MEXICO CITY (AP) — A pair of brothers accused of being responsible for the kidnapping of four Americans and the murder of two of them two months ago, were captured in northern Mexico, where they led a group dedicated to drug trafficking and extortion, authorities said Thursday.
Both —sons of an arrested capo— were identified as Axel “N” and Alan “N”, the Ministry of National Defense, the National Guard and the Ministry of Security and Citizen Protection indicated in a joint statement.
The suspects were captured on May 7 during the search of various properties in the city of Matamoros, state of Tamaulipas, on the border with the United States, in an operation in which elements of the Army, the National Guard and the Attorney General’s Office participated. the Republic.
Three other people were also arrested in the operation and 1,360 pills of probable synthetic drugs and six weapons were seized. After their capture, the two brothers were transferred to the Mexican capital in a Mexican Air Force aircraft.
Authorities did not provide the full names of the suspects, but their information matches those of two men listed in a federal database as detainees that day in Tamaulipas: Axel Alfredo Cárdenas and Alan Alexis Cárdenas.
The two brothers assumed the leadership of a faction of the Gulf Cartel after their father José Alfredo Cárdenas, alias “El Contador”, was arrested in February of last year.
The government reported that the two alleged criminals would be responsible for the kidnapping of four Americans and the murder of two of them, which occurred in March in Matamoros. The four Americans traveled to the Mexican city from Texas so that a woman from the group could attend an appointment related to cosmetic surgery.
In the case of the Americans, five other people turned over to the police by alleged members of the group “Los Escorpiones”, a faction of the Gulf Cartel, were prosecuted, who in a handwritten letter apologized to the families of the victims and said that those men they acted against the rules of the criminal organization.
Likewise, the authorities accused the two brothers of being responsible for the roadblocks that occurred on April 30, as well as on May 2 and 3 in Matamoros and the neighboring town of San Fernando.
On the other hand, in a town in the southern state of Guerrero, seven people were killed and another four were injured by firearms, the state prosecutor’s office announced in a statement on Thursday night.
The incident occurred around midnight on Wednesday during a Mother’s Day celebration in the town of Corral de Piedra, Leonardo Bravo municipality, where several of the attendees staged a fight that culminated in a confrontation with firearms.
