The wife of an American man allegedly gunned down by Mexican pirates said she's unsure that the two suspects named by Mexican authorities are the men responsible for her husband's murder.
Tiffany Hartley, whose husband, David, was shot and killed on a U.S.-Mexico border lake, said she hopes that the two drug cartel suspects reportedly named by Mexican officials are behind the attack.
"It's definitely frustrating because we don't really know if these two people were actually involved in the shooting," Hartley said in an interview Monday with Fox News. "Are they (Mexican authorities) just using two names that they've known that have been part of the other attacks?
"Hopefully these two guys are the ones that are responsible," she said. "It's frustrating because you don't know what to believe."
KRGV-TV reported Sunday that Mexican police have identified two men as suspects in the murder of Hartley, who was allegedly shot and killed Sept. 30 while riding on a Jet Ski with his wife on Falcon Lake.
Police commander Juan Carlos Ballasteros said Juan Pedro Saldivar Farias and his brother Jose Manuel are suspects in a string of murders, kidnappings, armed robberies and fires in the northern Tamaulipas state where the shooting took place.
Both suspects are reportedly from New Guerrero, Mexico -- close to the Old Guerrero church that Hartley and her husband had visited.
However, Zapata County Sheriff Sigifredo Gonzalez told the station that he is not aware of any suspects being named by Mexican authorities.
Hartley of Milliken, Colo., told Fox News that she is unable to describe what the suspects look like because "I was just so focused on that gun, hoping that they weren't going to shoot me."
"I saw them but I don't even really have a picture of what they look like," she said.
Following suggestions from Mexican authorities that her story may be fabricated, Hartley said defended her account of an alleged pirate attack, saying her version of events is "110 percent true."
No body has been recovered since Hartley said her husband was shot in the back of the head on Sept. 30 while the couple was dodging bullets from three boats of alleged Mexican pirates. The 29-year-old said she was forced to leave her husband lying face down in the water because she was unable to pull him onto her Jet Ski.
Hartley said she believed her husband was dead and recounted the "awful" feeling of having to leave him behind in Mexican waters.
The woman's mother-in-law, Pam Hartley, also defended her story, saying, "If you knew her, there would be no doubt."
Pam Hartley also said over the weekend that her family met privately with Mexican officials in recent days regarding the status of the investigation.
"I'm encouraged that there is discussion going on between the U.S. and Mexico," she said, though she declined to discuss the details of the meeting. "I hope and pray that there's more communications...we just need to bring David home."
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