Two of the four Americans who were kidnapped in a Mexican border city are dead, Mexican officials said Tuesday. “Approximately one hour ago we confirmed that the four Americans were located,” said Gov. Américo Villarreal of Tamaulipas state, the Washington Post reports. He added, "Two were found dead, one wounded and one alive." The four were kidnapped in after gunmen opened fire on their vehicle after they crossed the border into Matamoros from Brownsville, Tx. The FBI said the four crossed into Matamoros in a white minivan with North Carolina license plates. Shortly after crossing the border, the vehicle was fired on by armed men, who moved its occupants into another vehicle and fled, the Wall Street Journal reports. Tamaulipas state Attorney General Irving Barrios said Monday that the four were U.S. citizens from South Carolina.
“We don’t know what happened, if there was a confusion or a conflict between criminal bands,” said Barrios. “We are not discarding any hypothesis.” Barrios said a Mexican passerby died during the incident. A Mexican official said one woman and three men were abducted. The attack happened a few blocks from the U.S. consulate in Matamoros and about a mile from U.S. border crossings. Photos posted on social media by bystanders showed the Americans traveling in a white Chrysler Pacifica that crashed with another vehicle and was surrounded by heavily-armed men wearing bulletproof vests. President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said the four had crossed into Mexico to buy medicine when the abduction occurred during a confrontation between armed groups.