Fourteen Mexican police officers were killed, nine were wounded, and another 20 were left unharmed Monday after an ambush by heavily armed cartel hitmen.

The ambush while officers were traveling through the municipality of Aguililla in Michoacan, Mexico. According to Michoacan Attorney General Adrián López Solís, the five-vehicle convoy was allegedly ambushed by 30 individuals traveling in “armored” vehicles. They were allegedly armed with “heavy caliber weapons” and fired on the police convoy.

Local security forces were dispatched to the scene and found multiple officers killed or wounded, three of the vehicles shot up and two vehicles on fire.

“Due to the nature and type of crime, I have instructed the Specialized Unit for Investigation and Prosecution of the Crime of Homicide, continue with the respective acts of investigation and in parallel establish that there is currently a territorial deployment in the area with the purpose of locate the possible participants of the fact that concerns us,” Solis said in an official statement.

Images began circulating online shortly after showing the vehicles tagged with the initials “CJNG.” The initials stand for Jalisco New Generation Cartel, which Reuters claimed to have verified with an unnamed state official.

The Jalisco New Generation Cartel is described as “one of the most powerful and fastest growing in Mexico and the United States” by the DEA. It is largely dominant in western Mexico, where the alleged attack took place, and is led by Rubén Oseguera Cervantes, aka “El Mencho.”

The CJNG began rising to prominence in 2011 when it dumped 35 bodies off a Veracruz bridge as a message to rival Los Zetas cartel. It was also aligned with Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzmán and the Sinaloa Cartel before it split off and grew at a rapid pace.

Police have fired thousands of rounds of tear gas in the last few months
Police have fired thousands of rounds of tear gas in the last few months AFP / Philip FONG
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