52 dead in grenade attack on casino in Mexico

45 dead in attack on casino in northern Mexico

By PORFIRIO IBARRA RAMIREZ, Associated Press

MONTERREY, Mexico (AP) — Two dozen gunmen burst into a casino in northern Mexico on Thursday, doused it with gasoline and started a fire that trapped gamblers inside, killing at least 45 people and injuring a dozen more, authorities said.

The fire at the Casino Royale in Monterrey, a city that has seen a surge in drug cartel-related violence, represented one of the deadliest attacks on an entertainment center in Mexico since President Felipe Calderon launched an offensive against drug cartels in late 2006.

"This is a night of sadness for Mexico," federal security spokesman Alejandro Poire said in a televised address. "These unspeakable acts of terror will not go unpunished."

Calderon tweeted that the attack was "an abhorrent act of terror and barbarism" that requires "all of us to persevere in the fight against these unscrupulous criminal bands."

Nuevo Leon state security spokesman Jorge Domene said the number late Thursday had risen to at least 45.

"But we could find more," said state Attorney General Leon Adrian de la Garza, adding that a drug cartel was apparently responsible for the attack. Cartels often extort casinos and other businesses, threatening to attack them or burn them to the ground if they refuse to pay.

State police officials quoted survivors as saying armed men burst into the casino, apparently to rob it, and began dousing the premises with fuel from tanks they brought with them. The officials were not authorized to be quoted by name for security reasons. De la Garza said the liquid appeared to be gasoline.

With shouts and profanities, the attackers told the customers and employees to get out. But many terrified customers and employees fled further inside the building, where they died trapped amid the flames and thick smoke that soon billowed out of the building.

Workers continuing to remove bodies well into the night.

Monterrey Mayor Fernando Larrazabal said many of the bodies were found inside the casino's bathrooms, where employees and customers had locked themselves to escape the gunmen.

In an act of desperation, authorities commandeered backhoes from a nearby construction site to break into the casino's walls to try to reach the people trapped inside.

Maria Tomas Navarro, 42, stood weeping at the edge of the police tape stretched in front of the smoke-stained casino building. She was hoping for word of her brother, 25-year-old Genaro Navarro Vega, who had worked in the casino's bingo area.

Navarro said she tried calling her brother's cell phone. "But he doesn't answer. I don't know what is happening," she said. "There is nobody to ask."

Larrazabal said the casino, in a well-off part of Monterrey, had been closed by authorities in May for building an expansion without a permit, but a judge later granted the owner an injunction to continue operating.

Initial reports said 11 people had been killed, but the death toll climbed as emergency personnel and firefighters searched the casino building. Medics treated survivors for smoke inhalation.

State police officials initially said witnesses reported hearing three explosions before the fire started, but later said a flammable material was used. The officials were not authorized to be quoted by name for security reasons.

The reports of explosions may have been the sound of the ignition of the liquid.

It was the second time in three months that the Casino Royale was targeted. Gunmen struck it and three other casinos on May 25, when the gunmen sprayed the Casino Royale with bullets, but no was reported injured in that attack.

Last month, gunmen killed 20 people at a bar in Monterrey. The attackers sprayed the bar with rounds from assault rifles, and police later found bags of drugs at the bar.

Monterrey has seen bloody turf battles between the Zetas and Gulf cartels in recent months. Once Mexico's symbol of development and prosperity, the city is seeing this year's drug-related murders on a pace to double last year's and triple those of the year before.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/art ... ccc5ff87c2

At least 40 killed in Mexico grenade attack

By Javier Estrada,, For CNN
August 25, 2011 11:25 p.m. EDT

(CNN) -- At least 40 people were killed and numerous others injured in a reported grenade attack at a casino in Monterrey, Mexico, the capital of Nuevo Leon, according to attorney general in that northern state.

The incident occurred around 4 p.m. local time (5 p.m. ET) at the Casino Royale when two people aboard a vehicle arrived, and one threw three grenades into the building.

There were conflicting unconfirmed reports from local media that the assailants poured gasoline on the building before setting it on fire.

Between 20 and 30 people were trapped in the casino because of debris from the explosions, said Cmdr. Angel Flores with the Green Cross.

Video from the scene showed a burned-out building as firefighters made rescue attempts to break the wall of the facade of the casino to release the smoke inside the building.

Mexican President Felipe Calderon sent the following statement from his official Twitter account (translated from Spanish): "With deep consternation, I express my solidarity with Nuevo Leon and the victims of this abhorrent act of terror and barbarism."

He added more: "These reprehensible acts require us all to persevere in the fight against gangs of unscrupulous criminals. All the support to NL (Nuevo Leon)."

About five families were outside the casino waiting for information from authorities, local journalist Javier Estrada reported.

Gustavo Madrazo was one of those waiting outside the casino. He said his wife, Martha, and her sister, Miriam Gonzalez, were inside.

Authorities have not identified any of the victims.

So far, no representative for the company that manages the casino had arrived outside. The Mexican Army and state and municipal police forces were also on the scene.

Alejandro Poire, Mexico's top national security spokesman, said the federal government has made contact with local officials and that Calderon has spoken to the governor of Nuevo Leon to offer support.

Poire said those who carried out the attacks will be held responsible. "They will pay for their crimes. ... We will do absolutely everything ... to restore tranquility."

The National Commission on Human Rights in Mexico sent a news release saying it has opened an investigation regarding the response to the events at the casino.

"The priority is to help safeguard the human rights enshrined in the Constitution of the United Mexican States and international treaties. The commission again makes clear that the insecurity in the country requires public officials responsible for implementing and enforcing the law, carry out preventive actions to protect society and away from any violence."

"The National Commission will monitor the actions taken by the competent authorities to respond adequately to the aggrieved persons."

The NHRC says it has also sent personnel to the scene including physicians, psychologists and lawyers to work jointly with authorities.

Nuevo Leon, in northeastern Mexico, has seen several grenade attacks so far this year. On August 13, four civilians were wounded when an armed group fired two grenades at a jail in the municipality of Apodaca.

In July, gunmen entered a downtown bar in Monterrey and shot 20 people dead. A public safety spokesman told CNN the attack was likely sparked by a dispute between organized crime groups for control of the El Sabino Gordo nightclub, where drugs were allegedly sold.

Nuevo Leon and the neighboring states of Coahuila and Tamaulipas have been the scene of a series of clashes between organized crime groups. The Gulf Cartel and Los Zetas are vying for control of trafficking routes into the United States.

In November 2010, the federal government launched the Coordinated Operation Northeast, which involves sending more security forces to the area to tackle crime.

http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/americas/ ... gletoolbar

You realize how huge this story would be if it happened in the States?

Because it is in Mexico it will hardly be noted.

Less than 2 years ago Monterey was a vibrant city with universities and flourishing commerce.

What a shame the world is ignoring these atrocities.

It is a shame, Mapwife. To add to it, I don't think people in this country could handle it - the pictures I see on the M3 Report and Borderland beat is enough to give most people nightmares for days. Chopped off heads with thier eyes popping out, torso's hanging from bridges, dead kids, burned bodies, bloated bodies pulled from rivers and sewers, faces blown off, bodies that had been skinned alive....I could go on and on. I've seen so much of it over the last few years I'm almost immune to it. Once in a while it DOES still bring me to tears tho and I consider that a good thing because it tells me I still have a heart left. :( The last one that had that effect on me was a grandmother and an 8 year old girl shot to death. The grandmother was still in the defensive position of trying to shield the little girl. It ripped my heart out because I knew they were innocents in all this.

Also whats sad is they don't even count the kids when they are killed. Life means so little down there.

Try and tell someone who is clueless to what is happening down there and their eyes just sort of glaze over and they want to change the subject - pronto. I can't say I blame them.

Death toll lowered to 52 in Mexican casino attack

MONTERREY, Mexico — Rescue workers recovered burned bodies and anxious residents crowded behind yellow police tape Friday waiting to hear if relatives were among the victims of a grisly arson attack on a casino by presumed drug traffickers that killed at least 52 gamblers and employees.

Family members arrived at the morgue all through the night in Monterrey, a modern metropolis and one of Mexico's most important business centers that has recently become the target of increasing drug-related violence.

The armed assailants burst into the casino Thursday afternoon and then poured and ignited gasoline, burning the casino to the ground in what President Felipe Calderon described as the worst attack on innocent civilians in recent memory.

Nuevo Leon state Gov. Rodrigo Medina lowered the death toll to 52 early Friday in fire in northern industrial city of Monterrey. He had said late Thursday 53 people had died in the fire at the Casino Royale.

Santiago Loera, 53, came looking for his brother, Miguel Angel, a cook at another casino who had gone to the Casino Royale to sign a new contract.

"We think he's here," Loera said.

Loera said authorities have asked him for a DNA sample.

So far 45 of the victims have been identified

The fire represented one of the deadliest attacks in Mexico since President Felipe Calderon launched an offensive against drug cartels in late 2006.

Francisco Tamayo, 28, of Monterrey, said he and family members looked at about 40 bodies in search of his mother, Sonia de la Pena, 47, who loved to gamble at the casino and was there on average four days a week. They had yet to find her.

When Tamayo learned of the fire from television, he ran to the scene.

"She's probably here," said Tamayo, who repeatedly called her cell phone, only to hear that it was out of the area of service.

Calderon tweeted that the attack was "an abhorrent act of terror and barbarism" that requires "all of us to persevere in the fight against these unscrupulous criminal bands."

Attorney General Leon Adrian de la Garza said a drug cartel was apparently responsible for the attack, though he didn't name which one. Cartels often extort casinos and other businesses, threatening to attack them or burn them to the ground if they refuse to pay.

It was the second time in three months that the Casino Royale was targeted. Gunmen struck it and three other casinos on May 25, spraying the building with bullets, but no was reported injured in that attack.

The fire in the two-story casino, which advertised sports book and bingo, was reported just before 4 p.m. local time (5 p.m. EDT; 2100 GMT), a slow time of day when normally about 80 people played the tables and slots, said former security guard Alberto Martinez Alvarado, 30. Martinez, who was on his way home from work Thursday when he saw the fire, said the casino could hold hundreds, perhaps 1,000 people.

"We're lucky we weren't there," he said. "Why couldn't the people who did this do some honest work instead?"

State police officials quoted survivors as saying armed men burst into the casino, apparently to rob it, and began dousing the premises with fuel from tanks they brought with them. The officials were not authorized to be quoted by name for security reasons. De la Garza said the liquid appeared to be gasoline.

With shouts and profanities, the attackers told the customers and employees to get out. But many terrified customers and employees fled further inside the building, where they died trapped amid the flames and thick smoke that soon billowed out of the building.

Monterrey Mayor Fernando Larrazabal said many of the bodies were found inside the casino's bathrooms, where employees and customers had locked themselves to escape the gunmen.

Authorities commandeered backhoes from a nearby construction site and made a brief attempt to break into the casino's walls as smoke billowed from the main entrance, hindering firefighters.

Maria Tomas Navarro, 42, stood weeping at the edge of the police tape stretched in front of the smoke-stained casino building. She was hoping for word of her brother, 25-year-old Genaro Navarro Vega, who had worked in the casino's bingo area.

Navarro said she tried calling her brother's cell phone. "But he doesn't answer. I don't know what is happening," she said. "There is nobody to ask."

Monterrey has seen bloody turf battles between the Zetas and Gulf cartels in recent months. Once Mexico's symbol of development and prosperity, the city is seeing this year's drug-related murders on a pace to double last year's and triple those of the year before.

Last month, gunmen killed 20 people at a bar in Monterrey. The attackers sprayed the bar with rounds from assault rifles, and police later found bags of drugs at the bar.

State police officials initially said witnesses reported hearing three explosions before Thursday's fire started, but later said a flammable material was used. The officials were not authorized to be quoted by name for security reasons.

The reports of explosions may have been the sound of the ignition of the liquid.

Norma Reyes, 45, was one of the people who received good news Thursday. Her son called her before she even heard about the fire to say he was all right. Jonathan Reyes, 25, who worked as an area supervisor, told his mother he was at the hospital trying to find out what happened to his co-workers.

"God took care of us today," she said.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2011 ... no-attack/

I don't know how they can stand it....

RELATED

Mexico offers $2.4m reward in deadly casino arson

MONTERREY, Mexico — Mexican President Felipe Calderon declared three days of mourning Friday following the arson of a casino by presumed drug traffickers that killed 52, calling those responsible "true terrorists."
Armed assailants burst into the casino Thursday afternoon, swearing and shouting for customers and employees to get out. But many of the terrified victims fled farther inside the building, where they died trapped amid the flames and thick smoke that soon billowed out of the building.

The Mexican government is offering a $2.4 million reward for information leading to the assailants who set fire to a casino in northern Mexico, killing 52 people.

The Attorney General's Office says in a statement that Calderon instructed authorities to offer the reward to find those responsible for what he called "an act of barbarism."

Calderon described the incident as the worst attack on innocent civilians in recent memory.
"We are not talking about an accident," he said in a televised nationwide address. "We are talking about true terrorists who have gone beyond all limits."

Meanwhile, the Mexican government is offering a $2.4 million reward for information leading to the assailants who set fire to the casino.
The Attorney General's Office says in a statement that Calderon instructed authorities to offer the reward to find those responsible for what he called "an act of barbarism."

Surveillance video shows at least eight assailants arriving to the Casino Royale in four cars and heading to the main entrance. They are also seen carrying three large bottles, which Gov. Rodrigo Medina said probably contained gasoline.

Family members arrived at the morgue all through the night in Monterrey, a modern metropolis and one of Mexico's most important business centers that has been the scene of a ferocious turf battle between the Gulf and Zetas drug cartels.

Medina lowered the death toll to 52 early Friday. He had said late Thursday 53 people had died in the fire at the Casino Royale.

Santiago Loera, 53, went to the morgue looking for his brother, Miguel Angel, a cook at another casino who had gone to the Casino Royale to sign a new contract.

"We think he's here," Loera said.
Loera said authorities have asked him for a DNA sample.
Calderon tweeted that the attack was "an abhorrent act of terror and barbarism" that requires "all of us to persevere in the fight against these unscrupulous criminal bands."

Attorney General Leon Adrian de la Garza said a drug cartel was apparently responsible for the attack, though he didn't name which one. Cartels often extort casinos and other businesses, threatening to attack them or burn them to the ground if they refuse to pay.

It was the second time in three months that the Casino Royale was targeted. Gunmen struck it and three other casinos on May 25, spraying the building with bullets, but no was reported injured in that attack.

The fire in the two-story casino, which advertised sports book and bingo, was reported just before 4 p.m. local time (5 p.m. EDT; 2100 GMT), a slow time of day when normally about 80 people played the tables and slots, said former security guard Alberto Martinez Alvarado, 30. Martinez, who was on his way home from work Thursday when he saw the fire, said the casino could hold hundreds, perhaps 1,000 people.

"We're lucky we weren't there," he said. "Why couldn't the people who did this do some honest work instead?"

State police officials quoted survivors as saying armed men burst into the casino, apparently to rob it, and began dousing the premises with fuel from tanks they brought with them. The officials were not authorized to be quoted by name for security reasons. De la Garza said the liquid appeared to be gasoline.

Monterrey Mayor Fernando Larrazabal said many of the bodies were found inside the casino's bathrooms, where employees and customers had locked themselves to escape the gunmen.

Authorities commandeered backhoes from a nearby construction site and made a brief attempt to break into the casino's walls as smoke billowed from the main entrance, hindering firefighters.

Maria Tomas Navarro, 42, stood weeping at the edge of the police tape stretched in front of the smoke-stained casino building. She was hoping for word of her brother, 25-year-old Genaro Navarro Vega, who had worked in the casino's bingo area.

Navarro said she tried calling her brother's cell phone. "But he doesn't answer. I don't know what is happening," she said. "There is nobody to ask."
Monterrey has seen bloody turf battles between the Zetas and Gulf cartels in recent months. Once Mexico's symbol of development and prosperity, the city is seeing this year's drug-related murders on a pace to double last year's and triple those of the year before.

Last month, gunmen killed 20 people at a bar in Monterrey. The attackers sprayed the bar with rounds from assault rifles, and police later found bags of drugs at the bar.

State police officials initially said witnesses reported hearing three explosions before Thursday's fire started, but later said a flammable material was used. The officials were not authorized to be quoted by name for security reasons.
The reports of explosions may have been the sound of the ignition of the liquid.

Norma Reyes, 45, was one of the people who received good news Thursday. Her son called her before she even heard about the fire to say he was all right. Jonathan Reyes, 25, who worked as an area supervisor, told his mother he was at the hospital trying to find out what happened to his co-workers.

"God took care of us today," she said.

http://www.chron.com/news/nation-world/ ... 142638.php

RELATED

Mexican army, feds raid casinos after arson attack

By PORFIRIO IBARRA RAMIREZ and KATHERINE CORCORAN
Associated Press

http://hosted.ap.org/photos/3/307e27...678f-small.jpg

MONTERREY, Mexico (AP) -- Hundreds of soldiers and federal agents are raiding casinos in this northern city, authorities said Saturday, two days after an arson attack on a gambling house killed 52 people and stunned a country that had become numb to massacres and beheadings.

Security forces had so far confiscated about 1,500 slot machines at 11 casinos in Monterrey and its surroundings and arrested three people, Mexico's tax agency said. It said the continuing operation was meant to verify whether casinos had paid taxes or introduced slot machines illegally.

Thursday's arson attack by gunmen was a macabre milestone in a conflict that the government says has claimed more than 35,000 lives since President Felipe Calderon launched an offensive against drug cartels in late 2006. Others put the death toll near 40,000.

The torching of the Casino Royale has raised questions over Mexico's regulatory controls for fast-spreading gambling houses.

Authorities have not been able to reach the owners of two companies pointed out as titleholders of the casino. Jorge Domene, security spokesman for Nuevo Leon state, said an order to appear before state police has been issued for owners of the two companies, CYMSA Corp. and Vallarta Attractions and Emotions.

Casino Royale's legal representative, Juan Gomez, told reporters that the shareholders of the business were Jorge Alberto and Raul Rocha Cantu. They will meet with police when authorities set the time, Gomez said.

Their family members have been prohibited from leaving the city, he said without offering details.

During the raids, which began Friday, about 700 soldiers, federal police and Treasury Department agents seized slot machines and put them in moving trucks.

Authorities did not say the raids were related to the arson. But one of the casinos searched was also registered under Vallarta Attractions and Emotions, according to the gaming unit of Mexico's Interior Department. Information of the other locations was not immediately available.

Federal police deployed 1,500 offiers and sent Black Hawk helicopters to the state to step up security in this industrial metropolis of more than 4 million people. The Mexican army said it was sending in 1,500 soldiers.

Mayor Fernando Larrazabal said the Casino Royale and other 12 casinos violated municipal laws and were allowed to remain open after obtaining federal court injunctions.

The casino had been attacked twice before, including an incident in May when gunmen strafed it from the outside. Last month, gunmen killed 20 people at a bar in Monterrey.

Cartels often extort casinos and other businesses, threatening to attack them or burn them to the ground if they refuse to pay. But Gomez, the owners' representative, said the Casino Royale had not received extortion threats.

Speaking at a news conference, he also said the casino had the appropriate permits and met safety standards.

Authorities have not blamed a specific drug-trafficking organization for the casino attack. But the city has been ensnared in a turf battle between the Gulf cartel and its offshoot, the Zetas, and is on track for record levels of killings this year.

A surveillance tape showed the Casino Royale building engulfed in flames in little more than two minutes after eight or nine men arrived in four cars carrying canisters into the building.

Authorities said they were still investigating whether the casino's emergency exits were blocked. But many bodies were found in offices and the bathrooms, indicating the victims were expecting a shootout.

"They sought places to protect themselves from firearms," said Jorge Camacho Rincon, the state civil protection director. "They went running to closed areas."

Most died of smoke inhalation and were found clutching cellphones, a law enforcement official who wasn't authorized to be quoted by name told The Associated Press.

Gomez said the casino company would announce its plans for compensating employees and relatives for the disaster. But he said it was not the company's responsibility to compensate customers who survived or families of the dead.

"The casino will contribute in what it can, but it is not the company's responsibility because it did not cause this incident. The causes were beyond our control" Gomez said.

Saturday was the second day of mourning declared by Calderon, who labeled the attack the worst against civilians in the nation's recent history.

"We are facing true terrorists who have gone beyond all limits," Calderon said.

Mexicans have endured plenty of horrific crimes during their country's five-year offensive against cartels.

But the casino attack had a major impact because many of the victims were from the middle class, and not cartel foot soldiers or migrants who have become the usual targets, said Jorge Chabat, an expert in safety and drug trafficking at the Center for Research and Teaching in Economics.

"We're talking about an attack on a civilian population of a certain income," he said. "Because who was there was from the middle class, the upper middle class of an important city in Mexico."

Calderon is offering a $2.4 million reward for information leading to the capture of the casino's attackers, the same amount offered for the arrest of top drug lords. Authorities had sketches of three of the men based on interviews with 16 survivors of the fire.

The U.S. consulate in Monterrey issued an emergency message for Americans following the attack and warned consular employees and their families to avoid casinos, adult clubs and similar places "that have been targets for violence."

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Associated Press writer Adriana Gomez Licon in Mexico City contributed to this report.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/L/ ... 6-18-19-05

RELATED

Michelle Obama Declares it Safe to Travel to Mexico

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qBwf5Z4FfQo

Michelle Obama Declares it Safe to Travel to Mexico. Here is video of First Lady Michelle Obama in an interview from Mexico City, where she declared it to be safe to travel to Mexico. She said she would encourage Americans to come to Mexico. This despite the fact that over 35,000 people have been killed in drug violence in Mexico in the last three years.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by SicNTiredInSoCal

I don't know how they can stand it....

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Morally corrupt nations just need to eat. LOL