Ecuador’s youngest mayor Brigitte García shot dead
Brigitte García, Ecuador’s youngest mayor, has been shot dead. The 27-year-old, along with her press officer, was discovered deceased in a car on Sunday in the town of San Vicente, where she had triumphed in the mayoral election just last year.
As of now, no arrests have been made, and the motive behind the attack remains unclear. García’s death adds to a string of political killings in Ecuador, which was deeply shaken by the assassination of presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio last year.
The bodies of García and her communications director, Jairo Loor, were found in the early hours of Sunday, local time. According to the police, the fatal shots were fired from within the rented car they were travelling in.
Before her tragic death, García, a nurse by profession, had made history by becoming the mayor of San Vicente at the age of 26, representing the opposition Citizens’ Revolution party. San Vicente, situated in the province of Manabí, has been grappling with rampant violence associated with drug gangs involved in smuggling cocaine to lucrative markets in the US and Europe.
