• MASSACRE: At least three women and four children -all of them US citizens- were killed in an armed attack in Northern Mexico carried out by alleged members of criminal gangs operating in the area between the Mexican states Sonora and Chihuahua just 70 miles south of Douglas, Arizona.
• REGION: According to family members, the victims were part of the extended LeBaron family who for decades have lived in an area of Mexico engulfed by drug violence. Back in the early 20th century, the LeBarons were part of a breakaway group from the Mormon Church that settled in Mexico.
• HORROR: “First they found a truck with my cousin Rhonita and her four children who were burned and all shot. There were only bones left”, said Julián LeBaron, an anti-crime activist, who described the attack against a group of at least three trucks somewhere around the town of Bavispe, Sonora.
• CONTEXT: As the early phase of the Mexican drug war raged the agricultural areas of Chihuahua state in 2009, another member of the same family, Eric LeBaron, after the community in Colonia LeBaron rejected pressure from criminals after being threatened with kidnappings for ransom.
