- Out of the four Americans who were kidnapped in Mexico, only two were alive while other two died.
- The Two US Citizens of four kidnapped in Mexico returned back to home after treatment and other formalities.
Two Americans who were abducted last week were found by Red Cross workers alive. They were abducted in Mexico, in Matamoros last week. As per officials only two of the four Americans who are seen in the video are alive and safe while the other two were found dead. It has been confirmed that the surviving citizens are taken safely in a convoy of Mexican ambulances and SUVs. They were taken to the border near Brownsville in Texas.
The Americans were caught in a drug cartel shootout and were captivated in the Gulf Coast region and the other two were left dead. They were on their way for cosmetic surgery via road trip before the violence veered their purpose of crossing the border. Later they were rescued from a wood shack said the officials on Tuesday.
The attackers of the drug cartel faction crashed the minivan and fired on it after it crossed the border of the Matamoros as per the region’s governor who also further gave information that even a Mexican woman was killed in the incident who was half a block away.
The authorities searched as the cartel moved them around in a wake to create confusion by taking them to a medical clinic who were hauled through a pickup truck, Tamaulipas Gov. Américo Villarreal said.
They were under the vigilance of the kidnappers and were found in a wooden shack later on. A man who guarded the victims was arrested in a rural are east of Matamoros called Ejido Tecolote.
Mexican military was sent and convoy of ambulances and SUVs were escorted with mounted guns for the ones who are alive. They were brought back to US in Brownsville which is southernmost tip of Texas.
One of the victims relative on Monday said that they were all traveling to a doctor in Matamoros for a tummy tuck surgery to be done for one of them.
The wounded American Eric Williams who had been shot in left leg didn’t have a life threatening injury confirmed the governor while his brother expressed his emotions about meeting him back.
“It’s quite a relief,” said Robert Williams, 38-year-old Eric’s brother, reached by phone Tuesday in North Carolina. “I look forward to seeing him again and actually being able to talk to him.”
Robert Williams said in a telephone interview that he and his brother Eric are from South Carolina but now live in the Winston-Salem area of North Carolina.
He didn’t know his brother was traveling to Mexico until after the abduction hit the news. But from looking at his brother’s Facebook posts, he thinks his brother did not consider the trip dangerous.
“He thought it would be fun,” Williams said.
When told that his brother was among the survivors Tuesday, Williams said that when they meet, “I’ll just tell him how happy I am to see him, and how glad I am that he made it through, and that I love him.”
All injuries were reported to FBI and the victims were taken to the Regional center of Medical as reported by Herald Brownville.
The other two who faced the attack were Shaeed Woodard and Zindell Brown aged 33 and 20 respectively. Their bodies will be handed over to authorities after the forensic work at the Matamoros morgue.
The investigation has given various leads about the incidence such as a witness said that the vehicles collided and several men tackled and assaulted with rifles surrounding the vehicle. The video and photographs also show that the minivan beside another vehicle and a bullet hole in driver’s window.
During the incidence the civilians were seen silently sitting in the car, motionless hoping not to be noticed as the gunmen walked to the Americans to the bed of white pickup and dragged. This incidence and the violence caused during it is proof of terror that has been prevailing for years now in the city, Matamoros.
The president of Mexico has assured that the people responsible shall be punished.
U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland put blame for the deaths squarely on the drug cartels
“The DEA and the FBI are doing everything possible to dismantle and disrupt and ultimately prosecute the leaders of the cartels and the entire networks that they depend on” Garland said.
On the other hand theLópez Obrador complained about the U.S. media’s coverage of the missing Americans, accusing them of sensationalism. He said that when Mexicans are killed, the media “go quiet like mummies.”
“We really regret that this happens in our country,” he said, adding that the U.S. government has every right to be upset by the violence.
