Politic?

Mexico Mormons in the Cartel Maelstrom

"There's been a lot of rival cartels fighting up in this area. [A child who witnessed one of the shootings watched as one of the mothers exited from her vehicle to put her hands up, alerting the attackers to the presence of women and children]."
"They shot her anyway. They knew it was women and children [they were attacking]."
Lenzo Widmar, Mexican Mormon community

"I found Christina. She was outside her car, face down, murdered. And I found her baby, who was still alive."
"I don't know if there's a war here or what's happening."
"We want to know exactly who was behind this, why they did it and from where they are, and we need that information to be true."
"We don't know who would attack women and children."
Julian LeBaron, Mormon community member

The remains of a car where part of the nine murdered members of the LeBaron family were killed during an ambush by gunmen in the Sonora mountains, Mexico, on Monday. (Herika Martinez/AFP via Getty Images)

The community of Mormons, with both Mexican and U.S. citizenship who have lived in Mexico for decades are now in a state of shock, mourning nine members of their community -- three women and six children, all belonging to the extended LeBaron family -- when three of their vehicles travelling in a convoy for 'safety', yet some distance from each other on the road in the northern state of Sonora, were shot to death, their bodies then burned in their vehicles.

Some of the vehicle occupants had been travelling to a wedding, when what would have been a normal and celebratory event that led to their setting out on a dangerous route to fulfill social obligations in a close-knit community, became a scene of mass slaughter. The attention of the international community has been riveted on Mexico for the depraved and gruesome atrocities resulting from narco cartels fighting each other for primacy, and victimizing innocent populations in the process.

Mexican officials have put forward their specious theory that possibly the carnage was an instance of mistaken identity, that cartel gunmen thought the SUVs the women were driving were those of rival drug traffickers. Relatives of the women and children disputed this version of events, pointing out that the attackers did indeed know whose lives they were taking, that of women and children. One of the child witnesses having disproved the attribution, when he watched one of the women trying to persuade the gunmen they were innocent of any intention to do the gunmen harm.

In fact, members of the Mormon community have been known to vocally criticize the violence that cartels impose upon Mexican civilians. In response to their open accusations, gunmen belonging to the cartels have previously attacked Mormon community members. On this occasion, over 200 bullet casings were discovered close to the vehicles, according to state investigative authorities.

A mother and her four children had been travelling in one vehicle. Just outside the village of San Miguelito Alex LeBaron's vehicle came under attack. She was shot to death as were her four children, among them 8-month-old twins; the vehicle then set on fire. Authorities discovered another vehicle with the bodies of a woman and two children about 27 kilometres east near the Chihuahua state border. They were identified as Dawna Langford, her 11- and 3-year-old children. Seven other children escaped the carnage.

Their 13-year-old brother hid his younger siblings, along with his older, 14-year-old brother who had been shot in the foot. He settled them down within bushes, covered them up, cautioned them to be silent, then set off on a six-hour trek to his community where he reported the atrocity. His 9-year-old sister, after awaiting his return, set out on her own mission to find him and was only discovered much later, after rescuers had recovered the five other children and brought them to safety. Some injured in the attack, and being treated in hospital.

A mile east of the Chihuahua border the third vehicle was discovered, with the body of Christina Langford Johnson nearby, shut to death like the others. She was discovered by a member of the Mormon community, who found her infant 6-month-old daughter in a car seat on the floor of the abandoned vehicle where her desperate mother had placed her in the hope she would not be noticed and would survive.

Through hard work, the Mormon community had achieved farming success and managed to acquire wealth. Their financial security was well known and there were those among them who became extortion victims through kidnapping by organized crime groups. After having publicly denounced the drug traffickers when they abducted his younger brother demanding a $1-million ransom, Benjamin LeBaron, 31, had been shot dead in 2009.

"All of a sudden, bullets just rained from above, from on top of a hill, down on top of them. The mothers were dead. There were seven wounded children that were alive."

"Once the firing stopped, these men came off the mountain and pulled all these kids that were still alive. They basically told them to get out of here. So they immediately started walking toward home [taking turns carrying a young boy who was severely wounded]."

"She [9-year-old McKenzie Langford] had a bullet through her wrist, but nevertheless, she was probably in the best shape to walk at that point. And so away she went [looking for her older brother Devin who had gone for help]."

"And we found her by her little footprints. She took the wrong road. Six hours later, and we saw that her footprints had a shoe, and then a bare little foot because she had to take her shoes off and her feet were just swollen and covered in blisters when they found her at 9:30 at night."

Lafe Langford, Mormon Community