MS-13 gang targeted in pre-dawn sweep across Los Angeles
Hundreds of federal and local law enforcement fanned out across Los Angeles in pre-dawn sweeps, serving arrest and search warrants as part of a three-year investigation into the ultra-violent street gang MS-13. Federal prosecutors unsealed a sweeping indictment Wednesday morning charging…
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Federal prosecutors unsealed a sweeping indictment Wednesday morning charging dozens of members and leaders of the brutal street gang with a variety of crimes, including murder.
Acting U.S. Attorney Sandra Brown said the 127-page anti-racketeering indictment targets 44 members and associates of the gang, including the one-time leader of a Los Angeles faction of MS-13. Three people accused of murder could face the death penalty, she said.
Twenty-one people named in the indictment were arrested in pre-dawn raids across Los Angeles and Brown said warrants were served at more than 50 locations. Jail officials around the region also conducted cell searches, as some of those indicted were already in custody on unrelated charges. About a dozen of those arrested were so-called “shot callers” for the gang. At least three people were still at large Wednesday.
“It’s one of the largest and most entrenched gangs in Los Angeles,” Brown said. “Today’s actions will deal a critical blow to the top leadership.”
Federal prosecutors have been using racketeering and conspiracy charges to undermine MS-13. This approach was used to nab the former leader of the gang and a dozen people who acted as a joint council of leaders.
The lead defendant in the indictment is 43-year-old Jose Balmore Romero, known as “Porky.” Romero called the shots for the gang in Los Angeles in 2013 and 2014 and oversaw the gang’s drug-trafficking activities and coordinated the collection of extortion money, some of which was distributed to the Mexican Mafia, according to the U.S. attorney’s office in Los Angeles. Romero has been in custody since 2015, charged with ordering a gang-related slaying.
Three men were charged with murder in connection with the gang’s activities, authorities said.
Carlos Alfredo Cardoza Lopez, 23, known as “Little Boy,” faces a violent crime in aid of racketeering murder charge in the fatal shooting of a innocent bystander inside the gang-controlled Little San Salvador Nightclub and Restaurant on Western Avenue, federal prosecutors said in a statement. A friend of the victim also was stabbed.
Two others accused of being in the gang also are facing federal murder charges. Alexander Paredes Rivas, 39, known as “Blacky,” is accused of killing a man in August 2015 at a strip mall in Pacoima. Joffri Molina, 24, known as “Espia,” is accused of killing a man in September 2015 on a North Hollywood street, officials said.