A letter purportedly from the Mexican drug cartel blamed for kidnapping four Americans last week, killing two of them, apologizes for the deadly incident and says the group has turned over its members who were involved.
“We have decided to turn over those who were directly involved and responsible in the events, who at all times acted under their own decision-making and lack of discipline,” the letter says, according to the Associated Press, which obtained the letter from the Scorpions faction of the Gulf cartel. It says that they went against the cartel’s rules, which include “respecting the life and well-being of the innocent.”
As CrimeOnline has reported, four friends crossed the border in Mexico on March 3, apparently traveling into the area so one of them could have plastic surgery. Armed men opened fire on their white minivan in downtown Matamoros, Tamaulipas. Afterward, the men allegedly pulled four people out of the minivan and forced them into another vehicle. A bystander, Areli Pablo Servando, 33, was also killed by a stray bullet.
Authorities located the group on Tuesday, but two of them were dead. The survivors were identified as Latavia Washington McGee and Eric Williams, while the slain victims were identified as Shaeed Woodard and Zindell Brown.
The apology letter came with a photograph of five men, bound face-down. Tamaulipas officials did not publicly confirm the suspects were in custody. A state security official, however, told the AP that investigators found the five men tied up inside one of the vehicles they had been searching for, along with the letter.
A cousin of Eric Williams, who was shot in the leg, said he doesn’t accept the apology.
“It ain’t gonna change nothing about the suffering that we went through,” Jerry Wallace said.
Mexican security analyst David Saucedo told the AP that the cartels are concerned about publicity and that apologizing and handing over suspects are not unheard of.
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[Featured image: A Red Cross worker closes the door of an ambulance carrying two Americans found alive after their abduction in Mexico last week, in Matamoros, Tuesday, March 7, 2023. Two of four Americans whose abduction in Mexico was captured in a video that showed them caught in a cartel shootout have been found dead, officials said Tuesday. The two surviving Americans were taken to the border near Brownsville, Texas, in a convoy of Mexican ambulances and SUVs. (AP Photo)]
