image source, Government of San Miguel Totolapan
The party to which Mayor Conrado Mendoza Almeda belonged has condemned his “cowardly” murder.
The municipal president of San Miguel Totolapan, in the state of Guerrero, in Mexico, was assassinated this Wednesday during a double shooting.
Along with Conrado Mendoza Almeda, Juan Mendoza Acosta, former municipal president of San Miguel Totolapan and father of Conrado Mendoza, several police officers and municipal officials and workers were also murdered.
Although at first it was believed that there were 18 victims, later it was learned that there were 20 deceased, according to the Mexican Undersecretary of Security, Ricardo Mejía, with information from the Guerrero Attorney General’s Office.
San Miguel Totolapan is located in the heart of a region known as hot landa violent region of western Mexico controlled by drug cartels.
There were two attacks, pointed out the State Attorney General’s Office. The first once morest the town hall and the second in a nearby place where, at the time, a meeting led by Mendoza Almeda was taking place.
The event has shocked the country for being one of the deadliest so far this year and “occurs in the context of the criminal dispute between criminal groups” in the region, Mejía explained.
The armed group is believed to be linked to the criminal organization The Tequila Makerswho minutes following the event released a video on social networks in which he announced his return to that region of drug production and transfer, which is disputed with La Familia Michoacana, a criminal group from the neighboring state of Michoacán, tells the EFE agency.
However, authorities have not confirmed who may have been behind the attack.
Los Tequileros devastated Guerrero between 2015 and 2017 -and was known for threatening mayors in the region- until their leader Raybel Jacobo de Almonte, known as El Tequilero for his love of that drink, was assassinated in 2018.
About the group, Mejía said that it was dedicated “fundamentally to the transfer and commercialization of poppy, but also that it was dedicated to kidnapping, extortion and perpetrated various homicides and disappearances in the region.”
Although the authorities believe that the leader of the criminal group, known as El Tequilero, died in 2018 and the group weakened following several arrests, the group has “broken in” once more, the undersecretary acknowledged.
Another line of investigation, Mejía pointed out, has to do with the group known as La Familia Michoacana.
“There is a dispute with a criminal group known as La Familia Michoacana, whose heads, nicknamed El Pez and El Fresa, who are the criminal leaders of that region, a line of investigation also links them, along with this Tequileros group, as who may be responsible for this event,” Mejía deepened.
The governor of the state of Guerrero, Evelyn Salgado Pineda, lamented the assassination of the mayor, condemned the events and assured that there will be no impunity.
image source, EPA
The facade of the town hall of San Miguel Totolapan, in Mexico, pierced by heavy-caliber weapons.
Mendoza’s party, the Democratic Revolution Party (PRD) condemned the “cowardly” murder and called for justice.
According to the part of the Prosecutor’s Office, of the 18 people murdered in the place, 10 were identified. Among them, there is also the director of Public Security of the municipality, Freddy Martínez Suazo; the advisor to the president, Roberto Mata Marcial; the administrator of the health jurisdiction 01 of Tlapehuala, Genesis Araujo Marcos, as well as two security agents of the mayor.
It was reported that three injured people were airlifted for treatment.
As BBC Mexico correspondent Will Grant reports, even by the violent standards of the state of Guerrero, this was a shocking attack.
Various groups are fighting for control of lucrative drug routes north along the Pacific corridor, Grant adds.
A highway in the state of Guerrero, where San Miguel Totolapan is located, was reportedly briefly blocked by large vehicles to prevent security forces from entering the city.
In turn, the state government reported that the area is protected to provide security to the population and that the Ministry of National Defense (Sedena) deployed ground and air units to locate and arrest those responsible for the attack.
During the six-year term of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, which began in December 2018, 60 councilors have been assassinated in Mexico, including mayors, aldermen and trustees, according to the consulting firm Etellekt, a benchmark for political violence.
