Did the Mexican Army Just Massacre 42 People?

[twomp]

After a shootout in western Mexico, 42 alleged criminals are dead. The army said they died in a shootout, but it looks like they were executed.

At dawn on Friday, the Mexican armed forces and federal police swarmed a ranch near the town of Ecuandureo in the western state of Michoacán, sparking a three-hour gun battle. At one point, authorities radioed air and ground support and a Black Hawk helicopter hovered over the scene. Residents from the nearby town noticed a thick cloud of black smoke in the air in the direction of the violence.

In the end, 42 civilians encamped at the ranch perished in the assault, along with one federal police agent. The civilian dead are being identified as members of a crime syndicate that dominates the opium and methamphetamine production in the region.

The lopsided body count aroused suspicion, as did the fact that all the civilians at the ranch, with the exception of three taken into custody, were killed and none was wounded.

Several hours before the first comment from the Mexican government, photographs taken at the scene began circulating on social media. They showed the corpses of young men lying on the porch of a farmhouse or in the surrounding fields of a private ranch called Rancho El Sol. At least one of the victims had perished without time to put on shoes. Another was killed in his underwear.

One television producer and former war correspondent, Epigmenio Ibarra, who covered the civil wars in Central America in the 1980s tweeted: "12 years covering wars. Never an army as accurate as the Mexican. Only kill shots, never any wounded.”

http://www.thedailybeast.com/article...42-people.html

[r3volution 3.0]

Am I supposed to weep for the foot-soldiers of the cartels?

[twomp]

Am I supposed to weep for the foot-soldiers of the cartels?

It depends on if you believe they were foot soldiers of the cartels or unarmed civilians?

[Zippyjuan]

If it lasted over three hours and air and ground support were called in, it likely wan't a one sided execution confrontation.

sparking a three-hour gun battle. At one point, authorities radioed air and ground support and a Black Hawk helicopter hovered over the scene.

http://www.usnews.com/news/world/art...rtel-territory

More info- seems they weren't all dead- three were taken into custody and some officers were also wounded besides the one dead one:

ECUANDUREO, Mexico (AP) — The call for backup went out to local police after 8 a.m. There was a shootout underway at a ranch in the western reaches of Michoacan state and the federal authorities needed help.

One patrolman said he sped with his colleagues from a town 20 minutes away and arrived at the scene Friday to see bullets flying and military and police helicopters hovering overhead in what would become the deadliest confrontation with suspected cartel members in recent memory.

"It looked like a battlefield," the officer said Saturday, insisting that on anonymity like everyone at the scene.

The bloodshed at the ranch left 42 suspected criminals dead. One federal police officer died while trying to aid a wounded comrade, government officials said.

Investigators and human rights officials continued to work Saturday at the scene, where patrol cars of many agencies could be seen parked, and police guarded all entrances to the property, even dirt paths lead onto the 112-hectare (277-acre) property known as Rancho de Sol.

Photographs from the site showed the bodies of men without shirts and some without shoes strewn over the ranch, in an area near the Michoacan border with Jalisco state that is a stronghold of the Jalisco New Generation cartel, one of the most powerful and fastest-growing organized crime groups to surface in recent years.

The bodies, some appearing to lie with semi-automatic rifles, lay in fields, next to farm equipment and on a blood-stained patio strewn with clothes, mattresses and sleeping bags. Video of the battle obtained by The Associated Press showed federal police officers coming under fire.

While National Security Commissioner Monte Alejandro Rubido wouldn't name the cartel, he said the responsible group has its base in Jalisco state.

Government officials said the shooting broke out early Friday as federal authorities responded to a complaint of armed men taking over the ranch.

Federal forces heading to the ranch met a truck carrying armed men who opened fire, and when government forces chased the gunmen onto the ranch, they came under heavy fire from others, Rubido said.

Authorities detained three people and confiscated 36 semi-automatic weapons, two smaller arms, a grenade launcher that had been fired and a .50-caliber rifle, Rubido said.

He said eight vehicles also were confiscated, six of them set ablaze by a fire inside a storehouse that created a black plume of smoke seen for miles.

Despite the accounts of shooting, the lack of federal casualties raised questions because of a similar case last June 30 in Mexico state, where the army said 22 alleged criminals died in a shootout with troops, while only one soldier was injured. An investigation by The Associated Press revealed that many of the suspects had been killed after they surrendered.

Security expert Alejandro Hope on Saturday called the government's version of what happened at the ranch "weird." There were more dead than weapons recovered, he noted, and he said in some of the photos it appeared the corpses had been moved.

Blurry video of some of the battle:



Related videos at link.

[tod evans]

Relatives say they doubt that 42 men killed on ranch in western Mexico died in shootout

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2015/05...ntcmp=obinsite


One body was missing an eye and had bruises on its face. Another had its teeth knocked inward. One had a gunshot in the top of the head.

Relatives of some of the people killed in what authorities say was a shootout with drug cartel gunmen in Michoacan state told The Associated Press on Sunday that after seeing the remains of their loved ones they don't believe the official version of events.

Mexican officials say 42 gang members and one police officer died Friday in a three-hour gunbattle on a ranch in the drug-plagued state, the deadliest such confrontation in recent memory. Most of the dead were from neighboring Jalisco state, home of the powerful Jalisco New Generation Cartel, officials said.

An official from Michoacan state, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the press, said all the dead were men and most died from gunfire.

But the lopsided death toll, and photographs from the scene in which bodies appeared to have been moved, raised questions about the official version.

Family members who arrived at the morgue in the state capital, Morelia, to retrieve the bodies echoed these doubts.

They all spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because they feared reprisals, but some were willing to provide the names of their dead family members. Many were from Ocotlan in Jalisco state and said that a group of at least 25 men from the town had gone to the ranch after being offered work.

Juan Enrique Romero Caudillo, 34, was one of those men. Family members said he sold scrap metal to make a living.

"He said he had been offered maintenance work at the ranch," said a relative, adding that Romero didn't belong to a gang.

After seeing his corpse, the relative said Romero had been shot in the head from above and there was bruising on his face. On the death certificate, the cause of death was listed as "destruction of the brain mass due to penetration by a projectile from a firearm." It did not say if the gunshot was from close range or far away.

Romero's relative said he believed what happened on the ranch "was a massacre" not a shootout with criminal gunmen, as the government has said.

Relatives of Mario Alberto Valencia Vazquez, 22, said he worked in a furniture business but had been offered employment on the ranch.

One relative said Valencia's teeth had been knocked inward as if "he had been struck by something" and his body showed signs of having received blows. Another woman said her husband's face had been destroyed and was missing an eye.

Government officials weren't immediately available to respond to the comments by the family members, but previously they have said the shooting broke out when federal authorities responded to a complaint of armed men taking over the of Rancho del Sol, in the municipality of Ecuandureo near the border with Jalisco.

Federal forces heading to the ranch met a truck carrying armed men who opened fire, and when government forces chased the gunmen onto the ranch, they came under heavy fire from others, according to National Security Commissioner Monte Alejandro Rubido.

Authorities detained three people and confiscated 36 semi-automatic weapons, two smaller arms, a grenade launcher that had been fired and a .50-caliber rifle.

Photographs from the site showed the bodies of men without shirts and some without shoes strewn over the ranch. Some appeared to lie with semi-automatic rifles in a field with farm equipment and others on a blood-stained patio strewn with clothes, mattresses and sleeping bags. Video of the battle obtained by The Associated Press showed federal police officers coming under fire.

The case recalled events in the State of Mexico on June 30, when the army said 22 suspected criminals were killed in a confrontation and only one soldier had been wounded. An investigation by The Associated Press revealed that several of the suspects were executed after they surrendered in a cellar of the municipality of Tlatlaya.

[angelatc]

Let me clarify that the threat of terrorism does not keep me awake at night. But if it did, I'd be more worried about the drug cartels that are embedded in the nations surrounding us, and their sleeper cells in this country.

If you read the Spanish media, they don't censor the images like the US media do, and IMHO the ISIS guys got nothing on those guys.

[mrsat_98]

Did the Mexican Army Just Massacre 42 more People?