Cartel gunmen in Sonora opened fire upon a parked van, killing an adult male and his 3-year-old son. Two other children were also in the vehicle with one sustaining a minor injury. In a separate incident on Thursday night, a 3-month-old baby was wounded and a 28-year-old male was killed in a drive-by shooting.
Police in Ciudad Obregón, Sonora, responded to a report of a shooting in colonia Las Misiones at approximately 2:30 pm Thursday, according to local media. Witnesses reported that cartel gunmen in two separate vehicles arrived at a residence and directed a heavy volume of rifle fire at an adult male standing outside his parked van with three children inside.
Police discovered the unidentified adult male and his 3-year-old son, already deceased from gunshot wounds. The adult male was laying in the street outside the opened driver’s door and the child was found in the backseat. The gunmen reportedly fled southbound toward Federal Highway 15.
In the second attack, a drive-by shooting in colonia Primero de Mayo left a three-month-old baby wounded and an adult male dead. Local reports indicate that a gunman in a passing vehicle opened fire at a residence striking the adult male and baby who were inside. The infant sustained non-life-threatening wounds. The adult male died after being transported to a hospital.
Breitbart News reported Thursday that a total of 1,800 Mexican National Guard personnel will deploy to Sonora starting July 1 to help fight the escalating violence attributed to cartel and gang turf wars. The municipality of Cajeme will receive 300 personnel, due to it being considered the most violent, according to a local report. Earlier in the month, Breitbart News also reported on the discovery of two dismembered bodies abandoned on the side of a road with a narco-message in Ciudad Obregón. Also this month, two cartel attacks in the border cities of Agua Prieta and Naco occurred, leaving at least nine dead.
The violence in Sonora is attributed to an ongoing territorial dispute between the Sinaloa Cartel and the Beltran Leyva organization’s regionally aligned gangs.
Robert Arce is a retired Phoenix Police detective with extensive experience working Mexican organized crime and street gangs. Arce has worked in the Balkans, Iraq, Haiti, and recently completed a three-year assignment in Monterrey, Mexico, working out of the Consulate for the United States Department of State, International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Program, where he was the Regional Program Manager for Northeast Mexico (Coahuila, Tamaulipas, Nuevo Leon, Durango, San Luis Potosi, Zacatecas.)