Two Israeli citizens with connections to organized crime were killed in a shooting at an upscale Mexico City shopping center on Wednesday afternoon.
The shooting took place when the two victims were eating in a restaurant in the Artz Pedregal shopping center in the Álvaro Obregón borough of the city. At 5:22pm, a man and a woman approached the victims and started shooting with pistols at close range.
One of the victims died at the scene, while the other died after being transferred to a hospital. While fleeing, the couple also shot and injured two other people, including a police officer.
The male shooter was able to get into a blue Nissan Versa and escape, while the female shooter, identified as 33-year-old Esperanza “N,” was arrested outside the mall. Police found a blond wig and a change of clothes that she had planned to use to aid her getaway.
After being arrested, Esperanza “N” told police that she had met one of the victims on social media and had started a relationship him. But when he became unfaithful to her, she decided to buy a handgun for 7,000 pesos and kill him.
However, in a press conference on Thursday, Public Security Secretary Jesús Orta called Esperanza’s narrative “unsustainable.”
“The version of a crime of passion was the first story that the woman told the police,” he said. “However, as more investigation has been done, that narrative is not sustainable because of several pieces of evidence we have found.”
Orta added that police are looking for the male shooter, as well as another person the two shooters were seen talking to before the attack.
The victims were identified as Alon Azulay and Ben Sutji, both Israeli nationals. According to Israeli media, Sutji escaped in 2001 from an Israeli prison where he was serving a term for attempted murder. He is believed to have fled to Latin America to continue his criminal career, and was arrested in Venezuela and Mexico for drug trafficking.
Sutji is also an alleged associate of fellow Israeli Erez Akrishevsky, who Mexico extradited to Israel on Wednesday.
Source: Animal Político (sp), El Universal (sp), El Financiero (sp), Enlace Judío (sp)
