Assassin caught on video in deadly ambush of top Mexican government officials
Surveillance video captured the horrifying moment an assassin opened fire and executed two top aides to Mexico City's mayor on a busy street in broad daylight on Tuesday.
The footage showed the suspect approaching the vehicle of Ximena Guzmán, Mayor Clara Brugada's secretary, while she waited to pick up Brugada's adviser José Muñoz in the Mexican capital.
The assailant, shown wearing a motorcycle helmet, waited for Muñoz to enter the vehicle when he opened fired.
The shooter fired several times through the windshield, striking Guzmán, before turning the gun on Muñoz.
The vehicle began to lurch forward before the gunman moved out of the way and fired several more shots through the driver's window, video showed.
The suspect then shot at the car's tires before fleeing down the busy thoroughfare in the borough of Benito Juarez.
Both Guzmán and Muñoz had worked for Brugada when she was mayor of the borough of Iztapalapa from October 2018 to September 2023, before joining her staff when she became mayor of Mexico's largest city.
'I am deeply saddened by the loss of Ximena and Pepe. I shared many years of longing and struggle with them to transform, first Iztapalapa, and now our great city,' Brugada said in a statement.
'Ximena was a wonderful, tireless, and very kind woman. I knew Pepe almost from childhood; he was one of the most intelligent and responsible people I have ever known.
'Our hearts ache. We in the cabinet are deeply dismayed and in mourning. I wholeheartedly embrace their families, friends, and comrades in struggle.
'We will not rest until justice is done.'
The murders sent shockwaves through Mexico's capital, widely regarded as an oasis of relative security in a country plagued by violence.
Brugada's position as mayor makes her the second most powerful politician in the country behind President Claudia Sheinbaum, who previously served as Head of Government for Mexico City.
During a press briefing Wednesday, Sheinbaum cautioned against speculating over the assassinations.
'No speculation can be made about yesterday's events,' she said. 'We are guided by the ongoing investigations into what happened yesterday.'
Political violence has become common in many parts of Mexico, where scores of local political candidates have been assassinated in killings often linked to drug cartels seeking to exert influence.
While federal and local authorities have yet to provide a motive for the attack, security experts say it appeared to be a hit carried out by members of organized crime.
Mexico City's Ministry of Public Security recovered a motorcycle that was abandoned by suspects near the attack site and also found a vehicle that was left behind in the neighborhood of Iztacalco.
Authorities have been searching for a van that may have been used by the suspects.
David Saucedo, a public security specialist, told the Associated Press that the attacks were a warning for Brugada.
'It was a harsh message sent to Clara [Brugada], undoubtedly perpetrated by drug traffickers,' Saucedo said.
The assassinations come almost five years after Mexico City police chief Omar Garcia Harfuch, now Mexico's Secretary of Security and Civilian Protection, was wounded in an assassination attempt that left of his bodyguards and a mother-of-two dead.
To carry out the June 26, 2020 attack, an arms trafficker told Mexican newspaper El Universal that the Jalisco New Generation Cartel paid $22,800 for a cache of weapons that included 20 AR-15 rifles and three Barret sniper rifles.
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