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RICO Indictment Expands Case Against Clique of 18th Street Gang Involved in Murder of 3-Week-Old Child, a Cold Case Murder Committed in 2001, and Other Crimes Superseding Indictment Charges Defense Attorney with Laundering Illegal Proceeds on Behalf of Mexican Mafia Federal and local law enforcement authorities today arrested eight of 39 members and associates of one of the most entrenched “cliques” of the 18th Street Gang after the return of federal criminal charges alleging that the gang operated a racketeering enterprise responsible for the October 2007 attempted murder of a street vendor near MacArthur Park that resulted in the fatal...

Al-Qaeda Draws New Recruits Via Internet Al-Qaeda is using the Internet to recruit vulnerable young people to its terrorist network, according to a programme aired on Saudi Arabian TV late on Tuesday. Umm Osama, the founder of al-Qaeda's first women-only website, al-Khansa, joined several others on the programme to discuss how they renounced jihadist ideology. Among those who sought a response to this question was an imam from the Medina mosque, Saleh Ibn Awad al-Mudamsi, and the father of a young al-Qaeda suspect held in an Iraqi prison. Read More Qaeda Targets U.S. Oil Interests in North Africa U.S....

A 19-year-old reputed gang member charged in the March 2 shooting death of standout Los Angeles High School football player Jamiel Shaw Jr. pleaded not guilty today to murder. Los Angeles Superior Court Commissioner Henry J. Hall ordered Pedro Espinoza -- who was arrested March 7 and charged March 11, just before Shaw's funeral -- to remain jailed without bail.

ANITA Shaw says, "My country let me down." It's hard to argue with her. Not only did America let Anita Shaw down, so did California and Los Angeles. Truth be told, Anita Shaw is being diplomatic, if not generous, by not lashing out in righteous indignation at the massive tragedy she has suffered at the hands of an indifferent government. Our government: federal, state and local. Who is Anita Shaw and why should you care what she says? Pull up a chair. Anita Shaw is a sergeant in the United States Army. On March 2, little more than a month...

While hundreds of Mexican soldiers are deserting the army to join drug trafficking gangs, California is facing the opposite problem: A growing number of gang members here have infiltrated the U.S. Armed Forces in order to receive military training. The numbers speak for themselves: In 2003 there were just 16 incidents of gang members in the U.S. Armed Forces, while in 2006 the total was 10,309, according to the study, "Gang-Related Activity in the U.S. Armed Forces Increasing," released in 2007 by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Twenty-two official entities, including the Los Angeles Police Department, participated in the...

LOS ANGELES — A former gang member who founded an anti-violence group called No Guns has pleaded no contest to federal weapons charges. Hector "Big Weasel" Marroquin, 51, and co-defendant Sylvia Arrellano, 25, entered pleas Thursday for three counts of manufacture, distribution and transport for sale of an unlawful assault weapon. Arrellano also pleaded no contest to machine gun conversion and possessing a silencer and acknowledged that the crime was committed for the benefit of a criminal street gang. She was given until Tuesday to surrender for sentencing and would likely be sentenced to four years in prison, prosecutors said....

LOS ANGELES Three members of a Hispanic gang were sentenced Monday to life in prison without the possibility of parole for using murder and other violent acts to intimidate blacks in their neighborhood. Federal prosecutors had alleged Gilbert Saldana, Alejandro Martinez and Fernando Cazares targeted blacks in the largely Hispanic community of Highland Park, east of downtown Los Angeles. They were found guilty of conspiring to use violence, including the shooting deaths of two black men in 1999 and 2000. "These were horrific offenses that have had far-reaching consequences," U.S. District Judge Percy Anderson said during sentencing. Each defendant received...

MISSION — Family and gang were one and the same for Leobardo Villarreal. So in March it was no coincidence that federal authorities finally arrested Villarreal, a 22-year-old second-generation member of the gang Hermano Pistoleros, through a tip they got after arresting his father and fellow gang member Juan Eladio Villarreal-Saenza, officials said. The Pistoleros, whom the FBI says Mexican drug cartels are hiring to run drugs and do contract killings, operate in Mexico and the United States. They are highly mobile, organized criminals who also happen to be illegal aliens, Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials said. While the federal...

America's Most Dangerous Gang Spreading from El Salvador to L.A. and across the United States, Mara Salvatrucha 13 is increasingly well organized and deadly. Within one hour, two people were found murdered miles apart in suburban Nassau County, N.Y. After an intensive investigation, police officials learned the murders were the work of the violent street gang Mara Salvatrucha 13. It also soon became apparent the gang was sending a bold message to its members and associates. That message: “If you are not loyal, you are dead.” But there was another message in the brutal slayings for the people of Long...

<p>WASHINGTON -- Federal authorities arrested 582 alleged gang members, including 22 in South Jersey, over a two-week period, targeting an estimated 80 violent groups they say have spawned street crimes across the country, officials said yesterday.</p> <p>Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff called the gangs "a threat to our homeland security and ... a very urgent law enforcement priority."</p>

There's an old Army saying that wars are won by enlisted soldiers, not generals. So when U.S. Army South invited countries from the Caribbean and Central and South America to send senior enlisted personnel for four days of training in San Antonio, many accepted the offer. About 70 military officials from 18 countries are at Fort Sam Houston this week for the first conference of its kind, comparing notes on combat operations, riot control and other topics of mutual interest. And they were reminded Tuesday that the war on terrorism is indeed global. Islamic extremists have long been suspected in...

Deporting gang members triggers boomerang effect: Culture spreads across the Americas, winning recruits who see L.A. as the promised land. TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras -- Marlon Fuentes is a big man in his cell block at Honduras' largest prison. His face is tattooed. His talk is tough. He menaces with threatening stares. A gang member from Hollywood, Fuentes spends his time behind bars impressing Honduran "homies" with his exploits in California. He joined Los Angeles' infamous 18th Street gang when he was 12, was arrested for selling dope and brandishing a deadly weapon, then deported in 1995. Fuentes, 27, is the United...