SAN DIEGO — Five people were arrested Friday morning in connection with last month's shooting death of Tijuana photojournalist Margarito Martínez Esquivel, according to Mexico's top national defense official.
The arrests were made at dawn in Tijuana, where authorities also seized an AR-15-style rifle, a Smith & Wesson handgun, phones and drugs, including cocaine and methamphetamine, said Luis Cresencio Sandoval González, head of the national defense agency known as SEDENA.
The weapons will be tested to determine if they were used in the murder or in any other documented crimes, the official said.
The announcement was made during President Andrés López Obrador's daily morning media briefing. No further details were given, including the names of the suspects or the location of arrest. More information may be released later Friday.
The arrests were based on intelligence from a task force made of several Mexican agencies, including SEDENA, the federal prosecutor's office, military police, Navy and Baja California authorities.
Martínez, who covered crime and security issues in Tijuana, was shot to death Jan. 17 outside his home as he left for work. A month earlier he had made an official complaint about threats he'd received while working as a journalist and was in the process of seeking protection under a government program.
On Thursday, Martínez's mother pleaded for justice for her son's murder to Mexico's deputy interior minister responsible for human rights.
Less than a week after Martínez's killing, a second Tijuana journalist, Lourdes Maldonado López, was shot dead in her car in front of her home. Three suspects were arrested in connection with her murder on Feb. 8.
Little information has been released about the investigation.
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