Gunmen Kill 6, Wound 1 in Tijuana; 2 Arrested, 2 Sought

Gunmen who fatally shot six people and wounded another Tuesday were drug users just looking to kill, police said.

Authorities initially thought the latest round of violence in the border region was a drug-related vendetta. But Miguel Marin, a homicide detective for the Baja California judicial police, said late Tuesday that the shootings in a poor, southern Tijuana neighborhood called El Pipila were random.

“We don’t know exactly if these guys were drug dealers. They were on drugs, maybe cocaine,” Marin said.

Two suspects were arrested, and police were searching for two other men. One of the suspects, Marin said, told investigators the men had killed “because we wanted to.”

“They say they have no connection to these people [who were shot],” Marin said. “These people were at the wrong place at the wrong time.”

Officials said they found Juan Rivera Flores, 26, Miguel Angel Rivera, 30, and an unidentified 28-year-old man shot to death inside a Buick with California license plates on a dusty dirt road.

Around the corner, Joaquin Serrano Perez, 32, was found dead in a car parked in his driveway. The body of his wife, Felipa Leal Salazar, 26, was found beside the car.

Down the road, Ricardo Martinez Barajas, 17, was also killed. Carlos Gonzalez Alfaro, 17, was shot in the left leg, but the wound was not believed to be serious.

A few hours after the 3 a.m. shootings, police on the other side of town arrested Armando Benitez De la Vega, 22, and Mario Inzunza Hernandez, 24, both of Sinaloa, after the injured victim described the van involved. Police found an AK-47 assault rifle and ammunition in the van.

The shootings came only weeks after a deadly attack that shocked residents of northern Baja California. On Sept. 17, gunmen killed 18 members of an alleged drug trafficker’s family near Ensenada.