07 January 2010
Valentin Valdes Espinosa
Shooting
Valentin Valdes Espinosa, a reporter for the Zocalo of Saltillo newspaper, and two other journalists were intercepted by two trucks full of gunmen late Thursday.
Valdes Espinosa's body, bound, gagged and bearing five bullet holes, was found Friday morning. Tacked to it: a written warning of the kind often left by drug traffickers. The two reporters with Valdes Espinosa were let go or got away, authorities said. Valdes Espinosa, 28, is the third journalist slain in Mexico in the last 18 days. Mexico in 2009 had earned the unwanted designation of the most dangerous country for the news media in the Western Hemisphere.
