Kidnapping in Mexico: 4 Americans traveled to get liposuction and ended up caught up in a drug war

Four Americans who traveled to Mexico for cosmetic surgery on Friday were caught up in a deadly shootout and kidnapped by heavily armed men who threw them into the back of a pickup truck, officials from both countries said, now looking for them and offering $50,000. dollars for his release.

The relatives of the victims told that the kidnapped had traveled so that one of them could undergo cosmetic surgery.

One of them was going to have a tummy tuck – removal of abdominal fat – in a border town, said the sister of one of the victims.

Mexican authorities are looking for evidence that leads to the kidnapped. Photo: Reuters

“To see a member of your family thrown in the back of a pickup truck and dragged away, it’s just unbelievable,” Zalandria Brown told the AP of her brother Zindell Brown.

The FBI offered a $50,000 reward for its return.

The other people in the group have been identified in the US media as Latavia McGee (33 years old), Shaeed Woodard and Eric James Williams.

Mexican Army soldiers prepare for a search operation for four United States citizens. Photo: AP

They were driving through Matamoros, which is directly across the border from the Texas city of Brownsville, in a white minivan with North Carolina license plates when unidentified gunmen opened fire, the FBI said.

A video shows heavily armed men load them into a van. One is roughed up in the vehicle while others appear to be unconscious and are dragged into the vehicle.

A Mexican woman was killed in the incident, which Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador called a “confrontation between armed groups.” He said his “entire government” was working to secure the release of the Americans.

Zalandria Brown of Florence, South Carolina, said she has been in contact with the FBI and local officials after learning that her younger brother, Zindell Brown, is one of the four victims.

According to an anonymous US official quoted by CNN, investigators believe a Mexican cartel likely mistook the Americans for Haitian drug traffickers.

Barbara Burgess, Ms McGee’s mother, told ABC News that she had warned her daughter not to go, but her daughter told her: “Mom, I’m going to be fine.”

On Friday her daughter called to tell her that she was about to go in for an appointment for a tummy tuck, which removes abdominal fat.

The Mexican army participates in the search tasks. Photo: AP

When Barbara Burgess called her later that day, the phone went to voice mail.

Brown said his brother, who lives in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, knew that parts of Mexico could be dangerous.

“Zindell kept saying, ‘We shouldn’t go down,'” he told the AP, adding that it was “like a bad dream you want to wake up from.”

“Don’t travel”

Matamoros is in the state of Tamaulipas, one of six Mexican states that the State Department advises travelers not to visit due to “crime and kidnapping.”

Drug cartels control much of the territory and often have more power than local law enforcement.

Members of the Mexican National Guard also participate in the operation. Photo: AP

The video

Video posted to social media Friday showed men with assault rifles and tan body armor loading the four people into the bed of a white pickup truck in broad daylight. One was alive and sitting up, but the others appeared to be dead or wounded. At least one person appeared to lift their head off the pavement before being dragged into the truck.

The scene illustrates the terror that has reigned for years in Matamoros, a city dominated by factions of the powerful Gulf drug cartel that often feud with each other. Amid the violence, thousands of Mexicans have disappeared in the state of Tamaulipas alone.

Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said on Monday that “there was a confrontation between groups and they were arrested,” without offering details. He originally said that the four Americans came to Mexico to buy medicine.

A woman driving in Matamoros who asked not to be identified for fear of retaliation said she witnessed what appeared to be the shooting and kidnapping.

The white minivan was struck by another vehicle near an intersection, then shots were heard, the woman said. Another van pulled up and several armed men got out.

“Suddenly they (the attackers) were in front of us,” he said. “I went into shock, no one honked, no one moved. Everyone must have been thinking the same thing: ‘If we move, they’ll see us, or they’ll shoot at us.’”

Agencies

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