Third Mexican musician killed; trumpeter found dead

By Jessica Bernstein-Wax / Associated Press

Article Launched: 12/07/2007 04:08:45 PM MST

MEXICO CITY -- A trumpet player was found dead with his hands and feet bound and a nylon bag over his head in southern Mexico, in what authorities said was apparently the country's third murder of a musician in less than a week.

Jose Luis Aquino, 33, had been hit repeatedly on the head, a spokesman for the Oaxaca state attorney general's office said Thursday -- the same day that two other slain musicians received posthumous nominations for Grammy Awards.

The attorney general's spokesman, who could not be named according to departmental rules, said authorities were still investigating possible motives but suspected a crime of passion.

A wave of organized crime violence has terrorized many parts of Mexico and the latest victims appear to be popular musicians.

Most disquieting were the weekend slayings of two singers who had crooned only about love and loss, not drugs and guns like some singers of so-called "narcocorridos," or drug ballads, killed in the past.