Gunmen kill 8 people at a funeral in Cuernavaca

A group of gunmen burst into a funeral to kill some of the attendees in Cuernavaca , Morelos. At least eight people died during the attack, and another 16 were wounded.

According to investigations, the young men attended the funeral for a friend who died in a motorcycle accident.

A similar incident took place in August when gunmen killed six young men who were drinking on the street, neat the neighborhood where the latest attack took place.

In February, gunmen killed five young men in a nearby community. Two months later, armed men killed four young men in Morelos .

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Criminal organizations

often target young men, in a bid to force them to join their ranks.

Morelos registered a surge in violence in recent years. Moreover, authorities have discovered hundreds of bodies inside mass graves throughout the state.

Criminal organizations target young men

On July 1, gunmen broke into an unregistered drug rehabilitation center in Guanajuato and opened fire, killing 26 people.

Guanajuato authorities said the attack took place in the city of Irapuato.

Irapuato’s Mayor Ricardo Ortiz Gutiérrez said the attack was due to the “drug war.”

After several texts were posted in social media in which the Jalisco New Generation Carte (CJNG) allegedly says it was responsible for the attack against alleged members of the Santa Rosa de Lima cartel, the mayor said the events were related to a clash between different drug gangs over the drug dealing market.

"Clearly, this was related to organized crime; it’s a confrontation between different gangs, cartels, that exist in the country and the región; of course, this is not the first time we see this situation due to the drug war.”

However, he did not mention a specific criminal group that could be involved in the attack.

The Mayor added that before the attack, the aggressors allowed women to leave the rehab center located at the Jardines de Arandas neighborhood and that others escaped running by themselves

He said there were seven aggressors involved in the attack and that they fled in two vans.

The attackers shot everyone at the "Recuperando mi vida" rehab center and state police said nobody was kidnapped. Photos from the crime scene show those at the center were lying down when they were sprayed with bullets.

This is the crime with the largest number of victims in 2020.

Guanajuato is the scene of a bloody turf war between the Jalisco Nueva Generación Cartel and the Santa Rosa de Lima Cartel, a local gang, led by “El Marro.” This had led Guanajuato to become the most violent state in the country.

However, this is not the first shooting registered inside a rehab center. On June 6, gunmen killed 10 people at a center located in Irapuato.

Mexican drug gangs have killed suspected street-level dealers from rival gangs sheltering at such facilities in the past.

Also, addicts and dealers who face attacks from rivals on the streets sometimes take refuge at the rehab clinics, making the clinics themselves targets for attack. Still, other gangs have been accused of forcibly recruiting recovering addicts at the centers as dealers, and killing them if they refused.

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