A longtime member of a special unit with the Coahuila State Police died on Tuesday morning while trying to fight off an incursion by the terrorist organization known as the Cartel Del Noreste faction of Los Zetas. The incursion is just the latest attempt by the cartel to expand their territory into Coahuila, while government forces try to stop their spread.
The shootout took place on Tuesday early morning, near the town of Candela, south of the Colombia port of entry, in the eastern region of Coahuila, near the border with Nuevo Leon. According to information provided to Breitbart Texas by Coahuila State Police forces, a group of Coahuila police officers with the Action and Reaction Force (formerly known as GATES) were patrolling a series of rural roads when they encountered a cartel vehicle.
When police officers tried to stop the vehicle, the driver fled, and gunmen inside began firing at the officers. The police officers fought off the attack, killing two gunmen while a third attempted to run away into the brush. The clash set off a large-scale deployment of state police officers, investigators with the Coahuila Attorney General’s Office, National Guard, and Mexican military forces.
During the clash, officer Mauro Flores sustained a series of injuries. Authorities rushed him to a local hospital in the city of Monclova, but the officer died from his injuries.
While authorities have not publicly identified the gunmen, law enforcement sources revealed to Breitbart Texas that they are part of the Cartel Del Noreste faction of Los Zetas who have a long history of using the states of Tamaulipas and Nuevo Leon to try to enter Coahuila and carry out terrorist attacks.
As Breitbart Texas reported, in 2021, Los Zetas deployed dozens of SUVs full of gunmen into Coahuila in a span of several days in an attempt to carry out a series of attacks. Authorities fought off the attacks at the time and stopped the incursion.
The most famous terrorist attack took place in 2019, when Los Zetas sent more than 150 gunmen into the town of Villa Union, Coahuila, where they attacked the town’s city hall and terrorized the rural community before authorities were able to mount a counteroffensive in which over 21 people died, Breitbart Texas reported at the time. That attack led to the Coahuila government labeling the attack as an act of terrorism.
The CDN-Los Zetas is one of seven Mexican cartels that have been officially labeled as foreign terrorist organizations by the United States Government.
Ildefonso Ortiz is an award-winning journalist with Breitbart News Foundation. He co-founded Breitbart News Foundation’s Cartel Chronicles project with Brandon Darby and senior Breitbart management. You can follow him on Twitter and on Facebook. He can be contacted at Iortiz@breitbart.com.
Brandon Darby is the managing director and editor-in-chief of Breitbart Texas. He co-founded Breitbart News Foundation’s Cartel Chronicles project with Ildefonso Ortiz and senior Breitbart management. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook. He can be contacted at bdarby@breitbart.com.