Initial reports stated that on 14 September 2012 at around 20:55 local time, Castro Luque was returning home at Chapultepec neighborhood in Ciudad Obregón. Unaware of the assailant, the deputy-elect got out of his car and made a few steps towards the house entrance when an unknown gunman shot at him nine times, hitting vital organs. Nonetheless, according to the investigation of the Office of the Attorney General of Sonora (PJGE), the gunman faked a malfunction in his motorcycle when Castro Luque was coming back from a meeting held in
Hermosillo prior to his installation as a state deputy. The assassin then asked Castro Luque for tool support and then shot him at close range. Once they had materialized the attack, the killer fled the scene in a motorcycle. Castro Luque was taken to a local hospital by his wife and young son while still being alive, but was declared dead an hour later. He was scheduled to take office as a Sonora's state Legislature in just two days. The Municipal Police of
Cajeme, Sonora, reported that Castro Luque's front house door had been forced open and that some people had stolen his laptop a day before the assassination. At the scene, the police found six .45 millimeter bullet casings, as well as six warheads from the same caliber, that will help the office of the Sonora attorney general (PGJE) as evidence for the investigation.
Funeral At 3:00 p.m. during a religious ceremony in the Cathedral of Ciudad Obregón, friends, supporters, politicians, and several citizens of the municipality gathered to pay homage to Castro Luque. Bishop Felipe Padilla celebrated mass with over 900 attendees.
Background Since the start of
Mexico's drug war, northern Mexico has been the scene of numerous battles between several drug trafficking organizations fighting for the control of the local drug markets and the smuggling routes leading to the United States. In August 2012,
Édgar Morales Pérez, the mayor-elect of a town in
San Luis Potosí, was ambushed and killed by gunmen before taking office. Just like Castro Luque, Morales Pérez was a member of the
Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI).
Investigation and arrests The Attorney General of Sonora established a special investigation group to carry out the inquiry of Castro Luque's assassination. On 24 September 2012, the PGJE indicated that Manuel Ernesto Fernández Félix, the alternate deputy for Ciudad Obregón, ordered the assassination of Castro Luque so he could go into office. Fernández Félix is currently a fugitive, while the other five implicated in the assassination are arrested.
Interpol and authorities in Mexico and the United States are currently looking for the alternate deputy in over 190 countries. Several water-rights activists, however, question the theory of the Mexican prosecutors that the assassination was carried out by Castro Luque's substitute. The activists of the Citizen Movement for Water stated that Castro Luque had launched a massive political campaign against a water project in Ciudad Obregón, and criticized the state government for constructing an aqueduct despite the judicial orders to suspend it. ==Legacy==