Joe McConnell
Getty ImagesA Mexican journalist who reported violent crimes was killed while under police protection.
Unknown gunmen shot Alejandro Martínez as he was traveling in a car with two security guards in the central state of Guanajuato.
Mr. Martínez, known as “The Lone Ranger’s Son,” died in hospital from gunshot wounds sustained in the attack.
According to the non-governmental organization Reporters Without Borders, Mexico is one of the most dangerous countries in the world for journalists: more than 150 media workers have been killed since 1994.
Mr. Martínez, who was 50, ran a popular news site on Facebook, which had more than 340,000 followers.
He was under police protection after surviving a similar attack on his life in 2022.
Local authorities said the attackers opened fire from a pickup truck at the car carrying the journalist and his bodyguards.
Police sources told AFP news agency that bodyguards returned fire but were unable to save the journalist, who was shot in the head.
According to sources, a woman traveling in another car was also hit and injured by a stray bullet.
In an interview three years ago, Mr. Martínez said he felt unspeakable pain and sadness when he saw the damage being done to the region by increasing levels of violence.
Balbina Flores, of Reporters Without Borders in Mexico, told AFP that “he was a journalist at risk.”
He had been assigned bodyguards under a federal program for journalists who receive death threats, a government official said.
His shooting is the latest in a series of deadly attacks on journalists.
Earlier this month, Federico Hans, a journalist from the small town of Caborca in the northern state of Sonora, was shot and wounded as he got into his car outside his home.
And on June 29, Víctor Culebro was found dead along a highway in the southern state of Chiapas.
