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Tijuana death count continues to rise

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Police said Saturday that they had found nine more bodies dumped in Tijuana, where 49 people were killed last week in violence related to the drug trade, reports the Associated Press.

Municipal police found five of the bodies between two small shopping centers in the eastern part of the city. They had been beaten and their hands bound. The bodies of two beheaded men were found wrapped in blankets on a road elsewhere in the city, according to the Baja California state attorney general’s office. The heads were in black plastic bags nearby.A piece of cardboard left by the bodies read, ‘These are the bricklayer’s people.’ On Monday, a message found with 12 bodies next to an elementary school threatened ‘all of those who are with ‘The Engineer.’’ On Friday night, two men were found shot to death in the same empty lot by the school. State Atty. Gen. Rommel Moreno Manjarrez has blamed the violence on warring leaders in the Arellano Felix gang. More than 400 people have been killed this year in drug-related violence in Tijuana.

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Execution-style killings, beheadings and shootouts have soared across Mexico since the army and federal police intensified their fight against the drug trade nearly two years ago.

Despite President Felipe Calderon’s efforts to combat the country’s drug lords, 40% of Mexicans feel less secure here than they did two years ago, before Calderon’s assault on the drug gangs began, according to the results of a survey published in El Universal on Friday.

And more than half of all the Mexicans surveyed feel crime has gone up in their area in the last six months.

Read more about Tijuana here, and more about Mexico here.

Go to our ‘Mexico Under Siege’ page to read the latest coverage of Mexico’s ongoing drug wars.

— Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

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