Las Vegas Review-Journal (Sunday)
Fun trip became terror few miles past border
Attack in Mexico left two Americans dead
LAKE CITY, S.C. — It was supposed to be a fun road trip to Mexico, a post-pandemic adventure for a group of childhood friends.
One was treating herself to cosmetic surgery after having six children. It was a 34th birthday celebration for another.
They rented a white van in South Carolina and set out on the nearly 22-hour trip, shooting silly videos and driving straight through to Brownsville, on the tip of Texas.
But once they got to Mexico, the trip took a terrible turn. Two members of the group would never make it home, victims of the ruthless Gulf cartel, a drug gang tied to brutal killings and kidnappings in the violent border city of Matamoros, a city that has long been a stronghold of the powerful cartel.
There could hardly be a worse border town to pick for a fun adventure.
It’s a common story — people often leave the U.S. for all sorts of medical treatment; costs in Mexico can be less than half what someone would pay in the United States.
Latavia Mcgee’s appointment was within days of her cousin Shaeed Woodard’s 34th birthday. Friends Eric Williams, Zindell Brown and Cheryl Orange rounded out the group of five.
The friends set out early March 3 to cross an international bridge that spans the two countries, thinking they were headed to see the doctor right on the other side.
“They went to drop her off and was supposed to be back within 15 minutes,” Orange said.
But just a few miles across the border, around midday, a vehicle crashed into the group’s van. Several men with tactical vests and assault rifles surrounded them, according to Mexican police reports. Shots rang out.
Brown and Woodard were hit by bullets and appeared to have died immediately. Williams was shot in the leg.
Video on social media showed men forcing Mcgee into the bed of a pickup, then going back to drag a wounded Williams and the bodies of their two friends into the truck as onlookers sat in their cars eerily silent.
The truck barreled off. A Mexican woman who had been hit by a stray bullet, 33-year-old Areli Pablo Servando, was left to die on the street.
When Mexican authorities arrived, they found Social Security cards and credit cards belonging to the group inside the van, marked by a bullet hole in the driver’s side window.
On March 5, the FBI reported their disappearances and offered a $50,000 reward for their return and the arrest of the kidnappers, and U.S. Ambassador Ken Salazar said U.S. officials contacted President Andrés Manuel López Obrador directly to ask for help in locating the missing Americans.
An anonymous tipster reported sighting armed men and people in blindfolds at a shabby, orange shack in a tiny rural community known as Ejido Tecolote, on the outskirts of Matamoros.
Mexican authorities, following the lead, drove the dirt roads searching. Then they heard shouts and the word: “Help!” That led them to the shack, where they found Mcgee and Williams blindfolded inside. They were being held next to the of bodies of their friends.
Woodard’s father said he was speechless.
“I’ve just been trying to make sense out of it for a whole week. Just restless, couldn’t sleep, couldn’t eat. It’s just crazy to see your own child taken from you in such a way, in a violent way like that,” James Woodard told reporters. “He didn’t deserve it.”