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A total of nine individuals were found shot to death in Sinaloa state Saturday, according to Mexican news accounts.
A news report which appeared in the online edition of El Diario de Coahuila said that the victims were found near the village of Jahuara Dos in El Fuerte municipality in the Mexican sierras Saturday morning.
Three of the victims were stripped of clothing. All of the victims had been bound hand and foot, tortured and shot once in the head.
According to a wire dispatch which appeared in El Imparcial news daily, six of the dead were identified as Patricio Castro, Cervantes Efren Espinoza, Joshue Eleazar Cervantes Medina, Ruben Angulo Flores, Joel Vega Gaxiola and Juan Carlos Milan Bojorquez. All the victims were listed as residents of Guasave municipality.
According to official sources, the victims had been kidnapped over the course of two weeks in northern Sinaloa state.
Two weeks ago three other victims of executions were found in the same municipality. El Fuerte and its northern neighbor Choix municipality are considered to be Beltran-Leyva territory.
More than a year ago Choix municipality was the location of gang warfare between groups aligned with the Sinaloa Cartel against other drug gangs, including elements from the Juarez Drug Cartel and Los Zetas. Over that two week period a total of 57 individuals were killed in intergang fighting and in confrontations with security forces.
Two other individuals were killed in Culican municipality in Sinaloa state Saturday, according to the report in El Imparcial.
- Cristian Vizcarra was shot to death in Benito Juarez colony Saturday afternoon while on his way home.
- An unidentified man was found shot to death in Centenario neighborhood in the Barrancos sector.
Chris Covert writes Mexican Drug War and national political news for Rantburg.com and BorderlandBeat.com. He can be reached at grurkka@gmail.com