10 dead, several vehicles burned after the death of the Sinaloa Cartel leader

These are some of the 26 suspected Sinaloa cartel associates who authorities say were arrested in Zacatecas, Mexico, following the killing of a regional boss known as “El Gordo.”

EL PASO, Texas (Border Report) – Authorities in Zacatecas, Mexico, say a drug cartel retaliated for the killing of its regional leader this week by murdering 10 people, shelling police buildings and setting fire to several trucks on highways.

The alleged leader of the Sinaloa Cartel, identified only as “El Gordo” (The Fat Man), was killed last Sunday in a gun battle with state police, Zacatecas Deputy Public Security Minister Oscar Alberto Aparicio said a press conference on Tuesday that was broadcast by several news websites.

Police were responding to a tip that people were being held against their will in a home in San Jose, a suburb of Fresnillo, Zacatecas, when they came under heavy gunfire.

Officials “responded to the aggression and eliminated the alleged leader of the (Sinaloa) cartel in Zacatecas. That was the trigger for the violent events,” Aparicio said. The man known as El Gordo “was killed during the confrontation. He oversaw kidnappings, murders and all Pacific Cartel operations in Zacatecas, in the southeast and north of the state.”

In Mexico, the Sinaloa Cartel, co-founded by jailed drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman and now reportedly led by his sons and longtime associate and wanted fugitive Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, is referred to by authorities as the Pacific Cartel .

Before dawn on Tuesday, police security cameras recorded a white pickup truck dumping four bodies under an overpass on Avenida Plateros in Fresnillo. Earlier, witnesses told police that men driving a pickup truck dumped five bodies at the Mercado de Abastos food market in the city. A 10^Th The body was found in the town of Guadalupe, several miles south.

State officials also said several gunmen broke into police parking lots on Monday and Tuesday, drove off in several commercial vehicles and set them on fire in the middle of the highway.

Zacatecas Gov. David Monreal Avila told reporters Tuesday that traffic was running smoothly across the state and 1,000 additional Mexican National Guard troops would arrive soon.

He called the recent violence “a reaction, a consequence” of the police operation against the cartel leadership in the state.