A drug gang that carried out the first successful car bombing against Mexican security forces likely used an industrial explosive that organized crime gangs in the past have stolen from private companies, a U.S. official. The assailants apparently used Tovex, a water gel explosive commonly used as a replacement for dynamite in mining and other industrial activities, said the U.S. official, who is familiar with the investigation but spoke on condition of anonymity because the official was not authorized to discuss the Mexican-led investigation.
The U.S. official had no other details on how the bomb was constructed, and Mexican officials declined to comment. The car bomb killed three people - including a federal police officer –in the border city of Ciudad Juarez, and introduced a new threat in Mexico's drug war. Mexican authorities say the assailants lured police and paramedics to the scene through an elaborate ruse seemingly taken out of an Al-Qaida playbook.
A street gang tied to the Juarez cartel dressed a bound, wounded man in a police uniform, then called in a false report of an officer shot at an intersection. They waited until the authorities were in place to detonate the bomb.