MEXICO CITY - Authorities say three gunmen have shot to death seven people at a house in the Mexican resort city of Cancun, in an apparent dispute between street-level drug dealers.

Cancun is located in the Caribbean coast state of Quintana Roo. The city has been hit by rising violence.

The head of the state police says killers fled after the Sunday attack at a home located relatively far from the city's beach and hotel zone.

Alberto Capella said "the investigations we have so far ... point to a supposed dispute between gangs involved in street-level drug dealing."

Capella said a suspected gang leader who has been linked to the Jalisco cartel was behind the killings.

In a single day in August, police found eight bodies strewn on the streets of Cancun.