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Nine members of Mormon family, dual U.S.-Mexican citizens, killed in attack in northern Mexico; Trump offers support Nine members of Mormon family, dual U.S.-Mexican citizens, killed in attack in northern Mexico; Trump offers support
(32 minutes later)
MEXICO CITY — Assailants have killed at least nine members of a fundamentalist Mormon community in Northern Mexico, authorities said Tuesday, shooting and burning the bodies of women and children in a brutal assault that highlighted the escalating danger posed by organized crime groups around the country. MEXICO CITY — Assailants killed at least nine members of a fundamentalist Mormon community in Northern Mexico, authorities said Tuesday, shooting and incinerating women and children in a brutal assault that highlighted the increasing grip of organized crime on parts of the country.
Public Security Secretary Alfonso Durazo said three women and six children of the extended LeBaron family were killed in attacks on three vehicles Monday in the northern state of Sonora. The victims were part of a community of U.S.-Mexican dual citizens who have lived in Mexico for decades.Public Security Secretary Alfonso Durazo said three women and six children of the extended LeBaron family were killed in attacks on three vehicles Monday in the northern state of Sonora. The victims were part of a community of U.S.-Mexican dual citizens who have lived in Mexico for decades.
The vicious attacks on the women and children — some of whom were traveling to a wedding — stunned a nation still reeling from a series of violent incidents in recent weeks. President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has been heavily criticized for the botched attempt last month to arrest a son of former Sinaloa Cartel leader Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman. Soldiers briefly detained Ovidio Guzmán in Culiacan, but Sinaloa cartel gunmen took control of the city and the government released him. Drug traffickers in the region came under immediate suspicion. But the massacre was barbarous, even for them.
President Trump tweeted that “a wonderful family and friends from Utah got caught between two vicious drug cartels, who were shooting at each other, with the result being many great American people killed.” He offered to help Mexico strike back at the cartels, saying they “have become so large and powerful that sometimes you need an army to defeat an army!” “There have been conflicts between the cartels of Chihuahua and Sonora,” family member Julian LeBaron said on Mexico’s Radio Fórmula. “But to open fire in broad daylight on women and children? This crime has no name.”
López Obrador thanked Trump for the offer, but said Mexico would pursue the criminals. “This is a matter of our sovereignty,” he said. The attacks on the women and children — some of whom were traveling to a wedding — stunned a nation reeling from a series of violent incidents in recent weeks. President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has been lambasted for the botched attempt last month to arrest a son of the former Sinaloa Cartel leader Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman. Soldiers briefly detained Ovidio Guzmán in Culiacan but let him go after cartel gunmen took control of the city.
Mexican officials said cartel gunmen might have mistaken the women’s SUVs for those of rival traffickers. But relatives of the victims said the gunmen knew they were firing on civilians. President Trump offered to help Mexico strike back at the traffickers. “This is the time for Mexico, with the help of the United States, to wage WAR on the drug cartels and wipe them off the face of the earth,” he tweeted. He called López Obrador on Tuesday afternoon to offer support.
“There’s been a lot of rival cartels fighting up in this area,” said Lenzo Widmar, one of the community members who found two of the destroyed vehicles. But he said a child who witnessed one of the shootings saw one of the mothers get out of her vehicle and put her hands up. Gun battle involving El Chapo’s son highlights growing challenges to Mexican government control
“They shot her anyway,” Widmar said. “They knew it was women and children.” López Obrador thanked Trump, but said pursuing the criminals was “a matter of sovereignty” for Mexico. The leftist leader has been a strong critic of U.S.-backed offensives against organized crime groups over the past 13 years, and has instead emphasized addressing the causes of violence with social programs.
“We don’t think that by opening fire, massacring, using force, blood and fire, we will resolve this problem,” the Mexican president told journalists.
But the shocking attack was likely to affect the country’s security policy, wrote Falko Ernst, the senior Mexico analyst for the International Crisis Group. “Over the next days, I’d expect pressure within the U.S. to build on the Trump [administration] — by media and evangelicals, e.g. — and for that pressure to be passed onto López Obrador,” he tweeted.
Mexican officials and some of the victims’ relatives said cartel gunmen might have mistaken the women’s SUVs for those of rival traffickers. But other family members said the attackers knew they were firing on civilians.
“There’s been a lot of rival cartels fighting up in this area,” said Lenzo Widmar, a cousin of several of the victims who helped search for their vehicles on Monday night. But he said one surviving children told family members that one of the women stepped out of her car and put her hands up.
“They shot her anyway,” Widmar told The Washington Post. “They knew it was women and children.”
More than 200 bullet casings were found near the vehicles, state authorities said.More than 200 bullet casings were found near the vehicles, state authorities said.
Widmar said the community had not received any threats recently. He said all the victims lived in Mexico. Widmar said the community had not received any threats recently. He said all the victims lived in Mexico, though they have close ties to the United States, where they have family and many of the men do seasonal work. The LeBarons describe themselves as Mormons. They’re part of a polygamous offshoot of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Another family member posted video of a charred vehicle in which a mother and her four children had been traveling. Widmar said the attacks began Monday morning after the families left the community of La Mora in Sonora state. One woman, Rhonita Maria Miller, was heading to Arizona to pick up her husband from the Phoenix airport, he said. The other two were going to accompany her as far as a main highway near the border and then head for Colonia LeBaron in nearby Chihuahua state, to attend a wedding. The community is named for the clan.
“This is how we live under the government of @lopezobrador,” Alex LeBaron tweeted. “Mexican Mormons, innocent women and children were ambushed in the Chihuahua sierra, shot and burned alive by the Cartels that rule in Mexico!” The failed arrest of El Chapo’s son turned a Mexican city into an urban war zone
Widmar said the attacks began Monday morning after the women left the community of La Mora in Sonora state. One woman, Rhonita Maria Miller, was heading to Arizona to pick up her husband from the Phoenix airport, he said. The other two were going to accompany her as far as a main highway near the border, he said, and then head for the community of LeBaron, in nearby Chihuahua state, to attend a wedding. When the vehicles set out, Widmar said, Miller fell behind the other two women’s cars.
Miller had car trouble, Widmar said, and the convoy returned to La Mora. When the vehicles set out anew, he said, Miller fell behind the other two women. She was just outside the village of San Miguelito when her Chevrolet Tahoe came under attack on Monday morning, Sonora state security officials said. Gunmen shot her and her four children, including 8-month-old twins, relatives and officials said. The vehicle was then set on fire.
LeBaron was just outside the village of San Miguelito when her Chevrolet Tahoe came under attack, Sonora state security officials said. Assailants shot her and her four children, including 8-month-old twins, relatives and officials said. The vehicle was then set on fire.
About 11 miles east, toward the Chihuahua state border, authorities found a second vehicle, a white Chevrolet Suburban, with the bodies of a woman and two children. Relatives identified them as Dawna Langford and her 11- and 3-year-old children. They said several other children escaped from the vehicle.About 11 miles east, toward the Chihuahua state border, authorities found a second vehicle, a white Chevrolet Suburban, with the bodies of a woman and two children. Relatives identified them as Dawna Langford and her 11- and 3-year-old children. They said several other children escaped from the vehicle.
The third vehicle, also a white Suburban, was found about a mile east of the Chihuahua border. The body of a woman was found nearby. She was identified as Christina Langford Johnson.The third vehicle, also a white Suburban, was found about a mile east of the Chihuahua border. The body of a woman was found nearby. She was identified as Christina Langford Johnson.
Another member of the clan, Julian LeBaron, said he discovered Christina Langford’s body and her infant when he reached her vehicle. Family members said Dawna Langford’s 13-year-old son Devin watched his mother die and then hid his six surviving siblings in nearby bushes. Kenra Miller, the sister-in-law of Rhonita Miller, said the boy covered them with branches before he set out for La Mora for help. He reached the village at 5:30 p.m., she said, six hours after the attack, and relayed the news of the ambush of the women and children.
“I found Christina,” LeBaron told Ciro Gómez Leyva, a news host on Radio Formula. “She was outside her car, face down, murdered, and I found her baby, who was still alive.” “For 11 hours, their families all over Sonora, Chihuahua and the midwestern US waited in fear and horror for any news of possible survivors,” Miller wrote on Facebook.
“I don’t know if there’s a war here or what’s happening,” LeBaron said. Relatives said they were stunned to learn that Johnson’s baby had survived the shooting.
Johnson’s cousin Leah Staddon said Johnson’s 6-month-old baby was found on the floor of the vehicle. “When they started shooting, she ducked down and put the baby behind the seat,” said Kenny LeBaron, a cousin who grew up in Mexico and now lives in North Dakota. “I think it was a miracle.”
“It’s amazing because we first heard that she was dead also, then they found her alive,” said Staddon, who once lived in La Mora but has moved to Queen Creek, Ariz. One child is still missing, authorities said. Five of the surviving children were flown to Tucson for treatment.
One of the children is still missing, she said. Five of the surviving children were flown to Tucson for treatment. “I think we’re all still in shock, just trying to survive minute by minute,” said Leah Staddon, another cousin of Johnson, who grew up in La Mora before moving to Queen Creek, Arizona
“I think we’re all still in shock, just trying to survive minute by minute,” she said.
López Obrador and Mexico’s military in rare public spat after ‘El Chapo’s’ son is freedLópez Obrador and Mexico’s military in rare public spat after ‘El Chapo’s’ son is freed
The LeBarons describe themselves as Mormons. They’re part of a polygamous offshoot of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. A crescendo of violence in Mexico is posing one of the biggest tests of López Obrador’s year-old presidency. Last month’s failed anti-drug raid in Culiacan stirred so much concern that retired generals took the unusual step of publicly complaining to Defense Minister Luis Crescencio Sandoval about the president’s strategy.
The attacks came weeks after the botched anti-drug raid in Culiacan. Soldiers attempted to arrest Ovidio Guzmán on a U.S. extradition warrant, but then released him to avoid what officials feared would be a bloodbath. That cartel siege followed shootouts in Guerrero and Michoacan states that left at least 14 security officials dead, and a spectacular attack on a bar in the southern city of Coatzacoalcos that killed at least 27.
“Hard to imagine that what happened in #Sonora today won’t impact [Mexico-U. S.] relations and security policy in [Mexico],” wrote Falko Ernst, Mexico analyst for the International Crisis Group, on Twitter. “Over the next days, I’d expect pressure within the U.S. to build on the Trump [administration] — by media and evangelicals, e.g. — and for that pressure to be passed onto López Obrador.” López Obrador has created a National Guard with about 70,000 troops to improve security, and provided millions of young people with scholarships aimed at discouraging them from involvement in organized crime. But Mexico is on track for its deadliest year in recent history, with nearly 26,000 people slain in the first nine months of the year.
Mormons began to settle in Mexico and Canada in the 1870s and 1880s to avoid being prosecuted by the U.S. government over their practice of polygamy, according to Matthew Bowman, a historian at Henderson State University in Arkansas who has studied the Mormon Church. The main LDS Church, headquartered in Utah, abandoned polygamy and began to crack down on its practice by excommunicating members. Offshoot groups such as the LeBaron family began to form in Mexico in the early 1900s. The two U.S. senators from majority Morman Utah, Mitt Romney and Mike Lee, called on López Obrador to ensure justice after the massacre. Romney’s forebears lived in a different Mormon community in Mexico, one that retained closer ties with the main LDS Church.
For decades, the LeBaron clan lived quietly in farming communities, maintaining close ties with family in the United States and speaking both Spanish and English. “The U.S. must work with Mexican officials to hold accountable those responsible for this senseless violence,” Romney tweeted.
But their relative wealth made them targets of extortion and kidnapping when organized-crime groups began to assert themselves in northern Mexico. In 2009, a prominent member of the clan, Benjamin LeBaron, 31, was shot dead near his community in northern Mexico. He had publicly denounced the drug traffickers after they abducted his younger brother and demanded a $1 million ransom. (The family refused to pay.) The killers left a message saying they were retaliating for LeBaron’s activism. In besieged Mormon colony, Mitt Romney’s Mexican roots
In defiance of the LDS Church, the LeBarons say their leaders had special inspiration from God, and began infighting with other polygamous sects in the 1970s, Bowman said. Durazo told reporters that “serious advances” had been made in the investigation into the killings, but did not provide details.
“One of the things that makes them distinctive in the broader Mormon tradition is how isolated they are,” Bowman said. “They have a reputation for being set apart, for being charismatic, given to vision and prophecy.” Mormons began to settle in Mexico and Canada in the 1870s and 1880s to avoid being prosecuted by the U.S. government over their practice of polygamy, according to Matthew Bowman, the chair of Mormon Studies at Claremont Graduate University in California. The main LDS Church, headquartered in Utah, abandoned polygamy and began to crack down on its practice by excommunicating members. Offshoot groups such as the LeBaron family began to form in Mexico in the early 1900s.
Brittany Shammas and Sarah Pulliam Bailey in Washington contributed to this report. For decades, the LeBaron clan lived quietly in farming communities, speaking both Spanish and English. But their relative wealth made them targets of extortion and kidnapping as organized-crime groups increasingly asserted themselves. In 2009, a prominent member of the clan, Benjamin LeBaron, 31, was shot dead near his community. He had publicly denounced the drug traffickers after they abducted his younger brother and demanded a $1 million ransom. The family refused to pay, and the killers said the murder was in retaliation.
Kayla Epstein and Sarah Pulliam Bailey in Washington contributed to this report.
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