan to Durango city and points east.
This region of Durango is also part of the Golden Triangle in the western Mexican sierras, where drugs are grown and processed by most of Mexico's drug cartels.
Chris Covert writes Mexican Drug War and national political news for Rantburg.com and BorderlandBeat.com. He can be reached at grurkka@gmail.com