17 Slain in Mexico

Nine people were slain in the western state of Sinaloa, a spokesman for the state Attorney General’s Office told Efe Monday. Four bodies were discovered inside a burned-out SUV in Culiacan, the state capital, the spokesman said, adding that 22 shell casings from an AK-47 assault rifle were collected at the scene. In the town of Navolato, four people who had been kidnapped elsewhere were found shot to death near a technical training school. Another person turned up dead in the community of El Quemadito. News of the slayings in Guerrero and Sinaloa followed word that a dozen people were killed over the weekend in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico’s murder capital. Police found the bodies of five people who had been gunned down inside a hair salon in the northern border city, the Chihuahua state Attorney General’s Office said. Police homicide unit officers also found three bodies and a wounded man at a house in Juarez, located just across the Rio Grande from El Paso, Texas. The wounded man was taken to a hospital, where he died a short time later. Three other people were killed in separate incidents, the Chihuahua AG’s office said. Ciudad Juarez has witnessed more than 5,000 murders since 2008 and this year’s death toll stands at more than 1,600...more