Stay or go? U.S. residents of Mexico town torn after 9 killed
State,Federal agencies swarm in, but will their interest last?
LA MORA, Mexico — U.S. citizens living in a small Mexican farming community established by their Mormon ancestors are trying to decide if they should stay or leave after burying some of the nine American women and children slaughtered this week in a drug cartel ambush.
Their peaceful existence in a fertile valley ringed by rugged mountains 70 miles from the Arizona border has become increasingly dangerous in recent years as cartels battled in Sonora state, a smuggling hotbed.
But La Mora, a hamlet of about 300 people where residents raise cattle and cultivate pomegranates, “will be forever changed” following the killings Monday as the women traveled with their children to visit relatives, a tearful David Langford told mourners at the funeral for his wife, Dawna Ray Langford, and their 11-year-old and 2-year-old sons.
“One of the dearest things to our lives is the safety of our family,” said Langford. “And I won’t feel safe. I haven’t for a few years here.”
On Friday, the bodies of Rhonita Miller and four of her children were taken in a convoy on the same dirt-and-rock mountainous road where they were killed, for burial in the community of Colonia Le Baron in Chihuahua state. Many residents of the two communities, a five-hour, bone-jarring drive apartj are related. They consider themselves Mormon but are not affiliated with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and many have dual U.S.-Mexican citizenship.
Colonia LeBaron has been largely peaceful since the 2009 killing of one of its members, an anti-crime activist, prompted Mexican authorities to establish a security base. But the police presence in La Mora was negligible until the recent deaths and authorities sent a swarm of state and federal police to the area. How long they stay could be crucial to the community’s future.