The Associated Press
NUEVO LAREDO, Mexico- Two police officers were gunned down Wednesday while on their way to work, bringing to five the number of authorities that have been slain in this violent border city in four days.
Ricardo Uvalle Escobedo and Jose de Jesus Morin Salinas were killed by unidentified assailants in separate incidents while en route from their homes to the Nuevo Laredo police station, said investigator Oscar Sepulveda.
Numerous spent Kalashnikov rifle shells were found near the vehicles of both officers, who were killed in different parts of the city, Sepulveda said.
The shootings came just hours after two men with machine guns opened fire with more than 50 rounds Tuesday night, killing a pair of police officers not far from city hall.
Cmdr. Daniel Juarez and Inspector Carlos Manuel Alvarez were riding in an unmarked car in an area between the municipal building and a crowded federal consumer protection office when they were ambushed, Sepulveda said.
Juarez was killed instantly, while Alvarez died about an hour later at a hospital.
The back-to-back slayings brought to 13 the number of police officers killed since January in Nuevo Laredo, home to 330,000 across the border from Laredo, Texas.
On Sunday night, Jose Noel Vives, a police agent for Tamaulipas state, which includes Nuevo Laredo, was shot 15 times and killed as he left his financee’s house.
Authorities say two of Mexico’s most powerful drug gangs are waging a bloody battle for control of key cocaine and marijuana smuggling routes into the United States. The conflict has unleashed a wave of violence.
President Vicente Fox has sent in the army and federal agents to restore order, but the violence has continued. Officials also ordered all members of the municipal police force off the streets for drug tests and background checks.
Juarez and Alvarez were returning from city hall, where members of the police force have gathered many days, awaiting reinstatement for patrol duties.
As of Wednesday, no one had been detained in any of the last three attacks.