Shots fired at family’s pickup from police helicopter pursuing drug suspects
PUBLISHED : 7 Nov 2026 at 18:11
Mexican police shot dead a seven-year-old American girl when they opened fire on her family’s vehicle from a helicopter during a drug enforcement operation, the state prosecutor confirmed on Friday.
The incident occurred on Oct 29 after police captured a local criminal in Matamoros, which borders Brownsville, Texas, triggering a series of street blockades by cartel gunmen in the area.
The Tamaulipas state prosecutor’s office said on Friday that the child identified as Aranza, a seven-year-old who was born in the United States, was hit in the head by police gunfire.
The girl’s mother told Mexican media she was travelling with five children and her husband in a pickup truck when they noticed a police helicopter was following them.
She said the family stopped the vehicle and her husband got out to say they were civilians with children but they were fired at anyway.
Tamaulipas Attorney General Jesus Govea told Mexico’s Milenio network the officers were responding to “an attack they allegedly came under” from the ground during the roadblocks.
The officers who opened fire remain free but “significant progress is being made in the course of the investigation”, Govea said.
Six people died during a wave of cartel-related violence in Matamoros and surrounding areas on Oct 29 alone, authorities said.
Numerous civilians have died in the crossfire of drug-related violence in Mexico over the past two decades.
