First investigators of migrants massacre in Mexico found dead

Sep 8, 2010, 17:12 GMT

Mexico City - Two missing investigators into the killing of 72 migrants in the northern Mexican state of Tamaulipas were found dead, state authorities said.

The Tamaulipas Justice Department said late Tuesday that the bodies, with their identity documents, were found hours earlier in the Mendez municipality. DNA tests were to be made to confirm the men's identities.

Juan Carlos Suarez, public security secretary for the municipality of San Fernando - where the massacre took place - and public investigator Roberto Jaime Suarez Vazquez were the first to investigate the killings. They went missing on August 24, immediately after they found the bodies of the dead migrants.

Mexican authorities have so far arrested one Mexican man in connection with the killings of the migrants.

Further, six of the suspected killers are dead, the Mexican government said. Three were found dead after an anonymous telephone tip, while three others were killed in clashes with land forces of the Mexican Navy, government security spokesman Alejandro Poire told reporters.

The Central and South American migrants had been on their way to the United States when they were kidnapped late last month, allegedly by the criminal gang Los Zetas, which demanded money.

Since they did not any, they were asked to work for the gang for 1,000 dollars a fortnight. When they refused, they were shot at a ranch in the northern Mexican state of Tamaulipas, according to a survivor's account.

According to official figures, an estimated 28,000 people have been killed in Mexico in incidents linked to organized crime since President Felipe Calderon took office in December 2006.

The involvement of drug gangs in migrant trafficking is a relatively new development over the past several years.