Six Americans were among those injured Monday when a gunman opened fire at Mexico’s Teotihuacán pyramids, a popular tourist destination.
Mexican authorities identified the suspect as Julio César Jasso Ramírez. Officials said he had visited the site multiple times beforehand, allegedly conducting “reconnaissance of the specific locations he intended to utilize for his violent attack.”
One Canadian was killed in the shooting, and 13 others were injured. In addition to the six Americans, those hurt included individuals from Russia, Brazil, the Netherlands, and Canada, authorities said.
Law enforcement received initial reports of gunfire at 11:20 a.m. Monday. The National Guard responded quickly, and officials said the gunman took his own life at 11:45 a.m.
“Some people, because they were scared … threw themselves face-down on the ground, and the rest of us started to go down,” the tour guide said.
During a news conference Tuesday, Mexican officials said investigators found “literature, images and handwritten manuscripts, all allegedly related to violent events known to have occurred in the United States in April 1999” in the suspect’s backpack, referring to the Columbine High School shooting.
Authorities said the gunman was carrying 52 live rounds of .38-caliber ammunition in a plastic bag, along with a knife.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum addressed the shooting in a social media post Monday.
“What happened today in Teotihuacán deeply pains us. I express my most sincere solidarity with the affected individuals and their families,” she wrote. “Yesterday’s attack highlights the urgent need to strengthen our security protocols.”
José Luis Cervantes Martínez, attorney general of the State of Mexico, said investigators developed a “psychopathic profile” of the suspect, which was “characterized by a tendency to copy situations that occurred in other places, at other times and involving other figures.”
The National Institute of Anthropology and History announced that the Teotihuacán archaeological site will remain closed until further notice.
With all of the violence going on in Mexico why would anyone want to go there.
One more reason for MORAL people to be armed!
If more decent people had been armed, this scumbag would have been dispatched long before all that many people were shot.
Libs will say ‘get rid of all weapons’. With hundreds of millions of them all around the world, that’ll be an ‘interesting’ thing to do.
And if all weapon manufacturing is stopped and all guns confiscated, the ‘bad guys’ will make their own! It’s not all that hard to do!
But what are you going to do about hunters? No hunting means that increased herds will compete for limited forage. Many animals will die horribly from lack of food.
Is a slow death from hunger better than a quick death from a hunter’s bullet? And what about the food gotten from hunting?
And what about a person being able to protect themselves from those who make their own guns?
Libs … try a little logic!