The recent murder of a groom leaving his wedding illustrates the brutality that has taken over the Mexican border state of Sonora, just south of Arizona. The state ranks fifth in Mexico for murders due primarily to a fierce cartel turf war where rival factions fight for control of fentanyl smuggling routes into Arizona.

The shocking murder took place last weekend at the Candelaria Church in the city of Caborca, where a group of gunmen shot and killed 32-year-old Marco Antonio Rosales Contreras as he was walking out of the church with his wife. A photograph of the attack captured the bride in shock in her bloodstained wedding dress.

While Sonora Governor Alfonso Durazo publicly claimed that the murder was a direct attack and the public shouldn’t be afraid, his own state attorney general’s office claimed that the murder appears to be a case of mistaken identity.

The murder is just one of the latest examples of how during the first months of a new state government led by the Morena Party, the state of Sonora has become Mexico’s fifth deadliest.

Statistics from Mexico’s federal government revealed that from January to July 2022, the state recorded 1,018 murders primarily tied to cartel fighting over control of the fentanyl trade.

The murder of Rosales Contreras at his wedding is not an isolated event. Ten days before the murder of Rosales Contreras, four separate municipalities experienced extreme violence as convoys of gunmen clashed setting vehicles on fire and leaving a string of fatalities.

The violence in Sonora traces its origins to 2013 when, as Breitbart Texas reported, a Mexican judge mysteriously released Rafael Caro Quintero — the drug lord behind the 1985 murder of U.S. DEA Agent Enrique “Kiki” Camarena. After his release from prison, Caro Quintero returned to the drug trade and founded the Caborca Cartel. Just five years later, Caro Quintero went to war with Los Salazar. The regional criminal organization is closely aligned with the sons of famed Sinaloa Cartel boss Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman.

A second factor in the violence is linked to the arrival of fentanyl, research from the Colegio de la Frontera Norte (COLEF) revealed. The fight for the lucrative fentanyl smuggling routes intensified the fighting between drug cartels in Mexico’s Pacific coastal area.

The manufacture of fentanyl depends primarily on chemical precursors from China that arrive at Mexico’s Port of Guaymas in Sonora. On August 11, the Mexican Army made a historic seizure of 800,000 fentanyl pills and almost a ton of methamphetamine that was destined for the border city of Tijuana.

Editor’s Note: Breitbart Texas traveled to Mexico City and the states of Tamaulipas, Coahuila, and Nuevo León to recruit citizen journalists willing to risk their lives and expose the cartels silencing their communities.  The writers would face certain death at the hands of the various cartels that operate in those areas including the Gulf Cartel and Los Zetas if a pseudonym were not used. Breitbart Texas’ Cartel Chronicles are published in both English and in their original Spanish. This article was written by “Dharma Fernández” from Baja California.