6 kidnapped police officers found slain in Mexican state; 1 survivor located

6 abducted police found slain in Mexican state

ACAPULCO, Mexico — The bodies of six kidnapped police officers, most of them dismembered, were found Sunday in a ravine in the Mexican state of Guerrero, bringing to eight the death toll from a mass abduction of policemen, officials said.

Fernando Monreal Leyva, director of State Investigative Police, said one survivor of the massacre was located in this coastal state known for beach resorts that has become a drug cartel battleground.

Two other bodies were found on Saturday, accounting for all nine officers who disappeared Friday after going to identify a body in the community of El Revelado, located about 165 miles (265 kilometers) south of Mexico City. Authorities said they later learned that the officers had been abducted by gunmen.

Four of the six bodies had been dismembered and were found with a warning note apparently directed at authorities, Monreal said.

The bodies included the group’s chief, Commander Enrique Figueroa Abundes, said Monreal, who declined to name the survivor.

Monreal did not say who was suspected in the killings.

Mexico’s government says the Gulf Cartel and the Zetas gang are fighting for control of the region with La Familia Michoacana. The state was also a base for detained drug lord Sergio Valdez Villarreal - alias “La Barbie” - who was fighting for control of the Beltran Leyva cartel with Hector Beltran Leyva.

The bodies found Saturday corresponded to two heads thrown from a moving vehicle into a refreshment stand in the municipality of Coyuca de Catalan in Guerrero, according to a report by the state Public Safety and Civil Protection office.

The first two bodies were accompanied by a note that threatened a similar fate for anyone supporting Hector Beltran Leyva and suspected trafficker Reynaldo Pineda Chavez, saying “Guerrero and Morelos (states) have an owner and they know who is it is.”

Hector is the brother of Arturo Beltran Leyva, the former head of the cartel who was slain in a military operation in December 2009. Hector is the only one of the four Beltran Leyva brothers still alive and at large.

More than 28,000 people have died in drug-related violence in Mexico since President Felipe Calderon launched a military offensive against drug traffickers in late 2006.