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Ontario couple slain near Cancun
OLIVER MOORE

From Wednesday's Globe and Mail

Two Canadians were killed in Mexico as they prepared for their daughter's wedding in the sun-splashed country, family members said Tuesday.

Domenico and Annunziata Ianiero were found dead in their resort room near Cancun. They were “murdered,” said a relative in Woodbridge, Ont., who was grieving but could offer few details.

“All we were told is what happened and now the investigation is on,” said the son-in-law of the victims, who did not want to give his name. “When something like this happens everyone in the resort is a suspect.”

An investigation has been launched by local police, aided by Canadian diplomatic officials posted to the country. Relatives of the victims are being kept in the country for a few days while the investigation is carried out, said the son-in-law, speaking from his home north of Toronto.

“We're just waiting nobody really knows anything,” he said. “I don't think it's possible to imagine the grief.”

The couple, in their late 50s, was part of a large wedding party staying at a sprawling four-star hotel complex called the Barcelo Maya Beach Resort. In its promotional website the all-inclusive resort about an hour south of Cancun describes hotels called the Barcelo Maya Beach and Barcelo Maya Caribe and boasts about 1,000 guest rooms, more than half of them soundproof.

According to reports from Mexico, the victims were found dead in their room, throats slit but personal jewellery left untouched. Pamela Greenwell, spokeswoman for the Department of Foreign Affairs, confirmed the deaths but said she could not give details. Consular officials had been in contact with the family accompanying the victims, she added.

Local press splashed the story across the front pages, said Fred Devos, a Canadian citizen who has been living in Mexico for 10 years.

Periodico Quequi, a newspaper from the state of Quintana Roo, where the resort is located, said the bodies were found yesterday morning after family members became concerned about the couple's absence. According to that report, there had been a party Sunday night at the hotel and phone calls to the parents' room went unanswered the following morning. Hotel employees opened the door at the family's request and found Ms. Ianiero on the bed and her husband on the bathroom floor.

Mr. Devos, who works as a cave-diving instructor at Puerto Aventuras, about two kilometres from the Barcelo Maya Beach Resort, said he was shocked to hear about the killings.

“This is extremely rare; this is very surprising to everyone,” said Mr. Devos, who has lived in dozens of countries but has now settled in Mexico and is in the process of getting citizenship. “There is violence, like everywhere, but generally it is much safer here.”

The crime has provoked so much attention, he said, because Mexico derives huge revenue from tourism, particularly from visitors to that part of the country. The industry was hurt by the hurricane season last year and didn't need any more damage, he said.

“The violence you normally see in this area are drunken fights. This is the type of story that [Mexican authorities] don't want because it destroys the money-maker of this area.”

Officials were quick to respond and the Justice Attorney of Quintana Roo told a news conference that the police were working on two possible explanations.

Bello Melchor Rodriguez y Carrillo said that the crime could have been committed by someone in the wedding party or by an employee at the hotel, local newspaper El Universal reported.