SAN DIEGO — The remains of three people found near the Mexican fishing port of Ensenada are those of missing surfers from Australia and the U.S. who were killed in an apparent carjacking, authorities said Sunday.
Family members made the identification in-person at the behest of Baja California state prosecutors, the state attorney general’s office said in a statement Sunday obtained by NBC San Diego. The bodies had been recovered from a remote well about 50 feet deep, authorities said.
The attorney general’s office of Baja California said the bodies, found in La Bocana, south of Ensenada, are those of Jake and Callum Robinson, of Australia, and Jack Carter Rhoad, of the U.S.
At least two of the three were believed to be living in San Diego, authorities said, according to NBC San Diego.
The Ensenada medical examiner’s office said Friday the three victims were killed by gunshot wounds to the head.
At a Sunday news conference, prosecutors said the motive was carjacking, and the assailants may have been particularly focused on the wheels of the pickup used by the missing surfers.
The bodies were discovered Friday in a well in an area called La Bocana, authorities said.
The three were at a makeshift encampment during a fishing and surfing trip south of Ensenada, where the Baja coast rapidly becomes remote and filled with surprises for surfers seeking relatively rare rides.
Prosecutors said they found the trio’s encampment, including tents, spent gun shells, blood stains, and marks indicating bodies were dragged.
Three people were being questioned in connection with the case, authorities said. Two of the three, a man and woman, were held on suspicion of methamphetamine-related allegations, they said, and the third was the subject of a kidnapping warrant.
Chief state prosecutor Maria Elena Andrade Ramírez said previously there may be evidence, including a victim’s cell phone in the possession of one of the three, that may connect the trio to the case.
A fourth body was discovered with the three in the well and may be part of an unrelated case, authorities said.
On Sunday, Andrade Ramírez met with the parents of the three men, her office said in its announcement that the bodies had been positively identified.
She reassured them, it said, that she was committed to ensuring those responsible face the full weight of the law, according to the statement.
The three men were considered missing on April 27 when they did not return to an Airbnb closer to the border, in Rosarito, the mother of Jake and Callum Robinson, Debra Robinson, said on Facebook.
Cartel and big-city street violence attributed to the drug trade in places like Tijuana has been seen as rare in the world of Baja tourism that requires off-road-capable vehicles and the ability to start a camp fire.
