21 bodies found with warning notes in western Mexico

MORELIA: Twenty-one bodies were found strewn outside a town in western Mexico, several with warning notes affixed, officials said Thursday after the gruesome discovery.

The victims, all males between the ages of 25 and 30, were found in different areas just outside the city limits of Morelia a city of some 600,000 people in Michoacan state, some 300 kilometers (185 miles) from Mexico City.

State prosecutor Jesus Montejano said forensic examinations were being carried out on the bodies, which were discovered late Wednesday and early Thursday in various sites.

Five bodies were piled atop one another near Buenavista port, and five more at a road leading out of town. Three bodies were found on a local football pitch, three behind a hotel, the remaining five bodies were retrieved from undisclosed sites.

Police said some of the victims' faces were covered by tape and some showed signs of torture.

Another 14 bodies 12 men and two women were discovered in the port city of Acapulco between Wednesday and Thursday, according to a statement from the Guerrero state public security office.

The shocking discovery just outside Morelia comes just a few days after a "caravan" against violence protest passed through the town.

Officials took the unusual step of releasing the contents of the warning notes on the bodies, which bore the same ominous message.

"Because society asked for it, this is going to happen to those who continue to rob houses, kidnappers and rapists."

Michoacan state is the base of the notorious drug cartel La Familia, which is known for its religious zeal, notably justifying the beheadings of 12 policemen last June as being the work of "divine violence."

Late last year, the group said in a letter sent to local media it was ready to dissolve itself if security was enforced and citizens of the state are protected, urging the authorities to take control of the state.

Federal officials said it was unclear at the time whether the message was authentic, but still dismissed it, insisting the government "could not make deals with criminals."

The state has meanwhile seen an exodus of people fleeing their homes in recent weeks due to fighting between drug gangs and with security forces.

Esquivel Lucatero, the mayor of Buenavista municipality, told AFP in late May that nearly 2,000 people had left their homes, as army helicopters were deployed in the western state and soldiers maintained a heavy presence in the region.

Authorities had set up a refuge for the families in Buenavista, in at least the second exodus due to drug violence in less than a year, after several hundred people fled their homes in Ciudad Mier, northeast Mexico, last November.

The La Familia drug gang dominates Michoacan, but it was unclear whether intensified clashes were sparked by infighting within the gang or with other groups, such as the Zetas, which are expanding across the country.

Mexico has seen an explosion in drug-related violence in recent years that has left some 37,000 people dead since the government launched a military crackdown on organized crime in 2006.

In a brutal attack in the northern border state of Coahuila earlier this week, 13 people were killed after an armed gang stormed a drug rehabilitation center and fired on patients.

The "caravan of comfort" protest of families of victims and representatives of rights groups opposed to the military crackdown against drug cartels, wrapped up earlier this week, after stops in Michoacan; San Luis Potosi near the location where a US customs agent was gunned down in February; and Durango, where mass graves containing the remains of more than 220 people were uncovered in April.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2011