The Deadliest Month of the Sexenio

That's what April was, according to Milenio, with just over 1,400 murder victims. This surpasses August 2010, during which 1,322 victims were killed. The higher April numbers are largely due to the discovery of mass graves in Tamaulipas and Durango, which accounted for just under a quarter of the total. (Evidently, they are counting all of the bodies, some of which appear to have been dead for months, as April deaths.) Interestingly, 216 murders took place in Tamaulipas. That's a large number, but significantly less so when you subtract the 185 bodies discovered there, the overwhelming majority of whom are believed to be innocent civilians abducted from passenger buses. In other words, there were as low as 31 murders in confrontations between criminal groups in Tamaulipas last month, which is a very low number for that region; is it possible that the territory has now been effectively divided between the Gulf and the Zetas?

Chihuahua, which has remained relatively quiet in recent weeks, was as violent as ever, with 374 of the murders taking place in that state, by far the highest total.