Gunmen Kill Injured Patient and Police Officers in Deadly Hospital Assault in Puebla, Mexico

Gunmen stormed a Mexican hospital on Monday to attack a man recovering from a gunshot wound, killing him and two police officers, according to authorities.

The attackers shot the victim more than ten times in the central town of Atlixco before killing police officers who attempted to stop them from fleeing, according to Puebla state’s public security secretary.

“The victim initially entered the hospital early Sunday morning on his own, after being injured by a gunshot wound at a gathering,” Puebla security secretary Daniel Ivan Cruz said at a news conference.

“Early Monday morning, the person was killed by several men who entered the hospital,” he informed me.

“After hearing the emergency call and arriving at the scene, the police came under fire and died on the spot,” they said.

According to the security secretariat, investigators were investigating whether the patient, about 30 years old, was involved in illicit activities.

Atlixco, a renowned tourist location, attracts thousands of tourists during the Day of the Dead holiday. Puebla has previously seen brutal bloodshed. In April, state authorities discovered seven bodies — five of them decapitated and one entirely dismembered — in a car parked in the center of traffic on a major road, each with a note. In 2022, officials reported that gunmen “executed” nine individuals in an attack on a residence in Atlixco.

Since 2006, more than 450,000 people have been murdered in Mexico due to escalating violence, much of it tied to drug trafficking and gang activity.

Gunmen killed five members of the same family on Monday at a house in Acapulco’s suburbs, the former coastal playground of the affluent and famous that is now plagued by criminal violence, according to prosecutors.

Two other individuals were injured in the incident in Guerrero, a southern state plagued by drug cartel turf battles that have lasted years.

On Friday, a local leader of the Mexican folk saint cult “La Santa Muerte” was shot dead at an altar dedicated to the skeletal figure. The incident in Leon, Guanajuato, also killed two individuals and injured eight more.

Reference: Gunmen storm hospital, kill patient and 2 police officers in Mexico