Police identifies sixth suspect in Colosio assassination

MEXICO CITY (AFP): Police have identified a sixth suspect in last month's assassination of presidential candidate Luis Donaldo Colosio, the attorney general's office said.

Salvador Hernandez Tomasini, like four other suspects, had also been hired for crowd control at the March 23 campaign rally in northeastern Tijuana where Colosio was shot to death, the official statement said Wednesday.

The five men are suspected of having helped the alleged assassin, Mario Aburto Martinez, 23, shoot Colosio in the head as he was leaving the rally. They are seen in a videotape apparently hindering the candidate's movements.

Hernandez, in the footage, is seen ducking at Colosio's left side just before Aburto opens fire. Colosio was hit twice in the head and the abdomen, the attorney general's office said.

Hernandez had been hired for the security detail by Fernando De la Sota, the statement added.

Both men made statements to police Wednesday, but it was not immediately clear if they were arrested.

A seventh suspect seen in the videotape throwing himself to the ground to stop Colosio's advance before the shooting, has not been identified and is still at large.

Authorities still have not reported a motive in the assassination.

All the suspects, some of whom are former police officers, have been linked to a group opposed to the National Action Party (PAN), whose electoral victory in Baja California in 1988 was, some say, too readily acknowledged by Colosio.

The PAN victory in the local elections was one of the first losses inflicted on the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), which has been ruling the county uninterrupted since 1929.

Colosio, 44, was the PRI's candidate for the Aug. 23 presidential elections, and as such was favored to win.

A splinter group from the PRI known as Democracy 2000 called Wednesday for the creation of a Committee of Truth to independently investigate the Colosio assassination.