Mexican army officer’s body found

The body of a Mexican army captain was found in southern Guerrero state Sunday, a day after a severed head was left outside a military base with a note suggesting criminal gangs would defy the army’s increased presence.

Also in Guerrero, unidentified attackers tossed a grenade late Saturday at a police station in Tecpan, damaging two police cars but causing no injuries.

Police found Capt. Jacinto Pablo Granda, 36, near a highway in Guerrero’s capital of Chilpancingo, about 60 miles northeast of Acapulco, with two gunshot wounds to the head, said Erit Montufar, state director of investigative police.

Granda was vacationing with his family when he was abducted Saturday by armed men near a Chilpancingo military base, Montufar said. It was unclear whether the attackers knew that Granda, who was assigned to a different base, was an officer.

President Felipe Calderon has sent more than 24,000 soldiers and federal police to areas ravaged by drug violence, and criminals have apparently responded by attacking army troops. Five soldiers have died in attacks this month.

On Saturday, the head of a kidnapped auto mechanic was left in a box along with two grenades and a note from the purported gang members outside a military barracks in Veracruz. “We are going to continue, even if federal forces are here,” authorities quoted the note as saying.