Petatlan, Mexico – Unidentified assailants lobbed a grenade inside a restaurant where several people were celebrating the birthday of the mayor’s chauffeur early Wednesday, injuring about 40 people, including the driver. The mayor was not present.
The attack was the second in three days along the Pacific coast: Late Monday night, assailants threw a grenade at a home in the resort city of Acapulco, wounding two men and three women.
Acapulco Mayor Felix Salgado said the attack was carried out by members of an organized criminal gang. But police had no immediate leads in the latest incident, which took place about 1 a.m. local time (0600 GMT) at a bar in Petatlan, a town 165 kilometers (100 miles) northwest of Acapulco.
“I heard a deafening explosion and when I turned around I saw what looked like sparks and so I dived to the floor,” said 21-year-old Miguel Angel Cortes Blanco. “I didn’t feel anything at first, but then I felt an intense pain in my legs and my arm and I couldn’t get up.”
Victims, some with serious injuries, were brought to area hospitals. Among them was Ignacio Estrada Rosas, 27, driver for Petatlan Mayor Antonio Armenta Miralrio. Estrada’s condition was not immediately known.
