4 killed, 6 injured in Nogales shootout
Assassination suspect is held in Sonora battle
By Brady McCombs
Arizona Daily Star
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 11.05.2008
One Mexican police officer and three organized-crime gunmen were killed during an overnight shootout in Nogales, Sonora, authorities said.
Five state police officers and one federal agent were injured during the shootout that lasted about two hours Monday night into Tuesday morning, according to a news release from the Sonora Attorney General's Office.
During the gunbattle, officials captured a man who later confessed to participating in the ambush and killing of the director of Sonora's state police, Juan Manuel Pavón Félix, on Sunday night at the Marqués de Cima Hotel in central Nogales.
This latest gunbattle took place in Colonia Kennedy, a wealthy neighborhood in central Nogales. Authorities seized 13 rifles, three grenades, six handguns and two vehicles, the press release said.
Law-enforcement officers were out Monday night looking for the suspects in Sunday's assassination of Pavón, the press release said. When they spotted them, the suspects fired, setting off the gunbattle.
El Imparcial newspaper in Sonora reported that during the shootout, law-enforcement officers mistakenly shot up a house in Colonia Kennedy that had a family inside.
The gunbattle is the latest chapter in the bloody battle going on in Nogales, Sonora, between drug cartels and law enforcement.
There were 76 homicides recorded in Nogales through September, the latest figures available, surpassing the 2007 total of 52 and more than doubling the 2006 total of 35. Most of the killing has been attributed to feuding drug cartels.
The bloodshed landed Nogales for the first time on the U.S. State Department's new "travel alert" issued Oct. 14 alongside notoriously dangerous cities such as Ciudad Juarez, Tijuana and Nuevo Laredo. The alert — which cautions U.S. citizens about ongoing issues but doesn't instruct them not to travel in Mexico — mentions Nogales as one of the cities that "recently experienced public shootouts during daylight hours in shopping centers and other public venues."
On Oct. 23, state and federal police shot and killed 10 gunmen during a rolling gunbattle in Nogales.
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