May 3, 2016
MEXICO CITY (AFP) - Two severed human heads were found in Mexico City over the weekend, authorities said Monday -- gruesome discoveries that are more common in other regions of the country.
A man's head was found in a suitcase on Sunday in the crime-ridden neighborhood of Tepito, an official in the city prosecutor's office told AFP.
Elsewhere in the megacity, another head was found on Saturday, along with a hand and two forearms inside a black plastic bag that was dumped on a street corner in the Atlampa district.
More body parts from the same individual were found in bags discarded in two other municipalities, Mexico City prosecutors said.
They said the bodies have been tentatively as those of a 23-year-old and a 27-year-old. Both have criminal records and were from a municipality in northern Mexico City.
City officials have insisted that drug cartels do not operate in the metropolitan area of more than 20 million people.
Gangland-style violence -- such as street gunfights and the decapitation of victims -- is more frequent outside the capital but the city has not been immune to such crimes.
In May 2015 a dozen bags with the remains of three people were found in train cars in the city.
In August 2013 the remains of 13 young people were found in a mass grave outside Mexico City, three months after they were abducted from a bar in broad daylight just steps from the capital's main boulevard.
