Arson at a bar leaves at least 11 dead in Mexico

Photo: ALBERTO DE LA HOYA/The Tremendous Thing/AFP/Getty Images

Eleven people died in a fire in a bar in the border city of San Luis Colorado, in the state of Sonora in northern Mexico, which was allegedly caused by a customer expelled from the place who would have set it on fire with a Molotov cocktail, reported on Saturday the Attorney General's Office of the state of Sonora.

Sonora prosecutors said that based on preliminary findings, the suspect is a young man who was drunk at the time of the attack, which occurred early Saturday morning. The man had been kicked out of the bar for disrespecting the women present there.

Then he returned and threw some kind of Molotov cocktail at the doors of the bar, according to the statement from prosecutors in the state that has a long border with Arizona.

Among the victims there could be at least one American citizen woman, because the Sonora Attorney General's Office reported that a woman was transferred to receive medical attention in San Luis, Arizona.

"The Sonora Attorney General's Office is conducting investigations to identify and capture a subject who intentionally set a fire in a bar in the Comercial neighborhood of San Luis Río Colorado, Sonora, where so far 11 people have lost their lives," said the official report of the Prosecutor's Office.

"We have the suspect's data but we are not going to reveal it at this time, because we want to capture him, we have identified him through photographs and we have the half affiliation, but that is part of an ongoing investigation," said the head of the FGJE, Gustavo Rómulo Salas Chávez, at a press conference.

Media outlets in Mexico reported that the suspect has already been captured.

According to surveillance videos, the suspect went to his vehicle, a work truck, and took out a can of fuel, which he poured in front of one of the three doors of the bar, where there were about 80 people, and set it on fire. The Prosecutor's Office says that the man caused the fire with a torch.

Through social networks, family, friends and relatives have been identifying 9 of the 11 victims, Among those who stand out are the musicians from the band that entertained the bar, four women and a minor, of whom no one has been able to explain how and why they entered the venue.

?We have already made the border alerts about the vehicle, since it is fleeing north, so the border alerts have already been made and all the municipal, state and federal police have already notified it; as well as the Ministerial Investigative Agency and the authorities of the state of Baja California?, assured the state prosecutor.

Meanwhile, agents from the Criminal Investigation Ministerial Agency (AMIC) and Expert Services work at the scene to collect evidence.

The FGJE indicated that the investigations are still ongoing to clarify the facts and establish responsibilities against whoever is responsible.

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