Two children ages 11 and 16 were among four people killed in Ensenada on Saturday night when gunmen stormed a crowd of several hundred spectators gathered to watch a cockfight, law enforcement authorities reported Sunday.
An additional 15 people were wounded in the attack, which took place at about 10 p.m. at the Póker palenque, a cockfighting event held at an arena south of the city’s port off of Avenida Reforma, according to a statement Sunday by the Baja California Attorney General’s Office.
The four who died after being taken to hospitals were identified as Angel Osvaldo Pérez Camacho, 11; Alexis Omar Pérez Pucheta, 16; Angel Iñiguez, 22; and Carlos Verdugo Rodríguez, 34.
The statement gave no motive for the attack and did not say if arrests have been made. It said 37 witnesses are being questioned.
Ensenada police said that they were alerted about gunshots at the arena at 9:55 p.m. Witnesses told police that five to seven assailants fired weapons. According to the initial report, 21 people were taken to clinics and hospitals.
After searching the area, police said they located an abandoned vehicle that the gunmen supposedly had used to escape.
Mexican media reported that several hundred people were watching the fights when the gunmen came looking for a man nicknamed “Chino.” But neither the Baja California Attorney General’s Office nor Ensenada police confirmed the reports.
Following the attack, members of the Mexican military disactivated a smoke grenade left at the scene, authorities said. Law enforcement officials also recovered 27 cartridges from a .223-caliber weapon and 10 rounds of ammunition from an AK-47 assault rifle.
Initial inquiries into Saturday’s cockfighting activities “reveal that they were taking place without permits,” said the statement from the Baja California Attorney General’s Office.
This would not be the first time gunmen interrupted a cockfight hosted by Póker palenque at that location. In December 2009, a commando of about 10 masked gunmen broke into the same arena, abducting two people, according to a report by the news website Ensenada.net.
In November, in the southern Mexican state of Guerrero, authorities reported 12 people were killed in during a shootout at a clandestine cockfighting competition.