Baby and toddler among six family members shot dead at home in Mexico

A baby and a toddler were among the six members of the same family who died in a central Mexican state plagued by cartel-related violence, a local official said Monday.

According to authorities, armed attackers entered a house in the city of Leon in Guanajuato on Sunday evening and opened fire on the family.

“Unfortunately, two children and four women died,” the state’s governor, Diego Sinhue Rodriguez, told reporters. The children were an eight-month-old baby and a two-year-old boy.

Two men survived because they saw the attackers coming and hid on the roof, he said.

Guanajuato is one of Mexico’s most violent states, as it is home to turf wars between rival cartels involved in drug trafficking, fuel theft and other crimes. In Guanajuato, which has a population of just over 6 million, more police officers were shot dead – about 60 – in 2023 than in the entire United States.

In April, a mayoral candidate shot on the street in Guanajuato, just as she began her election campaign. In December 11 people were killed and another dozen were injured in an attack on a pre-Christmas party in Guanajuato. Just a few days before Bodies of five university students were found trapped in a vehicle on a dirt road in the state.

For years Santa Rosa de Lima Cartel has waged a bloody turf war with the Jalisco Cartel for control of Guanajuato.

In Mexico, more than 450,000 murders have been recorded since 2006, when the government deployed the military to combat drug trafficking. Most of the killings have been attributed to criminal gangs.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.