Published 2023-12-09 22.14
At least 14 people were killed as villagers in Mexico hunted down suspected gang members who had come to the village to try to extort money from farmers through patronage.
Another seven people were injured and are being treated in hospital.
Images from the incident were spread on social media and show how the villagers with scythes and hunting rifles chase the gang members, who shoot them with automatic weapons.
Ten of the dead are gang members, who are believed to belong to the drug cartel La familia Michoacána, which for many years has controlled parts of the area near the village of Texcaltitlan, roughly ten miles southwest of Mexico City.
– Events like this do not knock us out, on the contrary, they only make us stronger in our determination to improve the security of our beloved state so that this does not happen again, said the governor of the state of Mexico Delfina Gómez at a press conference.
La familia Michoacána is one of the more violent cartels in Mexico and known for several bloody attacks.