A 20-year-old Mexican beauty queen has been killed during a running gun battle between soldiers and a gang of drug traffickers she was travelling with in northern Mexico.
In a scene reminiscent of the 2011 movie Miss Bala – or Miss Bullet – the body of Maria Susana Flores Gamez was found lying near an assault rifle on a rural road. It was unclear if she had used the weapon.
“She was with the gang of criminals, but we cannot say whether she participated in the shootout,” state prosecutor Marco Antonio Higuera said. That’s what we’re going to have to investigate.”
The doe-eyed, slender brunette was voted the 2012 Woman of Sinaloa in a beauty pageant in February. She had earlier competed for the other, more prestigious state beauty contest, Our Beauty Sinaloa, but did not win.
Higuera said Flores Gamez was travelling in one of the vehicles that engaged soldiers in an hours-long chase and running gun battle on Saturday. Higuera said two other members of the drug gang were killed and four were detained.
The shootout began when the gunmen opened fire on a Mexican army patrol. Soldiers gave chase and cornered the gang at a safe house near the town of Mocorito. They escaped, and the gunbattle continued along a nearby roadway, where the gang’s vehicles were eventually stopped. Six vehicles, drugs and weapons were seized following the confrontation. It was at least the third instance in which a beauty queen or pageant contestants have been linked to Mexico’s violent drug gangs were killed and four were detained.
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