At least 14 people reported dead in Mexican gang gunbattle

MEXICO CITY — A series of raging gunbattles between two drug gangs left at least 14 people dead Wednesday in the mountains of the northern Mexico state of Chihuahua.

Authorities said the number of dead could rise. Initial reports from the relatively isolated region had put the death toll as high as 26 but officials said later that only 14 bodies had been recovered.

Oscar Alberto Aparicio, the Chihuahua state security commissioner, said security forces came under fire when they arrived at the scene of the clash in Las Varas, a town about 185 miles northwest of the state capital.

Soldiers and police “were met with gunfire, but they managed to beat back the attack and only one patrol vehicle was hit by gunfire,” Aparicio said.

Aparicio said gunfights were continuing as police and soldiers chased gang members through the mountains. Authorities called in a Black Hawk helicopter to help in the search in the area, which is in a region known for marijuana and opium poppy production.

Felix Gonzalez, a spokesman for Chihuahua state prosecutors, told local media the initial confrontation pitted members the La Linea gang, based in the border city of Ciudad Juarez, against a faction of the Sinaloa cartel.

Another state prosecutors’ spokesman, Eduardo Esparza, confirmed 14 bodies had been found, but added that “there could be more.” He said all the dead were adult males. Twenty rifles were found at the scene, along with grenades and grenade launchers.

The killings follow Friday’s reports of 19 people dead in Mexico’s northwestern state of Sinaloa in a run of related shootouts between police and gunmen, state authorities said.

Armed men in pickup trucks opened fire on a group of police officers on a major highway near the beach resort of Mazatlan, according to the state police and state attorney general’s office.

State Public Security Minister Genaro Robles Casillas said in a news conference on Saturday that drug gangs have been fighting over trafficking routes in the area where the violence occurred.

In Wednesday’s violence, Gonzalez had initially reported 26 died, but later told Milenio television that the higher toll had mistakenly included some wounded.

Aparicio said the gangs had apparently killed two state police officers who went up into the area to investigate about 10 days ago.

“These criminals were the ones who killed in a cowardly way two of our agents a week ago,” Aparicio said, noting there were about 50 gunmen in one of the gangs.

Mexico is experiencing its highest homicide total in at least 20 years as splintered drug cartels battle over territory.