MEXICO ARRESTS TIE FAMILY'S KILLING TO VIOLENT GANG

MEXICO CITY -- Mexican authorities have detained four people in
connection with this week's murder of a slain navy officer's family, a
killing they say was carried out by a notoriously violent drug gang in
retaliation for the recent death of drug kingpin Arturo Beltran Leyva.

Two of those arrested transported money to pay the hit men, who are
still at large, Rafael Gonzalez, the attorney general of Tabasco
state, where the killings took place, said Wednesday. He said two
other people arrested, including one woman, acted as lookouts on the
street where the killings took place.

"The killers themselves are still at large, but we are in the process
of identifying them and will do everything we can to capture them,"
Mr. Gonzalez said at a news conference. He added that authorities
suspect that some local police were involved in protecting the hit men
and possibly helping allow them to escape.

Last week, Mr. Beltran Leyva died during an assault by navy special
forces on a luxury apartment tower in a central Mexican city. He was
the highest-ranking drug lord to be killed or captured by Mexico in
years. Also killed in the gun battle was 3rd Petty Officer Melquisedet
Angulo, who was hailed as a national hero by the military and
President Felipe Calderon and was buried Monday with full military
honors.

Just hours after his burial, hit men burst into his family's home and
killed his mother, aunt and two siblings. A third sibling remains in
critical condition. Mr. Gonzalez said the killing was carried out by a
drug gang called the Zetas, formed by deserters from an elite Mexican
army unit who went to work as enforcers for the Gulf Cartel, which
controls trafficking along the Mexican Gulf Coast south of Texas.

The Zetas have since grown into a drug-trafficking organization
notorious as Mexico's cruelest. The group is said to have pioneered,
among other things, the tactic of beheading victims to intimidate
rival drug gangs, the government and ordinary citizens. It has
branched out into other kidnappings and extortion, Mexican officials
say.

Until now, the Zetas have stopped short of killing family members of
soldiers or policemen who fight them in the country's war on drugs.
Analysts worry it could signal the growing use of terror tactics to
pressure the government to back off.

Mexico, a leading supplier of marijuana, cocaine, methamphetamines and
heroin to the U.S., likely has the world's most powerful illicit drug
cartels. Mr. Calderon has staked his presidency on a high-profile
assault on drug gangs, sending 45,000 army troops to several parts of
the country in a bid to stop the growing power of cartels and slow a
wave of drug-related violence that has killed around 15,000 people in
the past three years. The death of the navy sailor's family will raise
pressure on the government to better protect those on the front line
of the drug war as well as their families. This year, drug gangs
murdered 12 federal police officers and dumped their bodies alongside
a highway in western Michoacan state in retaliation for the arrest of
a drug trafficker in the La Familia cartel. The head of customs for
Mexico's Gulf port of Veracruz disappeared in what officials say was
likely retaliation by the Zetas for his unit's role in helping to
seize various shipments of illegal drugs.

For much of the past three decades, Mexico and Washington have tried
to curtail the trade by going after drug kingpins like the late Mr.
Beltran Leyva. But as the drug lord's death shows, drug-trafficking
organizations usually survive their leader's death. Already, Mexican
officials are guessing who will replace Mr. Beltran Leyva in the
cartel that carries his name.