MEXICO CITY (AP) — Relatives on Monday buried the mayor of a state capital in southern Mexico who was killed just one week after he took office.
Photos of the crime scene shared on social media showed Mayor Alejandro Arcos’ severed head had been left on the roof of a pickup truck. Authorities did not immediately confirm the authenticity of the images, but at his funeral, there were signs his head had been reattached by forensic examiners or mortuary staff.
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Supporters of slain Mayor Alejandro Arcos throw flowers during his funeral service, one week after he took office, in Chilpancingo, Guerrero state, Mexico, Monday, Oct. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Alejandrino Gonzalez)
Relatives of slain Mayor Alejandro Arcos cry during his funeral service, one week after he took office, in Chilpancingo, Guerrero state, Mexico, Monday, Oct. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Alejandrino Gonzalez)
Relatives of slain Mayor Alejandro Arcos carry his coffin during his funeral service, one week after he took office, in Chilpancingo, Guerrero state, Mexico, Monday, Oct. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Alejandrino Gonzalez)
Supporters of slain Mayor Alejandro Arcos attend his funeral Mass one week after he took office, in Chilpancingo, Mexico, Monday, Oct. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Alejandrino Gonzalez)
A supporter of slain Mayor Alejandro Arcos prays at the entrance of the municipal building one week after he took office in Chilpancingo, Mexico, Monday, Oct. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Alejandrino Gonzalez)
Supporters of slain Mayor Alejandro Arcos attend his funeral Mass one week after he took office, in Chilpancingo, Mexico, Monday, Oct. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Alejandrino Gonzalez)
Supporters of slain Mayor Alejandro Arcos place candles and flowers at the entrance of the municipal building one week after he took office in Chilpancingo, Mexico, Monday, Oct. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Alejandrino Gonzalez)
Arcos was sworn in last Monday as mayor of Chilpancingo, a city so violent that a drug gang openly staged a demonstration, hijacked a government armored car and took police hostage in 2023 to win the release of arrested suspects.
Chilpancingo is the capital of Guerrero state, where Acapulco is located.
Arcos had said in an interview with local media shortly before his death that he wanted extra protection, but it was not clear if any formal request for that had been made to state officials.
The state prosecutors’ office issued a statement Sunday confirming Arcos had been killed, but provided no details.
Alejandro Moreno, the national leader of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, lamented Arcos' killing and said Monday “we will not allow his death to go unpunished.” A few days before Arcos' death, the newly installed secretary of the city council had also been murdered.
“They had been in office less than a week,” Moreno wrote on his social media accounts. “They were young and honest public servants who were seeking progress for their community.”
Chilpancingo has long been the scene of bloody turf battles between two drug gangs, the Ardillos and the Tlacos. The battle has resulted in dozens of gruesome killings and some high-profile scandals.
A previous mayor was caught on video apparently holding a meeting with leaders of one of the gangs at a restaurant. She was subsequently expelled from her party.
In July 2023, federal officials said a demonstration held by hundreds of people in Chilpancingo that month had been organized by the Ardillos gang to win the release of two gang leaders arrested for drugs and weapons possession.
The demonstrators largely blocked all traffic on the highway between Mexico City and Acapulco for two days, battled security forces and commandeered a police armored truck and used it to ram down the gates of the state legislature building.
The demonstrators abducted 10 members of the state police and National Guard, as well as three state and federal officials, and held them hostage to enforce their demands before releasing them.
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Supporters of slain Mayor Alejandro Arcos throw flowers during his funeral service, one week after he took office, in Chilpancingo, Guerrero state, Mexico, Monday, Oct. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Alejandrino Gonzalez)
Relatives of slain Mayor Alejandro Arcos cry during his funeral service, one week after he took office, in Chilpancingo, Guerrero state, Mexico, Monday, Oct. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Alejandrino Gonzalez)
Relatives of slain Mayor Alejandro Arcos carry his coffin during his funeral service, one week after he took office, in Chilpancingo, Guerrero state, Mexico, Monday, Oct. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Alejandrino Gonzalez)
Supporters of slain Mayor Alejandro Arcos attend his funeral Mass one week after he took office, in Chilpancingo, Mexico, Monday, Oct. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Alejandrino Gonzalez)
A supporter of slain Mayor Alejandro Arcos prays at the entrance of the municipal building one week after he took office in Chilpancingo, Mexico, Monday, Oct. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Alejandrino Gonzalez)
Supporters of slain Mayor Alejandro Arcos attend his funeral Mass one week after he took office, in Chilpancingo, Mexico, Monday, Oct. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Alejandrino Gonzalez)
Supporters of slain Mayor Alejandro Arcos place candles and flowers at the entrance of the municipal building one week after he took office in Chilpancingo, Mexico, Monday, Oct. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Alejandrino Gonzalez)
Two Minneapolis residents who have been monitoring immigration officers' actions during the Trump administration's latest crackdown say they were detained without charge for several hours in distressing conditions, denied phone calls, and pressured to rat out protest organizers and people living in the country illegally.
The accusations leveled by Brandon Sigüenza and Patty O’Keefe suggest that the Department of Homeland Security is employing similar tactics in Minneapolis and St. Paul as it did during the crackdowns in Los Angeles, Chicago and New Orleans. Federal officers are again using roving patrols, warrantless arrests and aggressive tactics such as spraying chemical irritants, breaking car windows and recording protesters, including Renee Good and her vehicle in the moments before an ICE officer fatally shot her.
According to organizers and an American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit, immigration officers have also been surveilling activists who have been observing their activities in the Twin Cities, violating their First Amendment rights. And Sigüenza, who like his friend O'Keefe is a U.S. citizen, said an immigration officer who questioned him Sunday even offered him money or legal protection if he gave up the names of organizers or neighbors who are in the country illegally.
“At one point, the officer said in vague terms that it looks like I’m in trouble, and he could possibly help me out,” Sigüenza said, noting he refused the offer.
DHS, which oversees Immigration and Customs and Enforcement and the Border Patrol, didn’t immediately respond to a Tuesday request for comment.
Sigüenza and O’Keefe, who are among an unknown number of Twin Cities residents observing the immigration officers in action, were detained Sunday while following ICE officers who were driving around and making arrests. The officers stopped in front of O’Keefe's car, fired pepper spray through her windshield vent and smashed her car's windows even though the doors were unlocked, the two told The Associated Press.
According to O’Keefe, the agents mocked her looks and laughed at her. She said they also brought up the killing of Good, a 37-year-old mother of three who was shot in the head last week by an ICE officer in front of her wife.
O'Keefe said the officer who sprayed their car Sunday threatened them, saying that “obstructing” their work was how Good got killed.
“It was very clear that they were trying to just humiliate me, break me down,” O’Keefe said.
Sigüenza and O’Keefe said they were arrested and taken in separate unmarked SUVs to the highly restricted federal facility on the edge of Minneapolis that's serving as the crackdown's main hub. They were put in adjacent cells reserved for U.S. citizens, one for men and the other for women. Each cell was also being used for other detainees and was no larger than 10 feet by 10 feet (about 9 square meters), with a concrete bench, flat-screen TV, two-way mirror and surveillance camera.
On their way to the cells, they saw other detainees who were screaming and wailing for help, though most were dejectedly staring at the ground, they said. In one instance, they observed a woman who was trying to use a toilet while three male agents watched. The overwhelming majority of detainees were Hispanic men, though some were East African — Minnesota is home to the country's largest Somali community.
“Just hearing the visceral pain of the people in this center was awful,” O’Keefe said. “And then you juxtapose that with the laughter we heard from the actual agents. ... It was very surreal and kind of shocking.”
Sigüenza said one of his cellmates had a cut on his head and the other had an injured toe, but neither was offered medical help. Their requests for water or to go to the bathroom outside their cells were also ignored, he said.
O'Keefe and Sigüenza were able to speak with lawyers, but only Sigüenza allowed to make a phone call — he called his wife.
Sigüenza, who is Hispanic, said DHS investigators took him to another room and offered him money or legal protection for any family members who might be in the country illegally in exchange for giving up the names of protest organizers or neighbors who don’t have legal immigration status. But he said he refused the offer, noting that he doesn't have any family members without legal status.
Sigüenza and O’Keefe, who have shared their story widely on social media, were let go by evening without charges.
Once they left the facility, they were again hit with chemical agents officers were using on protesters in the area.
“We were not charged with a crime,” said Sigüenza. “We were released and then tear-gassed on our way out.”
The conditions at immigration detention facilities around the country have been the subject of complaints, including a lawsuit over the one that served as the Chicago-area's operational hub that resulted in a judge’s oversight visit and an order to improve conditions.
DHS has defended the conditions in its facilities, saying detainees are fed and their medical concerns are addressed. And they've trumpeted the success of the immigration crackdowns, saying they've led to the arrests of thousands of people who are in the country illegally.
O’Keefe and Sigüenza believe their detention was meant to intimidate them and others critics of the immigration crackdown.
U.S. citizens’ and noncitizens’ rights differ slightly in immigration detention than in criminal detention, according to Lynn Damiano Pearson, an immigration attorney with the National Immigration Law Center. But detainees retain basic rights in both situations, including access to counsel and a phone, food and water, and privacy from the opposite gender when using the restroom.
Associated Press reporter Sophia Tareen contributed to this report.
Patty O'Keefe, a U.S. citizens who was arrested while following federal agents' vehicles and briefly held at a federal facility in Minneapolis, stands next to her car showing that her front driver's side window was smashed in, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Jen Golbeck)
The car of Patty O'Keefe, a U.S. citizens who was arrested while following federal agents' vehicles and briefly held at a federal facility in Minneapolis, shows glass on the ground after her front driver's side window was smashed in, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Jen Golbeck)
Patty O'Keefe, a U.S. citizens who was arrested while following federal agents' vehicles and briefly held at a federal facility in Minneapolis, stands next to her car showing that her front driver's side window was smashed in, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Jen Golbeck)
