11 Dead, Eight Wounded After Gunmen Attack Mexican Rehab Center in Border State

Armed assailants invaded a drug rehabilitation clinic in northern Mexico late on Sunday, killing 11 people and wounding at least eight, Reuters reports. The deadly attack comes almost exactly one year after 13 were killed in a similar shooting at a different rehab clinic in the same city.

The assault took place at roughly 9:30 p.m. Sunday at the Centro de Rehabilitacion Tu Vida Sobre La Roca A.C. in northern Torreon, located in the border state of Coahuila – about 10 minutes from El Paso, Texas.

Gunmen apparently stormed the drug treatment center and opened fire on the people inside. Officials say the attacks on rehab facilities seemingly target drug traffickers who are using the centers to distribute drugs on a rival's turf, Fox News Latino reports.

In an almost identical attack, on June 7, 2011, armed gunmen killed 13 people at a different rehab clinic in Torreon.

But the most recent attacks are part of a long list that suggests rehabilitation centers in Mexico are no longer safe for innocent bystanders.

Fox News Latino has more on previous attacks on rehab clinics:

Armed men attacked the Anexo de Liberacion y Adicciones treatment center on Dec. 5, 2010, in Ciudad Juarez, a border city in Chihuahua state, killing three people and wounding seven others.

At least 10 gunmen went into the clinic and opened fire, officials said.

Gunmen killed 13 people on Oct. 24, 2010, at a drug rehabilitation center in the northwestern border city of Tijuana.

The attack occurred at the El Camino treatment center in east Tijuana, which is in Baja California state.

Nineteen people were killed and six others wounded in an attack on a drug rehabilitation center in Chihuahua city, the state capital, on June 11, 2010.

Gunmen killed 18 people at a drug treatment center located two blocks from a police station and the Santa Fe international bridge in Ciudad Juarez, which lies just across the Rio Grande from El Paso, Texas, on Sept. 3, 2009.

Police say the attacks are linked to Mexico's brutal drug war, which has claimed the lives of about 55,000 in less than six years. No drug cartel had claimed responsibility for the assault as of 9:30 a.m.