Car bomb in Mexican border town kills 3

A car bomb killed at least three people in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, the city’s mayor, Jose Reyes Ferriz, said Friday. It was the first time a car bomb has been used to attack federal police, the mayor said.

"The violence is escalating," he said. Two police officers and a paramedic died and seven people, including a local news cameraman, were injured in the blast Thursday night. A female paramedic was in grave condition, he said. The incident happened around 8 p.m. in the city’s most violent zone. Before the incident, a call to the city’s emergency center reported "lots of shooting and killing," Reyes said.
"When the federal police responded, there was a suspicious car there. One of them went to go check it out and when he opened the door, that’s when the bomb went off," he said. While Mexican authorities say the attack was the result of a car bomb, a counterterrorism expert told there is "some confusion" about exactly what caused the car to explode. "For this to be an improvised grenade attack, in some capacity, it doesn’t surprise me," said Fred Burton, vice president of intelligence at Stratfor, a privately owned global Intelligence service. 

But if this particular car bomb was manufactured to the level of sophistication similar to those terrorist groups like Hezbollah are using, then this is a significant new event, said Burton. "The devil is in the details," he added. A claim of responsibility scribbled in a graffiti message was later found in downtown Juarez. It was purportedly signed by the Juarez drug cartel. "This is significant because usually it’s La Linea, the Juarez cartel’s operatives, that sign the messages," Reyes told. "It’s as if to say, ‘Now it’s the big guys in charge, not the operatives." Federal police spokesman Ramon Salinas said the blast in the Mexican border city took place as authorities were responding to "some sort of emergency." Earlier in the day, police announced the arrest of Jesus Armando Acosta Guerrero, believed to be a leader in the Juarez cartel — one of two drug trafficking organizations operating in the area. There had been relative calm in the city since elections were held there on July 4. But Thursday’s explosion and an attack Sunday against Mexican federal police mark the third and fourth major incidents in recent weeks.

On June 29, a shooting between suspected drug traffickers and Mexican federal police left one officer dead. The shooting was also seen as a watershed moment in the ongoing border drug war — several bullets from that gunfight strayed across the border into Texas, hitting the El Paso City Hall. There were no injuries reported on the U.S. side. On April 24, six federal police officers were killed in a daylight shooting in Juarez. Hours after the attack, a painted message found in the city allegedly from members of La Linea claimed responsibility for the attack. La Linea is an extension of the Juarez cartel, made up in part of former Juarez police officers, according to authorities. Assaults against federal police have increased since they took full control of security in the city from the Mexican military on April 9. "There have been at least a dozen, maybe 15 attacks against the federal police since we took over" security, Salinas said. The Juarez cartel and the Sinaloa cartel have been in a bloody turf war since 2008. More than 5,000 people have been killed in drug-related violence in Juarez during the turf war, according to local authorities.