The four Americans kidnapped in Matamoros have now been identified as a group of friends who travelled to Mexico so that one of them could get a tummy tuck procedure.
Family members named the group on Monday as Latavia “Tay” McGee, Shaeed Woodard, Zindell Brown and Eric James Williams, who travelled from South Carolina.
The four were travelling in a white minivan with North Carolina licence plates when they crossed the US border into Mexico on Friday.
Not long after entering Matamoros – an area dominated by the Gulf cartel – they came under fire from a group of armed men and were bundled into the back of a pickup truck. They have not been seen since.
A video circulating on social media appears to show the four friends being loaded into a pickup truck during their abduction – many of them dragged limply into the vehicle.
The FBI is offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to their return and the arrest of those responsible.
Mr Brown’s sister Zalandria Brown told the Associated Press: “This is like a bad dream you wish you could wake up from.”
Source: independent