Alejandro Gomez Monteverde's dad and brother found dead after kidnap from Mexican home

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Juan Manuel Gomez Fernandez and son Gomez Monteverde found dead
They are father and brother to film director Alejandro Gomez Monteverde
Monteverde is married to actress and former Miss USA Ali Landry
The pair were kidnapped by a drugs cartel more than two weeks ago
Their bodies have been found with both suffering serious head injuries

Published: 08:45 EST, 23 September 2015 | Updated: 16:28 EST, 23 September 2015

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The father and brother of Hollywood film director Alejandro Gomez Monteverde have been killed after being kidnapped on the way to their ranch in Mexico.

Juan Manuel Gomez Fernandez and Juan Manuel Gomez Monteverde went missing 16 days ago after leaving their home in Tampico to travel to the ranch in Veracruz.

Their bodies were found in Pueblo Viejo, Veracruz on September 19. Both had suffered severe head injuries.

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Juan Manuel Gomez Fernandez and his son Juan Manuel Gomez Monteverde (pictured) were kidnapped two weeks ago

Mr Monteverde is married to American actress and former Miss USA Ali Landry, also known as the Doritos Girl from her 1998 Super Bowl commercial and the first wife of tv host Mario Lopez

Film director Alejandro Gomez Monteverde, with his father Juan Manuel Gomez Fernandez, who has been found dead along with his son after being kidnapped in Mexico

It has been reported that the family had made one ransom payment to secure the release of the men, but they refused a demand to give another payment, asking for proof that the pair were still alive.

The director's brother Juan Manuel was a business partner at La Pecerita restaurant that allegedly reported drug cartel activity in the past.

It comes amid drug cartel wars between Los Zetas and the Gulf Cartel, in the area where the father and son were killed.

Mr Monteverde is married to actress and former Miss USA Ali Landry, distraught and he is yet to speak about their deaths.

The director's brother Juan Manuel (pictured), was a business partner at La Pecerita restaurant that allegedly reported drug cartel activity in the past

The 38-year-old is best known producing the film Bella, which won him a People's Choice Award at the Toronto Film Festival in 2006.

It also prompted the Department of Citizenship to give him the 'American by Choice' award for Bella's positive contribution to Latino art and culture in the U.S.

Earlier this year, he directed and released Mexican-American war drama Little Boy starring Emily Watson.

He has been married to Ali Landry since 2006 and the couple have a daughter aged eight, and two younger sons.

Landry won Miss USA in 1996 and became a household name as the Doritos Girl thanks to a 30-second commercial that aired during the Broncos-Packers Super Bowl XXXII game in 1998.

She married Alejandro Gomez Monteverde in 2006 - two years after her marriage to Saved by the Bell actor and tv host Mario Lopez was annulled two weeks after their marriage due to bachelor party infidelity with a stripper.

Alejandro Gomez Monteverde's actor friend Eduardo Verastegui, who has starred in both of his films, sent his condolences to Mr Monteverde via Twitter.

He posted: 'With a heart full of pain and sadness, I ask for prayers for my friend and 'compadre' Alejandro Gomez Monteverde and all his family.

'My deepest condolences to my soul-brother, I love you so much 'compadre', I put my heart in your hands and I join you in this deep pain.'

Kidnapping in the Tamaulipas region of Mexico has become an industry and it is no longer centered on rich entrepreneurs, as victims can come from many walks of life.

The battle being waged by the government of President Enrique Pena Nieto against violent criminal activities has had ambiguous results.

The official number of registered cases has fallen by 14 percent between 2013 and 2014, but the feeling of danger and insecurity among inhabitants has increased.

KIDNAPPINGS AND RANSOMS - EASY WAYS FOR CARTELS TO GET RICH

As well as the lucrative trade in cocaine and cannabis, drug cartels also use kidnap and ransom as a way of adding to their vast profits.

Despite a nationwide effort to fight kidnapping the crime has risen to epidemic levels across the country.

Official figures say Mexicans reported well over a thousand kidnaps a year but experts estimate more than 90 percent of kidnappings go unreported.

Known as the 'express kidnap', armed cartel members will usually target members of wealthy Mexican families and then reach out for a ransom figure in exchange for the return of the victim.

If ransom demands aren't met fast enough, the kidnapped person finds themselves at the ruthless mercy of the cartel members.

Renato Sales, a federal prosecutor named to head the anti-kidnapping committee, said Mexico needs to "deal quickly and efficiently with the humanitarian emergency that this crime entails."

The part of Mexico in which Manuel Gomez Fernandez and son Gomez Monteverde were found murdered is a known operating area of Los Zetas

Los Zetas known for committing some of the most brutal crimes in Latin America as part of their on-going turf war with rival cartels.

Los Zetas was set up by a group of defectors from the Mexican Special Forces in the early 1990s and grew into one of the most powerful and brutal groups in the area within its first two decades.

After splitting from the Gulf Cartel in 2010, the cartel embarked on one of the most violent turf wars in modern Latin American history, turning Mexico into a battle ground.

The group is responsible for several of Mexico's bloodiest massacres in the 10s including the San Fernando Massacres of 2010 and 2011 where 72 and 193 people respectively, were found tortured and brutally murdered.

Los Zetas has been branded the ‘most technologically advanced, sophisticated, and dangerous cartel operating in Mexico’ by the US Government.