Mexican Authorities Find 29 Bodies In A Hundred Plastic Bags

(Reuters) Lizbeth Diaz 18 September 2019 04:17 MEXICO CITY - Mexican authorities said on Tuesday they had found 29 bodies packed in more than a hundred plastic bags dumped in a clandestine grave in the violent western state of Jalisco. Murders in Mexico jumped to the highest on record in the first half of the year putting the cartel-ravaged country on track to surpass the 29111 recorded last year. Jalisco Attorney General Gerardo Solis told a news conference that since making the gruesome discovery in Zapopan municipality the first week of September investigators had counted 13 complete and 16 incomplete bodies. The state government and the state attorney general said two of the victims were women and that at least four had criminal records without specifying their crimes. The body count could go up as the investigation progressed according to a source at the state attorney generals office who declined to be identified because he was not authorized to speak to the media. In Mexico cartels often kidnap and kill their rivals many of whom are buried in clandestine graves scattered across the country. Authorities have not yet said whether the mass grave was related to cartel violence although Jalisco is home to several cartels including one of the countrys most notorious. Jalisco New Generation Cartel according to U.S. authorities is one of the five most dangerous criminal organizations in the world.