Most homicides were recorded in the departments of San Salvador, Chalatenango, Sonsonate and Cabañas; according to police.
Criminal violence killed 20 people in the first three days of 2021, according to police figures. On the first day of the year, ten crimes were registered, seven this Saturday and three more yesterday.
Five of the crimes took place in San Salvador, three in Chalatenango, another three in Sonsonate, two in Cabañas, another two in La Unión and two more in Ahuachapán. The rest took place in Santa Ana, La Paz and La Libertad.
On Sunday morning, police found the body of César Aníbal Cruz Juárez, 22, in the canton of San Juan, Cuesta El Gavilán, Tacuba, Ahuachapán.
Cruz Juárez was abducted by gang members on Saturday night when he was returning from a religious service, according to police. The reasons for his killing are unknown, although authorities do not rule out that gang members with a presence in the sector are responsible for this.
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Juan Manuel Flores Mendoza was also assassinated yesterday morning on the main street of Tepemechín township in Yucuaiquín, La Unión, authorities said.
During the previous Saturday, authorities found the bodies of a man and a woman in a ravine in Ciudad Delgado, on the Oro highway. The victims were not identified by police.
The body of a gang member who had just left a penal center was also found in the Loma la Gloria neighborhood of Ahuachapán.
But the worst event took place on the morning of January 1 in the La Clínica district of Guarjila, Chalatenango, in which two young people died and two others were injured.
A group of men in black clothes attacked the victims celebrating the arrival of the new year. Edwin Josué Hernández Cruz, 18; and Óscar Arnulfo Hernández García, 27 years old.
The injured youths were taken to a hospital in Chalatenango. After the attack, the criminals left a note that read: “Drug traffickers and gang members die (Los Justicieros)”.
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Gang members kidnap two police officers in San Salvador and the western area
The rise in homicides has led police to alert colleagues on social media to take precautions so that they are not targeted by gangs or other criminals.
On Saturday afternoon, police reported the abduction of one of their comrades by gangs in the western part of the country.
His relatives reported the incident to the police, so a search was carried out on his colleague and, after two hours, the policeman managed to escape his captors. He was found by agents of the 911 emergency system and taken to a hospital to be treated for the beatings he received while being abducted, according to police sources.
At night, another police officer stationed in Ilopango managed to escape the gang members who abducted him. He was found by colleagues in the 911 emergency system near the Harrison Community Bridge in the San Jacinto neighborhood, south of San Salvador.
The agent said he was deprived of his liberty by gang members, but that he was able to escape along the banks of the Acelhuate River. The victim, who was allegedly drunk, had a sprained right ankle, for which she was taken to hospital.
Authorities maintain that homicides have dropped significantly. Security Minister Rogelio Rivas wrote on his Twitter account on January 1 that 2020 ended with a rate of 20 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants and an annual average of 3.6 murders per day, “the lowest recorded in the last two decades ”.