CHILPANCINGO, Mexico ― The alleged leader of a drug gang implicated in the disappearance of 43 college students killed himself during a confrontation with Mexican security forces Tuesday, a day after protesters demanding an investigation into the students’ whereabouts burned government buildings in the southern state of Guerrero.
Federal forces, which include federal police and military personnel, were carrying out an operation to capture Benjamin Mondragon, or “Benjamon,” the alleged head of the Guerreros Unidos gang in the neighboring state of Morelos, when a gunfight broke out, a federal official said. The official, who was not authorized to be quoted by name, did not say which federal force had taken part in the confrontation.
Mondragon killed himself as he was about to be arrested, the official said, though he had no details on how.
The official said it was unclear whether Mondragon had been involved in the students’ disappearances.
Guerreros Unidos allegedly had ties to the family of the mayor of Iguala, the city in Guerrero where the students disappeared on Sept. 26 after a confrontation. Police in Iguala killed six people and carried off many of the students before reportedly turning them over to gunmen working for the gang, authorities say.
Investigators are conducting tests on 28 sets of human remains found at five mass graves outside Iguala to determine whether they are the bodies of the missing students. Police also have found four other burial pits at a different site, but have not said how many bodies were recovered there.
On Tuesday, Guerrero Gov. Angel Aguirre said many of the bodies appeared to have been in the graves for some time, suggesting they belonged not to the students but to earlier victims of criminal gangs operating in the region.
