TIJUANA – Police officers arrested two alleged gunmen for the Sinaloa cartel wanted in the attempted killing of a deputy attorney general in Nayarit state.

The two are brothers, Gilberto and Damián Partida Soto, 34 and 33 years old, respectively, were being sought by authorities from Nayarit, Tijuana's police department announced Monday.

According to Nayarit authorities, the brothers participated in the attempted assassination of Deputy Attorney General Edgar Veytia on Dec. 15, an attack in which two state police agents were wounded.

The attempt was linked to other attacks between rival drug-trafficking groups the same day in Nayarit, authorities there said.

Tijuana's police department said that the Partida brothers are members of the criminal cell known as Grupo Alfa. They were detained Saturday night in colonia Postal, during a surveillance operation.

"They were walking on the street when they noticed police officers nearby and they tried to flee, which made the officers suspicious and they intercepted them," according to the police report.

The brothers were not carrying anything illegal, the report said, but a check of their identifications showed an arrest warrant against one of them in connection with kidnapping and organized crime.

According to Tijuana's police department, the brothers confessed that, besides the attack on the deputy attorney general, they had participated in various confrontations and homicides against gunmen working for the Zetas, a brutal criminal organization fighting the Sinaloa cartel.

Tijuana police said that the brothers would be turned over to Nayarit authorities as part of agreement to work together to fight crime.

omar.millan@sandiegored.com