A missing pregnant woman has been found dead next to her friend who was also murdered with the foetus removed from her womb.
Martha Aurora Ramírez Luis, 19, was eight months pregnant when she was last seen getting into a taxi she booked with a taxi app on November 26.
The mum-to-be was with her friend Claudia González Perales, 34, when they both got in the taxi in Escobedo, Nuevo León State, Mexico when they were never to be seen again.
Several days after disappearing, the bodies of two young women were found in a disused warehouse in the area of Paso Cucharas on Wednesday.
The teen’s mother Maricela Luis Gallegos tragically confirmed the victim's identity the following day.
Ms Luis' unborn baby was reportedly removed from her womb and the infant’s whereabouts are currently unknown.
The Nuevo León Prosecutor's Office stated on December 5 that both women died of strangulation.
Maricela asked for help to cover her daughter’s funeral expenses on social media, saying: “I beg everyone to support me because I do not have the means to bury my girl.”
The distraught mother suffered heartbreak last year when Martha’s half-sister Irma Yamel Martínez Luis, 25, was shot dead in the Monterrey metropolitan area.
The investigation is ongoing.
On 30 November, another pregnant woman was kidnapped and killed for her baby in Las Bajadas, Veracruz City.
Rosa Isela Castro Vázquez, 30, went missing after she went to meet a Facebook contact who promised to give her free baby clothes.
The victim, who was nine months pregnant, was last seen getting into a car after arranging to meet the alleged altruist.
The young woman’s dead body was found at the Los Arrieros farm in the municipality of Medellín de Bravo on 3 December.
A tourist in Mexico, Shanquella Robinson, 25, was found dead on October 29 and police are investigating the possibility of femicide after a video emerged in which she appeared to be assaulted.
A business owner originally from Charlotte, North Carolina, US, Shanquella was visiting the resort city San Jose del Cabo with six of her friends at the Fundadores Beach Club.
A distressing video reportedly showed someone asking Shanquella if she "could at least fight back".
Her mum Sallamondra said to WBTV that Mexican police told her the death was caused by alcohol poisoning, but her death certificate says she passed away with a "severe spinal cord injury".
"They said she wasn’t feeling well, that it was alcohol poisoning," she said, also saying she recognised people in the footage.
