Mexican police accuse drug gang over 8 killings in Tijuana

Jan 18, 2008, 20:09 GMT

Mexico City - Mexican authorities on Friday said a cell of a top drug cartel was responsible for a shootout in the northern city of Tijuana that killed one police officer and injured three others.

One alleged drug dealer also died in the shootout, and inside the house where the raid occurred, police found another six men dead - 'gagged, blindfolded and with a coup de grace,' authorities said. They were allegedly members of a rival gang and had presumably been killed by the drug dealers in a vendetta.

A 24-year-old police officer who had been injured in the head in the shootout died of his wounds Friday.

Federal officials said they had identified the place as a safe house and were shot at when they arrived.

The clash, which involved soldiers, federal and municipal police officers and lasted more than three hours, caused a stir in Mexico because security forces had to evacuate a nearby daycare facility in the middle of the shootout.

Television showed dramatic footage of masked officers with long weapons lifting the children in their arms and carrying them outside the school. Other children ran around covering their ears, alongside their teachers.

Six people were arrested in the raid, among them a Tijuana municipal police officer. They were taken to Mexico City to continue the investigation.

At the time of the clash, local police were holding a funeral for three top Tijuana police officers killed in an unrelated incident Monday, allegedly by organized crime. Two relatives of one of the officers were also deliberately killed on the day, along with an apparent bystander who had no connection to the police or criminals.

Tijuana, in the state of Baja California on the Mexican border with the United States, is considered one of the most dangerous cities in Mexico. It is the seat of a drug cartel led by the Arellano Felix brothers, sometimes known as the Tijuana Cartel.