Honduras is plagued by gang culture and that was emphasised last week when the son of former Honduras President Porfirio Lobo and three other young men were executed allegedly by gunmen with the MS-13 after they left a nightclub in the country’s capital, Tegucigalpa.
Surveillance camera footage showed at least five armed men driving up to the front of a parking lot exit ramp and running inside the building where they forced Said Lobo Bonilla, 23, and the other men out of two SUVs.
Lobo Bonilla, Luis Zelaya, 23, the nephew of Honduras’ former defence minister, Salomón Vásquez, and Bonilla’s driver and security guard, Norlan Rodríguez, were then instructed to stand facing a wall before they were executed last Thursday.
Each was shot in the head, Honduran newspaper La Prensa reported. “The murder of four youths, including a son of former president Porfirio Lobo Sosa, is attributed to members of the Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13). The intention is to cause chaos, instability and terror,” National Police director Gustavo Sánchez said.
Additional video footage showed the assailants, wearing what appeared to be vests from a police anti-gang squad, running out of the parking lot towards their pickup truck before one of them appeared to be shot.
Someone retreated to help his injured accomplice and carried him away. Authorities checked area hospitals for the wounded gunman.
“I couldn’t see my son, but these are things that hurt,” former President Lobo said at the murder scene. “My son is hanging out with some friends. We don’t know if it was ordered or what.”
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