Mexican Singer Killed Hours After Denying He'd Died

(June 28) -- A popular Mexican musician famed for singing about the exploits of drug dealers was shot dead just hours after he gave a interview denying reports that he'd been murdered.

Mexican media reported that Sergio Vega, 40 -- who went by the stage name "El Shaka" -- was driving to a gig in the northwestern state of Sinaloa when a truck started to follow his red Cadillac. His assistant Sergio Montiel, who was also in the car, told El Debate newspaper that the truck's driver or passenger suddenly opened fire, injuring the singer, who lost control of his vehicle and crashed.

Montiel managed to climb out of the crumpled car and hide from the gunmen. Vega wasn't so lucky. The gang "finished Mr. Vega off" with shots to the head and chest, Montiel told the paper.

Just hours before he was murdered, Vega had dismissed rumors circulating among fans of grupero, a form of Mexican country music, that he'd been assassinated. "It's happened to me for years now -- someone tells a radio station or a newspaper I've been killed or suffered an accident," he told an entertainment website. "And then I have to call my dear mom, who has heart trouble, to reassure her."

He added that all grupero musicians are worried about their safety but that he had entrusted himself to God.

A lawyer working for Vega's family said he believed car thieves had randomly targeted the singer because of his flashy automobile. He told El Debate that it was unlikely that someone with a grudge against Vega could have ordered the murder, as his ex-client was a "good man" who had "no problems with anyone."

Others, however, suspect the killing could have been carried out because of the controversial content of Vega's songs. He performed "narcocorridos," ballads that recount the shootouts, betrayals, riches and loves of the country's many drug traffickers. In one song, for example, Vega sings that "Shaka told his people / I want to have some coca paste processed / Because that's what the customer wants / At the end if it rains and I get wet / You will get wet as well."

Over the past three years, at least seven singers of narcocorridos have been murdered. Vega himself said he had increased his security after the 2007 killing of Sergio Gomez, a singer with the Grammy-nominated band K-Paz de la Sierra. Gomez was kidnapped after a concert in the western state of Michoacan and found strangled several days later. Vega had performed at the same concert.

According to the Latin American Herald Tribune, the country's booming drug cartels pay gruperos large sums of money to write ballads honoring their criminal activities. But that puts the singers at risk of being targeted by rival syndicates, who may be displeased with the praise heaped on their enemies.