A group of gunmen shot and killed the mayor of a rural community in western Mexico and her husband. The region where the shooting took place has a long history of cartel violence. The attack follows on the heels of a similar case in southern Mexico.
On Tuesday morning, a group of gunmen ambushed and killed Martha Laura Mendoza, the mayor of Tepalcatepec, a rural municipality in the Mexican state of Michoacan located near the border with the state of Jalisco. Mendoza was with her husband, who also died during the attack, and with a third person who sustained multiple injuries.
Mendoza was not only the mayor of Tepalcatepec but also the sister-in-law of Juan Jose “El Abuelo” Farias, a cartel boss who masqueraded as one of the founding leaders of the self-defense movement in Michoacán. Authorities believed that the murder was tied to an ongoing power struggle between criminal organizations for control of the region.
As Breitbart Texas reported, in 2018, Mexican military forces arrested El Abuelo on various weapons and drug charges. However, just days later, a Mexican judge ordered his release under suspicious circumstances. At the beginning of his movement, Farias was a key operator of Cartel Jalisco New Generation. Since then, Farias went independent and established his own criminal organization and has sided with a group of smaller cartels known as Carteles Unidos as they seek to keep control of lucrative drug production facilities and trafficking routes into Mexico.
Through his family and their connections with Mexico’s Army, Farias has been able to control the local government in that municipality and operate with complete impunity despite being wanted in the United States.
The murder of Mendoza comes just after, as Breitbart Texas reported, a group of gunmen shot and killed another mayor in the state of Oaxaca. In that case, gunmen stormed the San Mateo Pinas City Hall. They shot Mayor Lilia Gema Garcia Soto and another city official, killing them both in a case that remains unsolved.
Ildefonso Ortiz is an award-winning journalist with Breitbart News Foundation. He co-founded Breitbart News Foundation’s Cartel Chronicles project with Brandon Darby and senior Breitbart management. You can follow him on Twitter and on Facebook. He can be contacted at
Brandon Darby is the managing director and editor-in-chief of Breitbart Texas. He co-founded Breitbart News Foundation’s Cartel Chronicles project with Ildefonso Ortiz and senior Breitbart management. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook. He can be contacted at
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