The four individuals went missing Tuesday night and on Wednesday morning their bodies were found wrapped in blankets in the Pacific coast city of Rosarito and their heads in bags in Tijuana, said Rosarito police chief Valente Montijo.
He identified the dead as police officers Ismael Arellano Torres, Jesus Hernandez and Adrian Ventura, and civilian Fernando Aguilar, a Mexican-American resident of Arizona.
According to Montijo, the cops and the other man - who was a friend of one of the officers - went missing after the three police answered a call about an attempted kidnapping in the Huahuatay district of eastern Rosarito.
The Rosarito police chief said that on Tuesday he received a report of an operation in the city by some 100 agents of the AFI - Mexico's FBI. Those individuals, who were identified by the credentials and uniforms this group typically uses, were - according to witnesses - the ones who abducted and killed the police officers.
The Baja California Norte state prosecutor's office and federal authorities were investigating the case.
Rosarito is located some 25 kilometers (15 miles) southwest of the border city of Tijuana, where the Tijuana cartel headed by members of the Arellano Felix cartel operates. |