Mexican influencer Valeria Marquez fatally shot during TikTok livestream, believed to be targeted by hit man

In Mexico City, authorities revealed that a social media influencer was fatally shot while live streaming on TikTok in the state of Jalisco. The incident indicated that she was targeted by a professional killer and had expressed fear prior to the attack.

The brutal killing of Valeria Márquez, a 23-year-old influencer, caused shockwaves in Mexico, leading to speculations about the reasons behind her murder in an area plagued by drug cartel violence. President Claudia Sheinbaum pledged government support in collaboration with local authorities to apprehend the perpetrator and offered sympathies to the victim’s family.

Denis Rodríguez, spokesperson for the Jalisco State Prosecutor’s Office, provided additional information on the homicide, confirming ongoing investigations into the death of the popular model and beauty influencer who had amassed a significant following of over 113,000 on TikTok.

Rodríguez said that early Tuesday afternoon, hours before the shooting, a masked man posing as a delivery driver arrived at the beauty salon on the outskirts of Guadalajara, accompanied by another man on a motorcycle. According to a woman in the salon, the men said they had a “very expensive” gift for Márquez that they had to deliver in person. When Márquez arrived and heard people were looking for her she expressed fear in her livestream.

“Maybe they were going to kill me,” she said in the video minutes before she was killed. “Were they going to come and take me away, or what? I’m worried.”

When the men returned, they asked if it was Márquez who was now in the salon, something that prompted prosecutors to believe that the men were hired assassins, Rodríguez said.

“The aggressor arrived asking if the victim (Márquez) was there. So it appears he didn’t know her,” Rodríguez said. “With that, you can deduce – without jumping to conclusions – that this was a person who was paid. It was obviously someone who came with a purpose.”

Márquez was handed a stuffed animal and a bag of Starbucks coffee while she was on the livestream, and was shot in the head and the chest, collapsing on camera. TikTok has since taken down the influencer’s account.

While it was still unclear who was behind the killing, the region is firmly controlled by one of the most powerful cartels in Mexico, the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, and Rodríguez noted murders by hired guns on motorcycles, often known as “sicarios,” have become a common occurrence.

Rodríguez said that authorities were also investigating if the death was connected to the murder of a former congressman just hours earlier in the same area of Guadalajara, also carried out by two men on a motorcycle.