Adding to the intrigue is the conflicting information Mexico’s authorities issued to the press during the days proceeding the raid.

On Dec. 15 authorities said Ayala had been released. However, an anonymous official with the country’s Attorney General’s office says the singer has been detained in federal police headquarters in Mexico City since last week’s raid.

Meanwhile Ayala’s lawyer, Adolfo Vega Elizondo says neither the singer nor his band – Los Bravos del Norte – have any ties to drug dealers.

“They have never in any moment belonged to organized crime” Elizondo told Associated Press. “They were offering their services as singers, as artists.”

Ayala and his band were performing for a Christmas party at a very upscale house in a gated community located outside the town of Tepoztlan when naval troops raided the house during a shootout in which three gunmen were killed and 11 others suspected of working for the Beltran Leyva cartel were arrested.

Some Norteno bands are known for singing about drug trafficking and have even been accused of being involved with drug cartels. Several singers have been killed during the past few years, most notably Sergio Gomez, a singer with K-Paz de la Sierra, whose tortured body was found the day after he went missing following a 2007 concert in Morelia.

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