A Mexican mayor from the town of Iguala and his wife were "probable masterminds" behind the disappearance of 43 student teachers last month after the mayor ordered for them to be picked up during a protest, according to The New York Times.
The students went missing on Sept. 26 from Iguala in the southwestern state of Guerrero, after they clashed with police during protest, The Associated Press reported.
Federal authorities have arrested 52 people in connection with the incident, including dozens of police who have links to a gang called Guerreros Unidos, or "United Warriors," according to the AP.
In Mexico City, Attorney General Jesus Murillo Karam said Casarrubias had told prosecutors that Iguala Mayor Jose Luis Abarca and his wife, Maria de los Angeles Pineda, had ordered two local police forces to stop the students from disrupting a political event that day, the Times reported.
Pineda, who the government says comes from a family of high-ranking drug traffickers, was Guerreros Unidos' top boss within the Iguala government, according to the Times. During the September incident, police shot and killed one student and detained the others before turning them over to Guerreros Unidos gang members, Karam added.
After the mayor handed the students over, the gang then mistook the students for members of rival criminal group "Los Rojos," or "The Reds," according to the AP.
On Wednesday, investigators found a total of nine mass graves containing 30 sets of human remains during the hunt for the missing students, but a second round of DNA tests is still needed to confirm if the bodies belong to the students, the AP reported. The leader of the Guerreros Unidos gang, Sidronio Casarrubias, had been arrested last week.
Karam said the mayor made payments to the gang, including money for the municipal police, according to the Times. The mayor and his wife are currently fugitives.
