Sept. 15 (UPI) -- At least five people in a Mexico City plaza were killed Friday after gunmen dressed as a mariachi band opened fire before escaping on motorcycles.
The five gunmen, dressed as mariachi musicians, were armed with rifles and handguns as they opened fire on Plaza Garibaldi, an attack that also injured at least nine others including a foreign national.
Investigators recovered 60 empty bullet casings at the scene of the crime, which prosecutors say appears a targeted attack on an individual.
Three men and two women, between 22 and 46 years old, died in the shooting, officials said.
The number of murders in Mexico is on the rise, with more than 31,000 killed in 2017, the highest total since 1990, the National Statistics Institute said.
The 31,174 murders in Mexico in 2017 equal a murder rate of 25 per 100,000 inhabitants, increasing 27 percent from 24,559 in 2016, when the murder rate was 20 per 100,000 inhabitants.
