In what the Mexican media are calling "Black Friday," nine bodies—some bearing signs of torture—were hanged side-by-side from an overpass in the border city of Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, on May 4, while 14 decapitated bodies were found stuffed in a minivan left outside a customs inspection building. The heads were later found in three ice coolers left outside the city hall. Four of those left hanging from the overpass were women; the decapitated bodies were all of men in the their 20s. A professionally printed "narco-banner" in block letters on the overpass read: "This is how I am going to finish off [Asi me los voy a ir acabando] all the jerks* [todos los pendejos] you send to heat up [que mandes a calentar] the plaza," apparently a reference to a car bomb that exploded in the city center on April 24, targeting the police and injuring one. The banner included a warning for someone called "El Gringo" who it accused of car-bomb attacks. It closes: "Now we'll see you around, you bunch of whorish parasites." (Ahora ahí nos vemos bola de parapatras puto.) Authorities said the message appeared to be from Los Zetas and addressed to their local rivals in the Gulf Cartel. Mexico's federal government has launched an operation dubbed "Northeast Coordinator" in response to the inter-factional violence in Tamaulipas.

The Mexican Chamber of Deputies on April 30 approved a bill that will recognize, protect and provide aid to victims of crimes stemming from the gang-related drug wars that have engulfed the country for nearly the last six years. Known as the General Victims Act, the law was passed by Mexico's lower house of Congress as a means to compensate those persons adversely affected by fighting between gangs and security forces. The law will provide financial, legal and medical aid to those in need; victims of criminal violence will be eligible for relief of up to 950,000 pesos ($73,000). The bill was passed by the Mexican Senate last week in response to longstanding demand, as more than 47,500 people have died in Mexico over the last five-and-a-half years due to drug-related violence, and thousands more have gone missing.

Wal-Mart de México's stocks fell by a total of 15.46% on the Bolsa Mexicana de Valores (BMV, the Mexico City stock market) from April 23 through April 24 following a report in the New York Times that the company's US-based owner, Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., had covered up a major bribery scandal in 2005. The Mexican branch of the giant retailer is the largest private employer in the country, with 2,138 outlets: 1,250 stores under the Aurrerá name, 214 Wal-Mart stores, 127 Sam's Clubs, 88 Superamas, 94 Suburbias and 365 restaurants. (La Jornada, Mexico, April 24: LJ, April 25)

An unknown assailant killed retired Mexican general Mario Arturo Acosta Chaparro Escapite with three shots to the head on the evening of April 20 at an auto shop in the Anáhuac section of Mexico City; the general had just brought his car there for repairs. The killer and an accomplice escaped on a motorcycle. This was the second attack against the general in two years; he was shot in the abdomen in Mexico City on May 18, 2010, in a supposed robbery attempt.

Eight indigenous Purépecha were shot dead the morning of April 18 near the autonomous community of Cherán in the western Mexican state of Michoacán. Two of the victims were from Cherán, which has been engaged in a year-long struggle to protect local forests from illegal loggers; six of the people killed were from the town of Casimiro Leco, better known as El Cerecito, where many of the loggers live.

After 15 days on hunger strike, on April 10 Antonia López Cruz sewed her lips together and had herself tied to the fence outside the federal Senate building in Mexico City in a mock crucifixion to demand the return of her six-year-old daughter, Concepción ("Cuco") Antonia Fernández López. Puebla state Public Ministry coordinator Leticia Villaraldo took the child from her parents on March 21 and turned her over to the state Integral Family Development (DIF) service, claiming she was an abuse victim because of an injury to her arm.

A study published in the March issue of the International Journal of Occupational and Environmental Health finds that the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) may be partly responsible for the sharp increase in obesity among Mexicans since the accord took effect in January 1994. Entitled "Exporting Obesity: US farm and trade policy and the transformation of the Mexican consumer food environment," the study indicates that by opening Mexico up to investment and food imports from the US, NAFTA altered Mexicans' eating habits in a way that has affected their health.

José Antonio Acosta Hernández AKA "El Diego"—purported leader of La Linea criminal organization, who has been linked to some 1,500 homicides in Mexico—was sentenced to 10 life terms April 5 in El Paso after pleading guilty to the slayings of three people tied to the US Consulate in Ciudad Juárez. Acosta also admitted ordering the massacre of 15 young people in the Mexican border city's Villas de Salvarcar neighborhood, and a car bombing in downtown Juárez. Acosta also pleaded guilty to racketeering, narcotics trafficking, and money laundering charges. US District Judge Kathleen Cardone sentenced him to seven concurrent life terms, three additional consecutive life terms, and 20 years in federal prison.