The cartel-related killings continue in Ciudad Juárez with 24 homicides registered over the recent weekend, bringing the April total to 79.

Some of the most recent homicides occurred early Sunday morning when three bodies were discovered on a dirt road near the Tepeyac Cemetery in colonia San Antonio, according to local reports. The victims were two males and one female with approximate ages between 18 to 25. Each had their hands and feet bound and suffered multiple gunshot wounds. Numerous .9mm shell casings were found near their bodies by responding crime scene investigators from the state attorney general’s office.

A short time later, municipal police responded to a call for assistance in colonia Independencia II at Profesora Díaz de Bustamante and Irigoyen Streets, where armed men reportedly forced entry into a residence and killed an unidentified male with multiple gunshots. Later in the day, a male identified as Jesús Chamorro Rosales, 30, was murdered in front of his house in colonia Carlos Castillo Peraza on José Contreras Aguilera and María Teresa Rojas Streets in the southeast section of the city. Four armed men arrived at the house and chased the victim into his front yard where he was killed in a hail of gunfire, according to witnesses who spoke to police.

In another case, authorities received a report of an unknown deceased male located inside a house in colonia El Sauzal. In the final registered killing on Sunday, an unidentified male was discovered in the middle of a street in colonia Emiliano Zapata—the victim was apparently killed by multiple suspects.

Ciudad Juarez is engulfed in a bloody cartel turf war. The municipal government was forced to announce the gradual re-deployment of joint police and military patrols in December 2018. The patrols were initially deployed in late October after police suffered 10 attacks from cartel gunmen in less than one month–leaving two dead and several wounded. No official information has been released pertaining to the most recent killings reported by local media.

In July 2018, the United States Consulate General in Juárez was forced to issue a security alert prohibiting U.S. employees from traveling into the downtown area without advance permission, due to an escalation of cartel-related violence. In 2018, Ciudad Juarez registered 1,247 homicides.

Robert Arce is a retired Phoenix Police detective with extensive experience working Mexican organized crime and street gangs. Arce has worked in the Balkans, Iraq, Haiti, and recently completed a three-year assignment in Monterrey, Mexico, working out of the Consulate for the United States Department of State, International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Program, where he was the Regional Program Manager for Northeast Mexico (Coahuila, Tamaulipas, Nuevo Leon, Durango, San Luis Potosi, Zacatecas.) You can follow him on Twitter. He can be reached at robertrarce@gmail.com