Domínguez and Argüello, reporters with El Mañana newspaper group in the Mexican city of Reynosa, near the Texas border, went missing during a wave of drug violence in the border city that endangered the local media, according to press reports and CPJ interviews.
Coming amid a series of violent confrontations between the Zetas and the Gulf cartel, the abductions sowed even greater fear in the local press corps, which was already practicing widespread self-censorship. Colleagues said the missing journalists could have done something to anger either the Gulf cartel or the Zetas or somehow gotten caught in the warfare between the groups. Authorities provided very little information on the seizures.
A third reporter for the newspaper group, David Silva, was also reported missing at the time. Silva reappeared months later, according to reports from several journalists, although the circumstances of his disappearance remained unclear.