Mexico’s LGBTQ+ community is in shock and angered after Samantha Gómez Fonseca, 37, a leading trans activist and politician, was found shot to death in a car in Mexico City this week. 

The shooting occurred shortly after she visited a friend at a prison in the capital.

Gómez had recently been recognized by the federal Congress for her outstanding human rights work. A Morena Party activist, she was in the running for a Senate seat in June’s elections.

The fatal incident comes on the heels of two more murders of trans women, Miriam Nohemí Rios, also an LGBTQ+ activist, in Michoacan on January 13, and another in Jalisco on January 14. At press time that person had not been identified by authorities.

The murders have sparked protests in various cities in Mexico, with many participants expressing fears at this sudden escalation in violence seemingly directed toward the trans community.

Some members of the LGBTQ+ community have accused Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador of fueling transphobia after he recently described a trans congresswoman as a “man dressed as a woman.” He later apologized for the remark.