The three moms and six children gunned down by drug cartel thugs in northern Mexico were deliberately targeted, according to a new report.

The ambush on Dawna Ray Langford, Christina Marie Langford Johnson and Rhonita Maria Miller and their 14 kids occurred over several miles in Sonora state on Monday — even after Johnson hopped out to show she wasn’t a threat.

Those details are why sources believe the family — residents of a Mormon community called La Mora founded decades ago by an offshoot of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints — was intentionally targeted, CBS News reported.

Taylor Langford, a nephew of one of the women killed in the attack, agreed.

“Three vehicles with women and children in broad daylight. There was no mistaken identity,” he told the network on Tuesday. “I felt this was in broad daylight and … no one could have done that not knowing what they were doing.”

Authorities are probing whether the family was slaughtered by drug lords who mistook their convoy for enemies — or whether the murders were deliberate.

The moms and six children, including Miller’s 8-month-old twins, were killed in the gunfire, while several other children survived.

On Tuesday, Mexican authorities announced the arrest of a suspect in connection to their deaths.