Car Bomb at Mexico Hotel Kills 5; Drug Link Suspected

A car packed with powerful explosives blew up outside a luxury hotel Saturday, killing at least five people and wounding 15. Police sources said the bombing may be linked to Guadalajara’s drug gangs.

The Camino Real Hotel was evacuated after the early morning explosion, which occurred as 300 guests were winding up a debutante ball for a 15-year-old girl. Investigators at the scene, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the girl’s family is known to have ties to drug traffickers.

The Mexico City newspaper Universal reported that police said members of the family of Rafael Caro Quintero, allegedly one of Mexico’s most powerful drug traffickers, were attending the party inside the hotel.

Body parts were found up to 300 yards away. Norma Leticia Gutierrez, deputy director of the state forensic service, said that pieces of the bodies were so scattered that her team had been able to piece together only two bodies, neither of which was identified.

The blast cracked hotel walls, shattered windows up to 20 blocks away and destroyed more than a dozen cars. Blood was smeared on the ballroom walls.

Police and state officials said the automobile was packed with 10 to 22 pounds of plastic explosives and may have been detonated by remote control. Enrique Hoyos Medina, an expert at the state attorney general’s office, said the explosives were a commercial type sold mainly to mining companies.

Guadalajara, 175 miles northwest of Mexico City, has been the scene of much drug-related violence. The city’s Roman Catholic archbishop was killed in the cross-fire of a drug-related shootout at the local airport last year.

No one claimed responsibility for Saturday’s blast, and the government said it had no suspects.

Witnesses told the official Mexican news agency Notimex that four people were seen leaving the car just before the blast.

The car, a 1993 Mercury Grand Marquis, was parked across from the hotel’s main entrance, which was blown away by the explosion.

The blast was the latest in a series of violent incidents that, although unrelated, have shaken Mexico. They include a New Year’s Day uprising in the south and the March 23 assassination of a presidential candidate.