3 women and 1 man Murdered in Northern Mexico

MONTERREY, Mexico – Three women and a man were murdered in a poor neighborhood controlled by gangs in Monterrey, the capital of the northern Mexican state of Nuevo Leon, a State Investigations Agency, or AEI, spokesman said.

The female victims, one a minor and another possibly pregnant, were shot dead on Saturday, while the man had his throat cut, the AEI spokesman told Efe.

“Reports were received that three women had been found dead inside a house and a man was outside” the property, the AEI spokesman said, adding that the killings occurred in the Colonia Independencia section of Monterrey.

Colonia Independencia, which borders the first district of Monterrey, is home to a shantytown where at least 20 gangs with links to drug cartels operate.

The weekend started in Nuevo Leon with the killings of 10 people on Friday at a beer distribution center in Garcia, a city in the Monterrey metropolitan area.

Seven of the victims were pronounced dead at the scene and three others died while being transported to hospitals.

“(The) evidence has let us pursue a line of investigation that considers this an attack by an organized crime group,” Nuevo Leon Attorney General Javier Flores said.

The killings at the beer distribution center are the worst attack by drug gangs in the Monterrey metropolitan area in a year.

Monterrey has been plagued by drug-related violence in recent years, with the worst incident occurring on Aug. 25, 2011, when Zetas cartel members set fire to a casino in the industrial city, killing 52 people