5 killed in shootout on main coast boulevard in heart of Acapulco; none appear to be tourists

5 killed in shootout on Acapulco’s main shore road

ACAPULCO, Mexico — A gunbattle erupted on the main coast boulevard in the heart of this Pacific resort Wednesday, killing five people, including an 8-year-old girl and her mother. None of the victims appeared to tourists.

One federal police officer died in a shootout with gunmen, but the other four victims seemed to have been caught in the crossfire at an intersection. Five other people suffered wounds and about a dozen vehicles were riddled with bullets.

Gunmen traveling in two vehicles appeared to have opened fire on a federal police patrol car. While the officers may have tried to return fire, the area was littered with hundreds of shell casings from AK-47 assault rifles — a weapon used almost exclusively by Mexico’s drug cartels.

The battle caused a huge traffic jam on the busy Miguel Aleman Boulevard, after some drivers crashed into each other and others tried to cross the palm-lined median strip in a desperate attempt to flee the shooting.

The Acapulco area has been the scene of bloody turf battles between the Zetas drug gang and the Beltran-Leyva cartel, which has recently been riven by additional internal disputes.

“An 8-year-old girl died when she was being transferred in an ambulance, and her mother also died,” city police said in a statement. A policeman at the scene said the mother had apparently just picked her daughter up from school when they were caught in the hail of bullets.

The intersection where the shooting occurred marks the start of a strip where high-rise hotels alternate with open strips of beach and is among the city’s most heavily traveled and best-known areas.

Also Wednesday, the Mexican army said two soldiers and two gunmen died in a shootout in a northern Mexico area that has seen a recent spike in drug violence.

The army said soldiers patrolling in the border state of Nuevo Leon gave chase to six suspicious cars that crossed into neighboring Tamaulipas state, where a gunbattle ensued in the town of Comales.

The army said in a statement Wednesday that three soldiers and several gunmen were wounded in the clash on Tuesday. It said that 200 soldiers and two helicopters were deployed to the area to locate the assailants.

The northeastern states of Tamaulipas and Nuevo Leon, across from Texas, have seen a surge of violence in recent weeks that authorities blame on a fight between the Gulf cartel and the Zetas.