MEXICO CITY -- The number of bodies pulled from mass graves in a rocky field outside the northern city of Monterrey rose to 50 Saturday, authorities said, marking one of the largest dumping grounds ever found for casualties of Mexico's drug war. Forensic experts used earthmoving machinery to dig up several new graves beyond the nine pits already excavated.Unnamed military sources told the semi-official Notimex news agency that workers uncovered 12 new bodies early in the day, bringing to 50 the bodies dug up in a landfill in the township of Benito Juarez east of Monterrey. Some of the bodies appeared to have been incinerated, while others had bullet wounds, the Milenio news network reported on its website. It said the victims appeared to have been killed within the past two weeks."The majority (of the victims) are men between 20 and 50 years old, and most of them have tattoos," said Nuevo Leon State Attorney General Alejandro Garza y Garza, adding that forensic experts would conduct genetic tests to identify the victims.
MEXICO CITY -- The number of bodies pulled from mass graves in a rocky field outside the northern city of Monterrey rose to 50 Saturday, authorities said, marking one of the largest dumping grounds ever found for casualties of Mexico's drug war.
Forensic experts used earthmoving machinery to dig up several new graves beyond the nine pits already excavated.
Unnamed military sources told the semi-official Notimex news agency that workers uncovered 12 new bodies early in the day, bringing to 50 the bodies dug up in a landfill in the township of Benito Juarez east of Monterrey.
Some of the bodies appeared to have been incinerated, while others had bullet wounds, the Milenio news network reported on its website. It said the victims appeared to have been killed within the past two weeks.
"The majority (of the victims) are men between 20 and 50 years old, and most of them have tattoos," said Nuevo Leon State Attorney General Alejandro Garza y Garza, adding that forensic experts would conduct genetic tests to identify the victims.
CULIACAN, Mexico -- As narcotics addiction soars in Mexico, drug rehabilitation centers have become killing zones and recruitment centers in the country's escalating drug war. Clinics have become incubators for crime. In central Mexico, a cartel given to religious fanaticism is thought to run its own drug centers, weaning addicts off narcotics only to convert them into killers.Hired guns from cartels also have taken to using rehab clinics as hideouts after committing brutal crimes, making the centers targets of revenge for rivals. Almost every month, heavily armed squads break into a rehab center somewhere in Mexico and gun down those who are thought to be rivals from competing narcotics syndicates, along with innocent patients. In one of the grisliest cases, assailants with AK-47 automatic rifles broke into the Faith and Life clinic in Chihuahua City, a desert hub about 220 miles from El Paso, Texas, lined up 19 people and executed them. The killers left a banner after the June 10 attack: "This is what happens to rapists, robbers, scum and pigs."About a dozen violent attacks on drug treatment centers have occurred in the past year in Durango and Chihuahua states
CULIACAN, Mexico -- As narcotics addiction soars in Mexico, drug rehabilitation centers have become killing zones and recruitment centers in the country's escalating drug war.
Clinics have become incubators for crime. In central Mexico, a cartel given to religious fanaticism is thought to run its own drug centers, weaning addicts off narcotics only to convert them into killers.
Hired guns from cartels also have taken to using rehab clinics as hideouts after committing brutal crimes, making the centers targets of revenge for rivals. Almost every month, heavily armed squads break into a rehab center somewhere in Mexico and gun down those who are thought to be rivals from competing narcotics syndicates, along with innocent patients.
In one of the grisliest cases, assailants with AK-47 automatic rifles broke into the Faith and Life clinic in Chihuahua City, a desert hub about 220 miles from El Paso, Texas, lined up 19 people and executed them. The killers left a banner after the June 10 attack: "This is what happens to rapists, robbers, scum and pigs."
About a dozen violent attacks on drug treatment centers have occurred in the past year in Durango and Chihuahua states
