The murder of an attorney in the border city of Matamoros has sparked new questions following an attempt by the Gulf Cartel to cover up the case and suppress information on the motives.
The murder took place on Monday morning, when 51-year-old Fernando Covarrubias Trevino was driving to his parents’ home in the San Francisco neighborhood in Matamoros, when a group of gunmen ambushed him and shot at him at least seven times, killing him almost instantly. Evidence from the scene, shared with Breitbart News Foundation by Mexican authorities, revealed that Covarrubias tried to take evasive maneuvers with his vehicle moments before the shooting, but the gunmen were able to box him in and begin firing.
Moments after the shooting, the gunmen were able to escape with complete impunity, leaving the attorney slumped over inside his SUV. Local journalists in Matamoros received instructions from cartel-connected individuals to report that the attorney had been killed by Tamaulipas state police forces, who had simply fired into a parked vehicle in a case of mistaken identity, and to not dig into the case. Local news outlets and social media pages pushed out that version of events.
Breitbart News Foundation / Cartel Chronicles
Since then, the case has remained dormant, with Tamaulipas government officials refusing to release any information on the matter and simply referring to it as a shooting incident.
The victim in the case has been described by sources consulted with Breitbart News Foundation as a high-profile attorney who had represented various members of the top leadership within the Gulf Cartel. The murder is believed to have been ordered by one of the top leaders within the organization as part of an internal struggle.
The move comes at a time when the Gulf Cartel continues to be able to control the city of Matamoros with complete impunity despite having been labelled as a foreign terrorist organization by the U.S. government.
Editor’s Note: Breitbart News Foundation traveled to Mexico City and the states of Tamaulipas, Coahuila, and Nuevo León to recruit citizen journalists willing to risk their lives and expose the cartels silencing their communities. The writers would face certain death at the hands of the various cartels that operate in those areas, including the Gulf Cartel and Los Zetas, if a pseudonym were not used. Breitbart News Foundation’s Cartel Chronicles are published in both English and their original Spanish. This article was written by “J.A. Espinoza” and “Francisco Morales” from Tamaulipas.
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