American hostages were in Mexico for tummy tuck, says family

• The FBI is offering a reward of $50,000 for the safe return of four Americans abducted in Matamoros.
• The US State Department warns travelers not to travel to six Mexican states.
• Including Tamaulipas, due to crime and kidnapping.

The four Americans who were abducted by highly armed men in Matamoros, Mexico, had gone there for cosmetic surgery, according to family.

According to the sister of one of them, one of them was scheduled to have a stomach tuck in a border town to remove belly fat.

“To see a member of your family thrown in the back of a truck and dragged, it is just unbelievable,” Zalandria Brown, told media about her brother Zindell.

In the incident, a woman from Mexico passed away.

For the safe return of the Americans, the FBI is offering a reward of $50,000 (£42,000).

Latavia McGee, a mother of six, Shaeed Woodard, and Eric James Williams have been named in US media as the other members of the group.

In a white minivan with North Carolina license plates, they were travelling through Matamoros, a 500,000-person metropolis located right across the border from Brownsville, Texas, when unidentified gunmen opened fire, according to the FBI.

They are shown on video being loaded into a pickup truck by armed guys. While several appear to be comatose and are being dragged to the truck, one is being manhandled onto the vehicle.

Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador described the incident as a “confrontation between armed groups”. He said his “entire government” was working to secure the Americans’ release.

Investigators think the Mexican cartel most likely mistaken the Americans for Haitian drug runners, according to an unidentified US official quoted by reputed media outlet.

Ms. McGee’s mother, Barbara Burgess, told media that despite her warnings not to go, her daughter said to her, “Ma, I’ll be OK.”

Her daughter called her on Friday to let her know she was about to leave for the appointment for the abdominoplasty, popularly known as a tummy tuck.

Later that day, when Barbara Burgess tried to reach her again, the phone went to voicemail.

Ms. Brown claimed that her brother, who resides in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, was aware that there were potentially dangerous areas in Mexico.

“Zindell kept saying, ‘We shouldn’t go down’,” she told media, adding that it was “like a bad dream you wish you could wake up from”.

The US State Department warns travelers not to travel to six Mexican states, including Tamaulipas, because of “crime and kidnapping.” Matamoros is located in one of these states.

Drug cartels frequently have greater influence than local law enforcement and are in charge of most of the territory.

According to the US government, hundreds of thousands of Americans cross into Mexico every year in quest of less expensive medical care.

According to Patients Beyond Borders, a medical tourism directory, cosmetic surgery is one of the most popular procedures people seek overseas, and Mexico is one of the top medical tourism destinations in the world.

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