A judge was shot dead on Thursday in Ecuador’s Manabí province, an area plagued by drug trafficking gangs, according to police.
Judge Marcos Mendoza was killed by a gunman on a motorcycle while taking his children to school in Montecristi, Police Colonel Giovanni Naranjo told the press on Thursday.
Human Rights Watch reports that at least 15 judges or prosecutors have been murdered in Ecuador since 2022.
The judge was not under police protection as no request had been made, Colonel Naranjo explained. He held the Los Lobos gang—one of Ecuador’s largest drug trafficking organisations — responsible for the killing.
President Daniel Noboa has declared a state of emergency in multiple provinces and deployed the military to tackle criminal activity.
Despite these measures, homicides rose by 47% in the first half of 2024 compared to the same period last year, according to Ecuador’s Organised Crime Observatory.
