MS-13 gang growing extremely dangerous, FBI says

https://nypost.com/2018/12/18/ms-13-gang-member-gets-25-years-for-killing-one-of-his-own/

MS-13 gang member gets 25 years for killing one of his own
By Lorena Mongelli and Aaron Feis
December 18, 2018 | 4:01pm

A member of the bloodthirsty MS-13 gang was sentenced Tuesday to 25 years in prison for his role in the 2016 murder of an upstart fellow gangbanger on Long Island.

Elmer Lopez — who pleaded guilty in March to racketeering for being among several MS-13 thugs who slashed and stabbed Jose Pena for violating gang rules — was slapped with the hefty sentence despite convincing Judge Joseph Bianco that he’d found religion behind bars.

“I have never had, in my life, someone more important than Jesus Christ,” Lopez groveled in throwing himself on the mercy of the federal court in Central Islip. “I beg for forgiveness not only from my family, but from the family of the victim.”

“I’ve prepared myself to be a good person in society.”

While Bianco commended Lopez for his “genuine and authentic” remorse :rolleyes:, the jurist didn’t hold back in issuing the stiff sentence for the “brutal” crime.

“It is clear you are not the same person that committed this crime or since you have been arrested. I want you to know I give you credit for that,” said Bianco. “[But] You killed Mr. Pena. He lost his life and the sentence has to reflect that.”

The 18-year-old’s mutilated body was found dumped in a wooded area of Brentwood in Oct. 2016, one of several violent outbursts by the infamous Central American gang on Long Island around that time, spurring a widespread crackdown.

“I just want to express to you my sorrow for the loss of your son,” Bianco said, turning to address Pena’s mother. “I understand the suffering and pain you will experience for the rest of your lives.”

Outside court, the heartbroken mom, who declined to give her name, said she was satisfied with the sentence — but would never accept Lopez’s apology.

“No ‘I’m sorry’ or any amount of regret will bring my son back,” she said.
 
https://nypost.com/2018/12/20/ms-13-gangbanger-gets-7-years-for-trying-to-kidnap-kill-teen/

MS-13 gangbanger gets 7 years for trying to kidnap, kill teen
By Priscilla DeGregory
December 20, 2018 | 10:01pm

ms-13-gang-banger-gets-7-years-in-kidnap-kill-attempt.jpg

Jorge Bermudez-Cedillo
Suffolk County District Attorney


A reputed MS-13 gang member was sentenced to seven years in prison for trying to kidnap and kill a 16-year-old Long Island teen he mistook for a rival gang member, officials announced on Thursday.

Jorge Bermudez-Cedillo, 19, pleaded guilty in November to attempted kidnapping after he and three others tried to capture and kill the Brentwood teen in order to move up in the gang ranks of the local MS-13 faction, the Brentwood Locos Salvatruchas, prosecutors said.

Acting Supreme Court Judge Fernando Camacho handed down the sentence in Suffolk Supreme court on Thursday.

On Dec. 7, 2017, police got a tip about MS-13 members driving around in a van in Brentwood harassing teens. Plainclothes cops who were monitoring the area, saw the men trying to force the target victim into a 1995 Mercury van, according to prosecutors.

After arresting the alleged gangbangers, cops found two knives, a bat, a lead pipe, duct tape and tarps inside the van, prosecutors said.

The three co-defendants Miguel Rivera, 21, Vidal Ortiz-Contreras, 19, and Oscar Fuentes, 19, were previously sentenced to varying prison terms.

“This was an outstanding case where the Suffolk County Police Department literally prevented a murder at the hands of MS-13 gang members,” Suffolk District Attorney Timothy Sini said in a prepared statement. “[N]ot only are four gang members who conspired to commit murder now in prison, but a 16-year-old boy’s life was saved.”

A lawyer for Bermudez-Cedillo did not immediately return a request for comment.
 
https://nypost.com/2018/12/23/ms-13...-lure-murder-victim-to-queens-bird-sanctuary/

13-year-old promising sex lured MS-13 murder victim to his death: cops
By Amanda Woods and Max Jaeger
December 23, 2018 | 7:45pm

The man found dead and half-naked in a Queens bird sanctuary was lured there with promises of sex — and then slaughtered by members of the vicious MS-13 gang, according to law-enforcement sources.

Ian Cruz, 23, of Far Rockaway, was discovered in Bayswater Point State Park last Friday.

Police have arrested four people in the gruesome killing, including an unidentified 13-year-old-girl and 15-year-old boy.

Sources said the teenage girl messaged Cruz online and got him to come meet her for a tryst in the woods some time between Dec. 15 and Dec 16. Instead, a group of four gangbangers — the girl included — pumped four rounds of .22-calibre ammunition into his head.

Investigators believe the foursome used the same femme fatale to ensnare and kill 17-year-old Harold Sermeno — also of Far Rockaway — who was found fatally shot outside the Five Towns Community Center on Tuesday, sources said.

Police believe both men were mistaken for rival gang members, but it is unclear whether they knew the girl was 13, sources said.

Police arrested Yonathan Sanchez, 22; Carlos Guerro, 18; and the two teens on Saturday, charging them with murder and weapons possession.

Elmer Guttierez, 18, was also collared and hit with weapons-possession charges, according to an indictment, which says all five were together in a Nameoke Street apartment Wednesday, where cops later found 900 rounds of .22-caliber ammunition, according to a criminal complaint.

The men had been a surly presence in the apartment building for a while, but the girl only started hanging around the apartment about three weeks ago, according to neighbor Matthew Woodard.

“I heard she was heavily involved,” he said. “You don’t expect a 13-year-old-kid to be caught up in something like that.”

Jose Mejia, a neighbor of Cruz, said the dead man was an El Salvadoran construction worker who was recently kicked out by his mom for drinking and smoking pot.

“He had problems. A lot of drinking. A lot of Marijuana,” Mejia said. “He is always with three or four or five people, but I don’t know what their business was.”
 
https://nypost.com/2019/01/10/ms-13-gang-members-attacked-li-teens-with-bats-and-knives-da/

MS-13 gang members attacked LI teens with bats and knives: DA
By Jon Cronin and Priscilla DeGregory
January 10, 2019 | 11:03pm | Updated January 10, 2019 | 11:41pm

Three reputed MS-13 gang members have been busted in a bat-and-knife attack on a group of teens outside a Long Island burger joint, authorities announced Thursday.

Ramon Aravelo-Lopez, 19, Oscar Canales-Molina, 17, and Nobel Montes-Zuniga, 20, are accused of jumping the Huntington Station teens in the parking lot of a Burger King as they were walking out on Wednesday, said Suffolk County DA Timothy Sini.

Inside the eatery, “the teens noticed a group of approximately six Hispanic males who they recognized from school, including the three defendants, staring at them in a menacing way,” Sini said.

They were uncomfortable so they left the restaurant. “But they were followed by the defendants,” the DA said.

Once outside the alleged gangbangers “charged the teens while wielding bats and knives and an altercation broke out between the two groups,” Sini continued.

Aravelo-Lopez allegedly stabbed a 16-year-old victim in the back. The victim survived and another had minor injuries, prosecutors said.

The perps fled the scene in a black 2007 Toyota but were found with blood on their clothes and hands when they were arrested shortly after, according to prosecutors.

Sini said the incident was “essentially random acts of violence. “

Authorities were able to trace the men back to the notoriously violent Salvadoran-based gang by running them through a database of MS-13 members.

Araveles-Lopes and Canales-Molina are both illegal immigrants who have been picked up by Homeland Security on prior occasions but were ultimately released :mad:, prosecutors said. Montes-Zuniga is also an illegal immigrant, officials said.

They are each charged with second-degree assault and face up to seven years behind bars of convicted.

They were arraigned in Suffolk County court Thursday and held in lieu of $35,000 bail. Aravelo-Lopez’s lawyer, Jason Bassett, said his client is innocent.

“It appears that my client was in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Bassett said.

The other two defendants’ attorneys did not immediately return request for comment.
 
https://nypost.com/2019/01/22/police-unions-say-removing-ice-from-long-island-could-be-deadly/

Police unions say removing ICE from Long Island could be deadly
By Kevin Sheehan and Max Jaeger
January 22, 2019 | 3:06pm | Updated January 22, 2019 | 5:52pm

Nassau County is rolling out the red carpet for the brutal MS-13 gang by booting Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers from the local jail, police union leaders charged on Tuesday — as county leaders shot back that the cops were ginning up phony outrage over an unrelated collective bargaining dispute.

Nassau County Executive Laura Curran last week asked the feds to yank six officials from the ICE Office of Enforcement and Removal Operations from the county’s correctional center in East Meadow by Jan. 31, following a November state appellate court decision that localities cannot hold suspects on ICE warrants alone.

But police union honchos slammed the plan as “stupid” and “mind-boggling” during a press conference Tuesday.

“It could be tragic. It could end up in deaths in Nassau County,” said county Police Benevolent Association president James McDermott. “This is a political decision. This is not a decision for public safety. I’m calling on the county executive to reconsider and stop the madness.”

McDermott said ICE agents are able to get inside information on gangs such as the brutal MS-13 that his own local cops are not.

“They deal directly with gang members and they are very good at it,” McDermott said. “ICE is good at getting information from these guys in jails. We are nothing without information.”

Information gathered by ICE helped thwart an April 2018 plan by MS-13 to kill a police officer, union officials said.

“A police officer’s life was saved and possibly members of the public also,” McDermott said.

Nassau County has become ground zero for the brutal MS-13 gang, prompting President Trump to visit the island last year.

But Curran said Tuesday the six ICE officers are simply being moved to a facility at the Nassau University Medical Center across the street — and argued that the unions are coming after her because they’re mad that labor contract negotiations have stalled.

“The decision to relocate ICE agents from the County jail facility had no effect on ICE’s jurisdiction to operate within the County. The Nassau County Police Department will continue to notify ICE at the time of arrests, as they did before. The only change will be the relocation of ICE officers from jail property to prevent mistakes that could lead to unlawful detentions,” said Nassau County communications director Christine Geed.

“This has never been a police issue and it has not impacted police procedures in any way. What this morning’s PBA press conference was about is collective bargaining!”
 
https://nypost.com/2019/01/24/ms-13-gang-member-sentenced-to-27-years-in-prison/

MS-13 gang member sentenced to 27 years in prison

By Emily Saul
January 24, 2019 | 7:20pm

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Suffolk County homicide detectives investigate the scene where Jonathan Cardona Hernandez was found dead. Victor Alcorn


A reputed MS-13 gang member nicknamed “Satanico” was sentenced to 27 years behind bars Thursday for his role the 2015 killing of a Long Island teenager.

William Castellanos, 22, admitted last year to taking part in the group slaying of 16-year-old Jonathan Cardona Hernandez, who was found shot to death in June 2015.

The teen, who was shot 10 times, was mistaken for a member of a rival gang, prosecutors said.

Castellanos pleaded guilty in February 2018 to causing Cardona-Hernandez’s death through use of firearms.
 
https://nypost.com/2019/02/04/ms-13...pols-office-the-same-weekend-as-gang-slaying/

‘MS-13’ scrawled outside Queens pol’s office — the same weekend as gang slaying
By Max Jaeger
February 4, 2019 | 7:37pm | Updated February 4, 2019 | 10:04pm

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"MS13" scrawled outside Queens politician Francisco Moya's office
Office of Francisco Moya


Vandals scrawled “MS13” outside a Queens pol’s office — on the same weekend a member of the ruthless gang shot dead a rival on a subway platform, it was revealed Monday.

City Councilman Francisco Moya shared photos of the graffiti and said it appeared some time over the weekend.

“Gang activity is not going to be tolerated here. The people of this community will not be made to feel afraid in the streets they walk, on the trains they take or in the homes where they live,” he raged in a statement.

“If intimidation is MS-13’s goal when its members resort to gun violence — as is reportedly the case in Sunday’s fatal shooting of a man on the 90th Street stop on the 7 train — or when they spray paint gang graffiti in our neighborhoods — as they did on my district office this weekend — they will fail in those endeavors. We are stronger than any senseless display of force.”

The tag was written in black letters about 3 feet in height, photos show.

On Sunday, 20-year-old Abel Mosso was gunned down on the No. 7 train platform at 90th Street — also in Moya’s district — following a scuffle with another man.

Mosso had ties to the 18th Street Gang, and a suspect in custody is a known MS-13 member, officials have said. NYPD Chief of Detectives Dermot Shea said the incident was “definitely gang-related” during a press conference Monday.
 
https://nypost.com/2019/02/08/ms-13-members-charged-for-attacking-rival-in-jail/

MS-13 members charged for attacking rival in jail
By Emily Saul
February 8, 2019 | 5:51pm

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Luis Rivas, center, was one of three busted for attacking a fellow inmate they believed to be a rival gang member. U.S. Attorney’s Office, Eastern District of New York


Three reputed MS-13 members have been busted for attacking a fellow inmate they believed to be a rival gang member, city authorities said Friday.

The assault, caught on surveillance footage, allegedly shows Luis Rivas, Dennis Cabrera and Javier Rodriguez jumping their target inside the Tombs jail on Oct. 22, punching, kicking and stabbing him with a makeshift blade.

When they were done, Rivas allegedly flashed the unnamed victim an MS-13 hand signal.

The attack happened some 20 minutes after Cabrera was recorded on a jailhouse phone call whining :rolleyes: to his girlfriend.

“A Latin King came in here, you know, and we have let him be, but now these guys want to get him, and they want to stab him,” he said, according to Brooklyn federal court documents.

“There’s only three of us here right now. Supposedly the three of us have to do it … If not, the one that would be stabbed would be me.

“I’m telling you that sometimes I feel like taking my own damn life. This thing is garbage.”

The trio faces assault-in-aid-of racketeering charges.

At the time of the beat-down, they were variously incarcerated on charges of attempted murder, assault and robbery.

If convicted on the federal charges, they face up to 20 years behind bars.
 
https://nypost.com/2019/02/22/ms-13-members-busted-for-queens-subway-shooting-held-without-bail/

MS-13 members busted for Queens subway shooting held without bail
By Georgett Roberts and Natalie Musumeci
February 22, 2019 | 6:57pm

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NYPD Transit and the medical examiners transporting a body from the 7 train in Queens at the scene of the homicide. Brigitte Stelzer


Two reputed MS-13 gang members accused in the broad-daylight fatal shooting of a rival on a Queens subway platform were ordered held without bail Friday.

Tito Martinez-Alvarenga, 19, and Victor Lopez, 20, were both remanded at their arraignments in Queens Criminal Court on charges of second-degree murder, gang assault, kidnapping and criminal possession of a weapon.

Prosecutors say the two suspects attacked shooting victim Abel Mosso, a purported affiliate of the rival 18th Street Gang, kicking him and dragging him off a No. 7 train before fellow gangbanger Ramiro Gutierrez shot Mosso dead.

“These defendants…approached the victim on the subway car. They attacked the victim. They dragged him out of the subway onto the subway platform while the victim screamed for help,” said Assistant District Attorney Bryan Kotowski of the district Attorney’s Homicide Investigations Bureau.

“They threw the victim on the ground,” Kotowski said.

Martinez-Alvarenga’s lawyer, Michael Paul – speaking outside of court – called the charges “very serious” but insisted that his client was not involved in the attack.

“At this time, we’re maintaining that he was just present at the scene,” Paul said.
 
https://nypost.com/2019/03/12/ms-13-gangster-killed-a-man-for-wearing-peyton-manning-jersey/

MS-13 gangster killed a man for wearing Peyton Manning jersey: feds
By Lorena Mongelli and Tamar Lapin
March 12, 2019 | 10:14pm | Updated March 13, 2019 | 2:04am

A ruthless gangster conspired to kill a man for wearing a Peyton Manning jersey — all to earn respect and raise his status with the MS-13 gang, federal prosecutors said Tuesday.

Jose Suarez, an associate of the MS-13 Sailors clique, is accused of being the getaway driver in the cold-blooded Jan. 29 killing of Esteban Alvarado-Bonilla in a Long Island deli.

“The only way he could rise up the ranks … was to commit outrageous acts of violence, including murder,” US Assistant Attorney Raymond A. Tierney said during opening arguments in the Central Islip courtroom.

Prosecutors said Suarez, 24, and his associates “marked for death” the victim because he was wearing a Manning number 18 jersey and was suspected of being part of the rival 18th Street gang.

Suarez was the getaway driver and was to “serve as the communications center,” by relaying information back to the leaders, Tierney said.

“He was to wait … he was to let the leader know the hit was on” while the shooter walked into the El Campesino Deli in Central Islip and squeezed off five shots at point-blank range, striking the victim in the head.

The bullet went through the victim’s head and hit a female deli clerk, who survived.

While Alvarado-Bonilla “was taking his last breath, this defendant drove away,” Tierney said.

“It’s about the role this defendant played in helping to hurt people … helping to kill people.”

Suarez has pleaded not guilty for his alleged role in Alvarado-Bonilla’s death. The shooter, Mario Aguilar-Lopez, pleaded guilty last year and is awaiting sentencing.

Suarez is also charged with the caught-on-video assault of two men outside a Brentwood restaurant on Dec. 18, 2016, which prosecutors say he also committed to make a name for himself with MS-13.

“The defendant commits these crimes at least in part of increase or raise his status in the gang,” Tierney said.

An MS-13 gang member turned cooperating witness named German Cruz confirmed in court that Suarez is a member of the Sailors clique.

He said he and Suarez pummeled two men outside the Super Taco restaurant because “They disrespected our gang.”

Suarez’s lawyer, Raymond L. Colon, said the assault was just a “stupid fight amongst a bunch of young, dumb men” and claimed it was not gang-related.
 
https://nypost.com/2019/03/29/ms-13-member-indicted-for-2016-murder-of-long-island-teen/

MS-13 member indicted for 2016 murder of Long Island teen
By Lorena Mongelli and Lia Eustachewich
March 29, 2019 | 9:03pm

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Elmer Gilberto Santos Contreras
Newsday/Jessica Rotkiewicz


An admitted member of MS-13 was indicted Friday in the 2016 murder of a Long Island teen who was beaten so badly that he was “virtually unrecognizable,” prosecutors said.

Elmer Gilberto Santos Contreras, an illegal immigrant from El Salvador :mad:, was hauled into Suffolk County Supreme Court to plead not guilty to second-degree murder charges that could land him behind bars for up to life.

Suffolk County District Attorney Timothy Sini said he ordered a “hit” on Estiven Abrego-Gomez, 18, of Greenlawn, in August 2016 “after the victim was reportedly seen on social media flashing gang signs of the 18th Street gang, which is a known rival of the MS-13 gang.”

“This is a dangerous homicidal sociopath that we are not simply going to let walk out the door, go back to El Salvador and potentially illegally re-enter the United States,” Sini said at a press conference.

Abrego-Gomez’s cause of death was determined as sharp force injuries and blunt-force trauma. Contreras, 23, allegedly admitted to the murder while being held by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement on deportation proceedings in Virginia, Sini added.

In court, principal assistant prosecutor Kathleen Kearon divulged details of the gruesome slaying, including that the victim’s hands were nearly sliced off.

“The decedent was virtually unrecognizable,” she said.

Contreras’ lawyer Christopher Gioe denied the allegations.
 
https://nypost.com/2019/04/02/deported-ms-13-killer-arrested-after-being-caught-back-on-long-island/

Deported MS-13 killer arrested after being caught back on Long Island
By Priscilla DeGregory and Ben Feuerherd
April 2, 2019 | 8:49pm | Updated April 3, 2019 | 9:02am

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An admitted MS-13 gang member who had been booted from the US after killing a man in Huntington, was arrested again Tuesday — back on Long Island.

William Umberto Martinez Chavez, 40, had been deported in 2017 after he was convicted of manslaughter and did time for the fatal stabbing of a man in May 2000 outside a Huntington deli, federal prosecutors said.

But the Salvadoran killer — who has MS-13 tattoos on his chest and stomach — sneaked back into the country and was nabbed in Huntington on Tuesday.

“This office is firmly committed to prosecuting criminals who illegally re-enter the United States, especially MS-13 gang members who break into the country after deportations resulting from violent-crime convictions,” said Eastern District US Attorney Richard Donoghue in a statement announcing Chavez’s apprehension.

In 2000, Martinez allegedly plunged a knife into Jose Armando Garcia after an argument outside a Huntington Station bodega.

He was convicted of manslaughter two years after the crime, but maintained his innocence.

He pleaded with a Long Island judge to give him a lenient sentence, claiming he didn’t know what he was signing when he inked a confession.

“I didn’t have anything to do with it,” he said at his sentencing, Newsday reported. “I didn’t know what they were writing. I didn’t know what I was signing.”

Chavez was busted outside his Huntington house Tuesday morning by ICE officers, authorities said.

After he was taken into custody, officers took his fingerprints and matched them to sets that were taken when he was arrested in 2000 and when he was deported in 2017.

He was carrying a Mexican driver’s license bearing his name at the time of his arrest, federal prosecutors said.

Chavez, who claims he is no longer affiliated with the violent street gang, is now charged with *illegal re-entry into the US, for which he faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted. He was remanded after appearing in Central Islip federal court Tuesday.

Chavez’s lawyer did not immediately return a request for comment.
 
https://nypost.com/2019/04/05/how-deported-ms-13-gang-members-sneak-back-into-the-us/

How deported MS-13 gang members sneak back into the US
By Gabrielle Fonrouge and Stephanie Pagones
April 5, 2019 | 8:04pm | Updated April 5, 2019 | 10:03pm

The deported MS-13 gang member who was caught back in Long Island this week snuck into the US over the southern border — and may have had help from ganbangers in Suffolk County, law enforcement sources told The Post Friday.

William Umberto Martinez Chavez, 40, was first kicked out of the country back in 2017 for a fatal 2000 stabbing — but was found in Huntington on Tuesday morning and arrested by Immigration and Custom Enforcement agents for illegal reentry.

Investigators don’t think he crossed into the States at an official port of entry — because he was not interviewed by border patrol officers and would’ve been denied entry if he had been due to his previous deportation, sources say.

Gang members who are kicked out of the country and make it back into the US typically pull it off with help from others in the crew who are still stateside, sources said.

Once the gang member is ousted, they must report back to the leaders of the group in their home country and show some proof they were deported, one source explained.

Those who want to return back to the US then typically enlist the help of fellow members in America, who’ll pitch in and gather the money needed to pay a coyote to get their gang brother back into the country.

Without a deportation order hanging over their head, it’s otherwise surprisingly easy for a gangbanger to get into the US themselves, a federal source noted.

Being a possible gang member isn’t enough to deport someone or deny them entry to the US, sources said. :mad:

Even someone with MS-13 tattooed on his face could still be allowed to stay in the country for immigration hearings if they claimed asylum or were busted illegally crossing the border, a source added.

Martinez Chavez has MS-13 ink on both his chest and stomach — although claims he only joined the gang in prison for protection :rolleyes:, according to Newsday.

In 2018, ICE agents arrested more than 10,000 gang members in both criminal and administrative busts — including more than 2,000 MS-13 members, according to the agency.

The FBI estimates there are over 10,000 MS-13 members nationwide, with at least 1,000 across Long Island.

The group — whose motto is “murder, rape, control” — has long held a stronghold on Long Island’s eastern end and recently trickled further west into Nassau County, where authorities say its members were behind a spate of recent murders.
 
https://nypost.com/2019/05/23/ms-13...illing-man-for-wearing-peyton-manning-jersey/

MS-13 gangster convicted of killing man for wearing Peyton Manning jersey
By Joe Tacopino
May 23, 2019 | 4:32pm | Updated May 23, 2019 | 5:04pm

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El Campecino Deli, at 133 Caleb's Path Victor Alcorn


An MS-13 gangster was found guilty on Thursday of conspiring to kill a man for wearing a No. 18 Peyton Manning jersey.

Jose Suarez, also known as “Chompira,” was convicted on murder, racketeering and assault charges for the Jan. 29 killing of Esteban Alvarado-Bonilla in a Long Island deli, according to federal prosecutors.

The gang member was also convicted for a violent 2016 attack in Brentwood.

“Suarez has been held responsible for the execution-style murder of a suspected gang rival and violent assaults, ruthless crimes that reflect the danger to our communities posed by MS-13,” US Attorney Donoghue said.

“By his actions the defendant sought status within the gang, and with today’s verdict, what he has found instead is a mandatory sentence of life in prison.”

Suarez, 24, was trying to earn his stripes for an MS-13 affiliate when he served as the getaway driver in the slaying, the US Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York said.

He also communicated with gang leaders as the shooter walked into the El Campesino Deli in Central Islip shot Alvarado-Bonilla in the head.

The victim was “marked for death” because he was wearing a Manning number 18 jersey, and was suspected of being part of the rival 18th Street gang, prosecutors said.

A bullet that went through the man’s head hit a female deli clerk, who survived.

Suarez’s lawyer had claimed that the assault was a “stupid fight amongst a bunch of young, dumb men” and not gang-related.

He faces a mandatory life sentence for the conviction.
 
https://nypost.com/2019/05/25/body-of-suspected-ms-13-victim-discovered-in-long-island-park/

Body of suspected MS-13 victim discovered in Long Island park
By Joe Marino
May 25, 2019 | 7:17pm

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Det. Lt. Stephen Fitzpatrick, commanding officer of Nassau County Police Department's Homicide Division, speaks at a press conference on May 25. Matthew McDermott


The decomposing corpse of what cops believe is a victim of MS-13 has been discovered in a Long Island park, law enforcement sources said Saturday.

The remains were found in the Massapequa Preserve, just 100 to 150 feet from where another victim of the brutal gang, 19-year-old Julio Espantzay, was found butchered to death in 2017, Det. Lt. Stephen Fitzpatrick, commanding officer of Nassau County Police Department’s Homicide Division, said Saturday.

Cops investigating Espantzay’s killing had developed information about another victim and have been searching for remains in the 600-acre preserve for two years. On Friday, they found them.

“We had many indications with the dogs that this area might be where the person might be,” Fitzpatrick said. “As we started to excavate we found the remains of a human being.

“We do believe we know who this person is,” he added, noting the medical examiner will identify the victim.

It wasn’t clear if there were obvious signs of trauma to the decomposed body, a source said.
 
https://nypost.com/2019/06/12/ms-13...odges-life-behind-bars-in-brutal-murder-of-4/

MS-13 member in US illegally dodges life behind bars in brutal murder of 4
By Ruth Weissmann, Andrew Denney and Tamar Lapin
June 12, 2019 | 6:36pm | Updated

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Victims of the MS-13 quadruple homicide by Josue Portillo: (from left) Justin Llivicura, Jefferson Villalobos, Michael Lopez Banega and Jorge Tigre


An MS-13 gang member, in the US illegally, faced life behind bars for a savage 2017 quadruple slaying on Long Island — but a federal judge went easy on him Wednesday, despite tearful statements from the victims’ families.

Josue Portillo, 18, pleaded guilty to stabbing four suspected rival teen gang members — and bludgeoning them with tree limbs — in a Central Islip municipal park, in what prosecutors called a “horrific frenzy of violence.”

Portillo, who was 15 when he committed the slayings, was tried as an adult and faced life in prison on four counts of racketeering, murder and a related conspiracy charge.

Federal prosecutors pushed to send him to jail for 60 years — but Central Islip Judge Joseph Bianco shaved five years off his stint, citing Portillo’s age and his guilty plea to his role in the murders of Michael Lopez Banega, 20, Justin Llivicura, 16, Jefferson Villalobos, 18, and Jose Tigre, 18.

“Two years ago, we were a happy family,” said Lopez Banega’s mother, Lourdes, moments before the judge sentenced Portillo. “And he destroyed everything. Everything.”

The weeping mother said Portillo “doesn’t know the harm that he inflicted on us” and that she’s in therapy and taking medication because of her son’s murder.

“My dreams were gone the night that Portillo killed my son,” she said, sobbing.

Portillo and fellow MS-13 members on April 11, 2017 schemed to have a pair of female associates lure five suspected rivals from the 18th Street gang to a wooded area.

There, Portillo and his sick pals ambushed the men with machetes, knives, sticks and an ax.

One of their targets managed to escape and became a government witness.

Portillo admitted that he and another MS-13 gangbanger fatally stabbed Lopez Banega “knowingly, willfully and without coercion.”

But in court Wednesday, defense lawyer Joseph Ryan claimed Portillo was influenced by his peers, as a “juvenile without an adult brain” who was seeking out relief from a bad family situation.

Ryan said his client had been “dealt a bad hand at birth” — his parents abandoned him in El Salvador, leaving him in the care of his 68-year-old grandmother. He was later smuggled into the US in a trailer.

Wearing a tan jail uniform over a short-sleeved shirt, Portillo pleaded for mercy through an interpreter, saying his victims didn’t deserve to die and that as an MS-13er he was “consumed by soccer, girls and marijuana.”

“Please, do not put me in jail for the rest of my life,” Portillo begged the judge. “I know that what I have done was very wrong.”

Even though Bianco didn’t buy Portillo’s argument that he was a mindless MS-13 follower, he didn’t give him a life sentence.

But Bianco offered some words of consolation to the grieving mother.

“We can’t bring your son Michael back … but I can assure you I’ve given the sentence a lot of thought,” the judge said.

Outside court, Lopez Banega’s mom said the sentence was “the consequences of when you do bad things.”

“When Portillo took Michael, everything changed,” she said. “We’re no longer happy.”

Portillo was also sentenced to three years of supervised release upon completion of his sentence but will likely face deportation back to El Salvador if he ever leaves prison. His lawyer said he plans to appeal the sentence.
 
https://nypost.com/2019/07/18/sixth...murder-of-alleged-snitch-carlos-rivas-majano/

Sixth MS-13 member busted in murder of alleged snitch Carlos Rivas-Majano
By Lorena Mongelli and Jorge Fitz-Gibbon
July 18, 2019 | 4:09pm | Updated July 18, 2019 | 5:30pm

A reputed MS-13 gang member was arraigned on a murder charge Thursday, making him the sixth and final member of the notorious gang busted in the 2017 machete slaying of a suspected snitch on Long Island.

Luis Alejandro Varela, 21 — nicknamed “Felon” — is accused of taking part in the brutal slaying of Carlos Rivas-Majano, 22, who was lured into some woods near the Meadowbrook Parkway and hacked to death in August 2017, Nassau County officials said Thursday.

“We had issued a warrant for him. When he showed up in federal plaza applying for US citizenship :confused:, the warrant popped and we arrested him,” Nassau Police Detective Lt. Stephen Fitzpatrick said.

Majano’s dismembered body was found a year later in a hole in the woods near Kellenberg High School in Uniondale.

Several of the gang members arrested in the slaying were illegal immigrants, although Varela’s exact status is uncertain for now. The violent MS-13 gang has terrorized Long Island communities for years.

“The facts of this case, like every MS-13 homicide, are horrific and the arrest this morning of this individual makes our community safer,” Nassau County District Attorney Madeline Singas said at a press conference Thursday.
 
https://nypost.com/2019/07/22/photos-of-ms-13-gang-member-as-a-teen-help-nail-him-for-murder/

Photos of MS-13 gang member as a teen help charge him for murder
By Kate Sheehy
July 22, 2019 | 3:30pm | Updated

190722-chilling-ms13-photos.jpg


An MS-13 gang member from Long Island posed as a killer in chilling photos — and Monday, he pleaded guilty to being one.

Illegal immigrant Carlos Argueta was 16 when he helped murder fellow gang member Jose Pena three years ago, according to the feds, who released snapshots of the killer wearing rosary beads around his neck — while holding a rifle and pointing a pistol at the camera.

Argueta was charged as an adult in the slaying, with prosecutors using the photos of him loaded up with weapons to help convince the judge of his ruthlessness.

“The defendant was wearing rosary beads, which are traditionally worn by MS-13 members to demonstrate membership, when taken into federal custody on September 20, 2016,” court documents added.

Argueta claimed at the time that the rosary beads “were worn as a religious act,” the papers said.

He was out on bail in another shooting when he helped kill Pena, authorities said.

The killer — an El Salvador native whose nicknames include “Desorden,” which is Spanish for “Disorder” — pleaded guilty to racketeering and firearms charges in federal court in Central Islip, authorities said.

Argueta, who had been the head of the MS-13 subset the Freeport Locos Salvatruchas, faces a maximum of life behind bars when sentenced.

Argueta was one of several members of the ruthless Central American gang charged in Pena’s killing in Brentwood in June 2016.

Prosecutors have said the suspects turned on Pena, 18, after Argueta told them he thought he had become a government snitch — and also might have been gay.

After getting the OK from MS-13 higher-ups back in El Salvador to murder the victim, Argueta assigned “tasks,” such as gathering weapons and a vehicle, to underlings as part of the plot, the feds said.

The killers then lured the unsuspecting Pena into the vehicle and drove him to a wooded area, where they slashed and stabbed him to death.

His skeletal remains weren’t found till October 2016, more than four months later, on the grounds of the Pilgrim State Psychiatric Center.

Argueta also pleaded guilty in the attempted slaying of a rival outside the Brentwood public library the same year.

“With today’s guilty plea, Argueta admitted that while free on bail for shooting a gang rival in broad daylight outside a public library less than six months earlier, he planned and carried out the vicious murder of a fellow gang member on behalf of the MS-13,” United States Attorney Richard Donoghue said in a statement.

FBI Assistant Director-in-Charge William Sweeney Jr. added, “The twisted code the members and leadership of the MS-13 adhere to doesn’t make sense to anyone outside of the gang.”

At least one other gangster involved in Pena’s slaying and the separate attempted murder has already copped a plea and landed a 25-year prison sentence.

Last year, the man, Elmer Alexander Lopez, also known as “Smiley,” admitted to the crimes.

Some of the defendants in the attempted-murder case also were charged in the killings of Brentwood High School students Nisa Mickens, 15, and Kayla Cuevas, 16, in September 2016. The victims were hacked and beaten to death with machetes and baseball bats.

Neither Argueta nor Lopez was charged in the double slay, which grabbed the attention of President Trump and then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
 
https://nypost.com/2019/09/09/ms-13-member-gets-50-year-sentence-in-brutal-li-slay-of-four-teens/

MS-13 member gets 50-year sentence in brutal LI slay of four teens
By Andrew Denney
September 9, 2019 | 7:33pm

One of the members of the deadly MS-13 gang who pleaded guilty to taking part in a grisly 2017 ambush killing in which four teens were mutilated and killed has been given a half-century prison sentence.

Freiry Martinez, 18, was handed the 50-year sentence on Monday before Judge Joseph Bianco of the federal court on Long Island.

Martinez was 15 years old when he and other MS-13 members surrounded five teens in a Central Islip community park on April 11, 2017 after two of their female associates after they lured the unsuspecting victims there and attacked them.

The marauders killed Justin Llivicura, 16; and Michael Banegas, Jefferson Villalobos and Jorge Tigre, who were all 18 years old. The fifth person in their group managed to escape the carnage.

Days after the murders, Martinez, who also goes by “Discreto” and “Sovietico,” fled New York and holed up in Virginia and Maryland.

While he was on the lam, Martinez stayed active with MS-13 by selling drugs, committing assaults and taking part in armed robberies at check-cashing establishments, according to a news release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Brooklyn.

“It is my hope that today’s sentence brings some measure of closure and a sense of justice for the family members of the four victims, whose young lives were senselessly cut short by Martinez and his fellow MS-13 members,” U.S. Attorney Richard Donoghue said in the release.
 
https://nypost.com/2019/09/12/feds-charge-three-locked-up-ms-13-members-with-2017-queens-slay/

Feds charge three locked-up MS-13 members with 2017 Queens slay
By Andrew Denney
September 12, 2019 | 7:54pm

Three reputed MS-13 members who are already behind bars on previous charges have been hit with a new indictment alleging that they knifed a 16-year-old rival gang member to death in a park in Queens — and left his body there to be discovered by a bird-watcher.

In an indictment unsealed on Thursday, the US Attorney’s office in Brooklyn alleges that Melvi Amador-Rios, 28, known as “Letal” and “Pinky”; Josue Leiva, a 22-year-old who is also known as “Colocho”; and 24-year-old Luis Rivas, also known as “Inquieto,” stabbed Julio Vasquez to death in May 2017 in a wooded area in Alley Pond Park in eastern Queens.

The trio’s new charges include racketeering, murder, robbery and other charges.

Amador-Rios, alleged to be the head of the MS-13’s Centrales Locos Salvatruchas clique, has been in the slammer since August 2018, when he was picked up on charges that he ordered the murder of a rival gang member. The plot proved unsuccessful, but rendered the target a paraplegic.

In March, Leiva was added to the indictment against Amador-Rios on robbery and firearms charges. Rivas has been locked up since at least October.

While being held in a Tombs jail cell in Manhattan on state charges that include attempted murder, Rivas and two other reputed MS-13 members assaulted an inmate believed to be a member of the rival Latin Kings, according to court papers.

About 20 minutes prior to the beatdown, Rivas was recorded whining to his girlfriend on the phone about life with MS-13 and his directive to assault the rival gang member.

“If not, the one that would be stabbed would be me. I’m telling you that sometimes I feel like taking my own damn life,” he said in Spanish, according to court papers. “This thing is garbage.”

The teen’s body was discovered by a 52-year-old bird-watcher who stumbled on the corpse at Alley Pond Park near 76th Avenue in May of 2017.
 
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