Six people, including a boy, shot dead in Mexico; mass murders of families continue

Six members of two families were killed in the violent state of Mexico GuanajuatoWhat is at least the third massacre of family members in the country since last month, authorities confirmed on Wednesday.

An increasing number of Women, children and entire families have fallen victim to the increasingly indiscriminate violence in Guanajuato and other states where drug cartels are engaged in bloody turf wars.

The killings in the Guanajuato town of Yuriria left six people dead – three members of one family and three from another – including an adolescent boy and a woman, prosecutors said.

Yuriria Mayor María De Los Ángeles López said the victims were working at a construction site when they were shot.

The Guanajuato prosecutor’s office said the murders were currently under investigation but no suspects had been arrested.

“It is a peaceful place,” López said of Yuriria, where “everyone knows everyone and people know those who were killed.”

For years, Guanajuato has had the highest number of murders of any state in Mexico. The Jalisco cartel is fighting with local gangs for dominance in the industrial and agricultural center. In Guanajuato, more police officers were shot dead in 2023 – around 60 – than in the entire United States.

The US State Department is urging Americans to reconsider travel to Guanajuato. “Of particular concern is the high number of murders in the south of the state that are linked to cartel violence,” the department said in a travel warning.

Mexican security analyst David Saucedo said there had been constant cartel activity in the cities south of Guanajuato, on the border with the state of Michoacán.

“The aim of attacking entire families is to break up rival cartel structures,” he said. “The idea is that they take revenge not only on their rivals, but also on their families.”

Last month, a baby and a toddler were among six members of the same family murdered in Guanajuato. Authorities said armed attackers entered a home in the city of Leon and opened fire on the family.

Later in June, another family of six, including three children, killed by armed men in the southern Mexican border state of Chiapas.