Six kidnapping victims were today found dead inside a house where gunmen took refuge during a three-hour gun battle with soldiers and police in Mexico.
The male victims were blindfolded and gagged and had been shot in the head, said a police spokesman in Tijuana. One gunman and four officers were wounded in the shoot-out.
The shoot-out began when officers prepared to raid a house near the US border that police say was a shelter for a cell of the Arellano Felix drug cartel.
Four gunmen were arrested - one a state police investigator and another a Tijuana police officer. Eleven rifles and three bullet-proof vests were seized inside the house, police reported.
Already this week, gunmen shot and killed eight people in Tijuana, including two local police officers, as well as a district commander, his wife and his 12-year-old daughter.