Two glamorous women found brutally murdered a week after they disappeared had been trafficking drugs and weapons, it has emerged.
Mexican homicide prosecutor Miguel Angel Gaxiol believes the pair were slaughtered because of their links to organised crime.
Yesenia Ontiveros Gutierrez, 36, and Zamira Oliver Paredes Carranza, 27, disappeared in the US border town of Tijuana, in the Mexican state of Baja California, during a night out bar hopping on 10th April.
Zamira Oliver Paredes Carranza poses in undated photo. She was murdered in Tijuana, Mexico. Note: Private photo taken from social media. (Newsflash/NX)
They disappeared after a visit to a motel during the early hours of the morning and were never seen alive again.
Their decomposing bodies were found nine days later, on 16th April, in the back of an abandoned van after locals reported a foul smell coming from the vehicle, according to local media reports.
They were found wrapped in blood-soaked blankets with signs that they had met with a gruesome and violent end.
Zamira Oliver Paredes Carranza poses in undated photo. She was murdered in Tijuana, Mexico. Note: Private photo taken from social media. (Newsflash/NX)
The police said that the women were so badly mutilated they at first could only be identified by the clothes they were wearing.
Gaxiola said on 23rd April that both women were smuggling drugs and weapons in the border area.
He added: "We see in the investigation that they are possibly linked to illegal activities in that area. Apparently, they never left the area, and they were killed there."
Yesenia Ontiveros Gutierrez poses in undated photo. She was murdered in Tijuana, Mexico. Note: Private photo taken from social media. (Newsflash/NX)
Gaxiola added that although neither of the victims had criminal records, the investigation showed that they "moved drugs or weapons around the city".
No arrests had been made at the time of writing.
The investigation is ongoing.
(Joseph Golder/newsX)