Marcela Yarce and Rocío González (credit: Contralinea)

Certain elements of the most recent crime against journalists stand out from other murders in the hemisphere’s deadliest country for press workers. First, it was a double homicide involving two women; Marcela Yarce and Rocío González. Second, it occurred in Mexico City – which has been spared much of the physical violence suffered by press workers in other parts of the country. Third, the two journalists were close friends. The two had gone to a cafe together on Wednesday night.

Marcela Yarce co-founded the critical investigative news magazine “Contralinea” which has been the target of lawsuits, harrassment, and office break-ins. She went from actively reporting to becoming a key figure in the magazine’s administrative functions. Noteably, she secured advertising revenue for the publication which receives no government-sponsored advertising. Official ads are the financial life blood of many commercial news outlets in Mexico.

Rocío González spent 15 years as a reporter at the Televisa network. She worked as as freelance journalist and owned a currency exchange booth in Mexico City’s international airport. Mexico City authorities have indicated they are investigating robbery as a possible motive, citing a large cash withdrawal from the business coffers before the women dissappeared.

Another publicly-disclosed line of investigation is that of femicide; a murder that specifically targets women and usually involves both physical torture and sexual assault. Femicide victims are usually in their teens or early 20s. Both of the murdered women were 48 years old.

Press freedom organizations have called on Mexico City investigators not to rule out the possibility that the murders were related to the journalism work of the women.

The bodies of Marcela Yarce and Rocío González were found dumped in a park Thursday in Mexico City’s Iztapalapa district. They were stripped naked, hands and feet bound, mouths gagged, with a cord around their necks. Asfixiation is noted as the cause of death in both cases although their bodies bore gunshot wounds.

Their deaths came one week after the kidnapping and murder of veteran reporter Humberto Millán Salazar in the state capital of Sinaloa. Press freedom organizations say eight press workers have been killed in Mexico so far this year – half of them in the state of Veracruz.

Armed men broke into the home of columnist and editor Miguel Angel Lopez Velasco early Monday morning and killed him along with his wife and 21 year old son, Misael, who had recently started performing photography work. Another son, named Miguel like his father, is a staff photographer at the same newspaper but lives in a separate residence.

While more reporters die violent deaths in Mexico than in any other country in the Americas, it’s not common that they are killed inside their homes with other family members. According to Notiver, the newspaper he co-edited, Miguel Angel Lopez Velsco lived two blocks from a police station.

Two other Mexican reporters have been murdered in recent weeks. Pablo Ruelas Barraza was shot dead June 13th while resisting an apparent kidnapping attempt in the state of Sonora. Some regional coverage of the crime indicated that Ruelas Barraza had spent some time in prison and stated he was  unemployed at the time of his murder.

Noel López Olguín was found in a shallow grave in the state of Veracruz. He had been kidnapped in March.

Another newspaper reporter, Marco Antonio López Ortíz, has been missing since unidentified men kidnapped him earlier this month in the state of Guerrero.

This comes in the wake of a corruption scandal in which prison guards in Gómez Palacios, Durango allegedly released and armed convicts to carry out mass murder in Torreón, Chihuahua. The two sister cities are one metropolitan area separated by a river which marks the state line.

Federal police investigators dropped this bombshell in a weekend press conference after looking into the July 18th massacre of 17 people at a birthday in a hotel. Eighteen people were wounded in the same attack. This was the third such massacre this year thought to have been committed by inmates released from the state penitentiary in Gómez Palacios. Crime scene shell casings were traced to assault rifles used by guards at the prison.

The four missing journalists aren’t the only victims in the scandal’s immediate fall out. A prison guard has been killed and 8 human heads have been found around the city of Durango, capital of the state of the same name.

Official corruption is suspected behind a major jailbreak near the northeastern border city of Matamoros. The 41 inmates simply walked through the front doors of the high-security prison to waiting vehicles. Most were in prison for federal crimes. Two guards disappeared along with the inmates. The prison’s director has been fired and all 200 staffers are under investigation.

Most of the escaped inmates allegedly have ties to organized crime. Their jailbreak comes at a time when the Gulf Cartel is said to be battling its former enforcement wing, The Zetas, for control of valuable drug trafficking territory in northeastern Mexico. The warfare has included heavy intimidation of the press in the region, resulting in very little on-the-ground coverage outside of posts on social networking sites.

North of the border, the Department of Justice says that Mexican cartel activity has expanded to every region of the US and the tonnage of drugs trafficked has increased despite a 1.4 billion dollar military aid package aimed at reducing supply.