Mexican Border City Drug Dead Hits 800

Monday, August 18, 2008 10:52 AM

By: Jim Meyers

A massacre at a drug rehab center last week helped push the number of homicides in the Mexican border city of Juarez to more than 800 this year as rival drug gangs battle for turf.

On Wednesday a commando-style group fired a barrage of more than 60 rounds during a religious service at the drug rehab center, killing eight and wounding five. Five other people were killed elsewhere in the city on that day.

More than 100 people have been killed so far in August in the war between the Sinaloa and Juarez drug cartels, which broke out in January, the El Paso Times reports.

The homicide rate in Juarez, a city of nearly 2 million that is just across the border from El Paso, Tex., now stands at about 3.5 murders a day.

“If you wanted to see what terrorism is like, you are looking at it full-fledged over there,â€