Drug war mayhem instills a new fear in Mexico

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Scooped up by gunmen as she walked near her home, 12-year-old Alexia Moreno hardly had a chance. The gangsters were driving straight into a shootout. Within minutes, she was dead, shot in the head as she cowered in the back seat, writes the L.A. Times’ Tracy Wilkinson from Ciudad Juarez, Mexico.

It was two weeks before her sixth-grade graduation.

Alexia’s death in a city so accustomed to death struck a nerve because she was -- in this city tortured by killings, broad-daylight gun battles and rampant kidnappings -- an innocent victim.

Continue reading this story about drug violence in Mexico here.

Read more about Mexico’s drug wars here.

-- Deborah Bonello in Los Angeles