Five killed in shooting at Tijuana house

By Sandra Dibble, UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
Monday, May 31, 2010 at 11:53 a.m.

TIJUANA — Five people are dead after assailants opened fire late Sunday inside a two-room wood house in an impoverished hillside neighborhood southeast of downtown.

The victims of the assault in Colonia Tres de Octubre included four men and a woman, ranging in age from their mid-20s to their mid-50s, according to the Baja California Attorney General’s Office. All were shot in the head.

The attack was reported at 10:40 p.m. Sunday. Investigators said they found four of the victims -- three males and one female -- dead at the scene. A fifth victim in his mid-20s survived the attack, but died shortly after midnight at Tijuana’s General Hospital.

Only one of the victims was identified, EfraÃ*n Nava Santiago, 29.

Casings found at the scene indicated the assailants fired from an AK-47 rifle and a 9 mm handgun.

The Baja California Attorney General’s office gave no motive for the attack. Authorities say many of the victims of recent violence have been neighborhood drug dealers caught in a struggle between gangs vying for control over domestic markets.

Sunday's incident is the first mass killing in recent months, as such violence had diminished since the arrests earlier this year of Teodoro Garcia Simental, a notoriously violent trafficker, and two of his top deputies.

After spiking at 120 in January, the monthly death toll has dropped by about half, with 55 in May, according to the Baja California Attorney General’s Office. So far this year, there have been 366 homicides in Tijuana.

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