Posted on 03/15/2005 2:53:38 PM PST by fight_truth_decay
As part of a nationwide crackdown, federal authorities Monday announced 103 arrests in six major cities of members of Mara Salvatrucha, an international gang born in Los Angeles and now involved in murder, narcotics trafficking and human smuggling.
The sweeps, conducted in recent weeks in an operation stretching from Hollywood to New York City and Miami by agents with the Department of Homeland Security, represent the first thrust of a campaign to rein in Mara Salvatrucha, also known as MS 13, officials said.
With new cells in 33 states and up to 50,000 members in the U.S. and Latin America, the gang had become a law enforcement priority in Washington, as well as in El Salvador, Honduras and Mexico.
Underscoring the gang's national reach, more than half of the arrests announced Monday came in the New York, Washington and Baltimore areas. In Los Angeles, authorities arrested 17 reputed MS 13 members, including a former soldier in the Salvadoran military described as a founding member of the gang's Hollywood branch.
Many of those arrested had reentered the country illegally after being deported and could face prison time before being deported again.
In the coming months, authorities say, they expect hundreds of additional arrests of MS 13 members, the majority of whom are in the country illegally.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
"A top al Qaeda lieutenant has met with leaders of a violent Salvadoran criminal gang with roots in Mexico and the United States — including a stronghold in the Washington area — in an effort by the terrorist network to seek help infiltrating the U.S.-Mexico border, law enforcement authorities said.
Adnan G. El Shukrijumah, a key al Qaeda cell leader for whom the U.S. government has offered a $5 million reward, was spotted in July in Honduras meeting with leaders of El Salvador's notorious Mara Salvatrucha gang, which immigration officials said has smuggled hundreds of Central and South Americans — mostly gang members — into the United States.
Mr. Ashcroft confirmed that U.S. border agents and inspectors had ramped up efforts to find El Shukrijumah amid reports that the al Qaeda leader was thought to be seeking entry routes into the United States along the U.S.-Mexico border. Mr. Ashcroft noted that increased enforcement efforts were under way in the wake of a rise of arrests of border jumpers from Afghanistan, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Pakistan, the Philippines, Saudi Arabia and Syria. Authorities said Mara Salvatrucha gang members moved into the Los Angeles area in the 1980s and developed a reputation for being organized and extremely violent. The gang since has expanded into the Washington area, including Virginia and Maryland, and into Oregon, Alaska, Texas, Nevada, Utah, Oklahoma, Illinois, Michigan, New York, Georgia and Florida. More than 3,000 Mara Salvatrucha gang members are thought to be in the Washington area, with a major operation in Northern Virginia. Other gang centers, authorities said, include Montgomery and Prince George's counties and the Hispanic neighborhoods of Washington. Mr. McNulty, whose office has prosecuted Mara Salvatrucha gang members, has described the organization as the "gang of greatest interest" to law enforcement authorities. He said gang members are recruited predominantly from Hispanic communities and typically among juveniles, some as young as 13."
CUT
Time to utterly exterminate MS-13, as well as the evil immigration shysters who keep them infesting our country.
Arent these the people who thought they could threaten us in the border states if we dared to stand up to the lunacy down there?
Transport them back home in a C130, When the Herc gets over LA MESA open the back door and have the pilot nose up over one of the runways...problem solved...
I hope we're not fooling around and this doesn't turn out to be yet another "catch and release" program.
We ought to be thankful that the Founding Fathers were successful in forming the Union because this is the kind of thing that would lead to all kinds of big trouble if the States were divided up into several sovereign powers rather being all together.
Send 'em all to Gitmo with the other terrorists.
With new cells in 33 states and up to 50,000 members in the U.S. and Latin America...... And we bagged 103 of these rats. Encouraging....
CUT
El Shukrijumah, born in Saudi Arabia but thought to be a Yemen national, was spotted in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, in July, having crossed the border illegally from Nicaragua after a stay in Panama. U.S. authorities said al Qaeda operatives have been in Tegucigalpa planning attacks against British, Spanish and U.S. embassies. Known to carry passports from Saudi Arabia, Trinidad, Guyana and Canada, El Shukrijumah had sought meetings with the Mara Salvatrucha gang leaders who control alien-smuggling routes through Mexico and into the United States. El Shukrijumah, 29, who authorities said was in Canada last year looking for nuclear material for a so-called "dirty bomb" and reportedly has family members in Guyana, was named in a March 2003 material-witness arrest warrant by federal prosecutors in Northern Virginia, where U.S. Attorney Paul J. McNulty said he is sought in connection with potential terrorist threats against the United States. A former southern Florida resident and pilot thought to have helped plan the September 11 attacks, El Shukrijumah was among seven suspected al Qaeda operatives identified in May by Attorney General John Ashcroft as being involved in plans to strike new targets in the United States. Citing "credible intelligence from multiple sources," Mr. Ashcroft said at the time that El Shukrijumah posed "a clear and present danger to America." In August, an FBI alert described him as "armed and dangerous" and a major threat to homeland security.
I agree..I doubt El Shukrijumah and his ilk are shaking in their boots, as this "roundup" was small in comparison to the number of its' members. If these cells are as dangerous as posed by Homeland Security with Al-Qaeda ties and multiplying so fast in major U.S. cities, why are they only "soft targets for arrest"?
The White House announced last week that Bush would meet Fox in Texas on March 23 to discuss security and trade issues. Bush will talk, Fox will nod ....and I can't finish the statement; as I have no idea what if anything will come out of it.
Maybe I should send a copy of this to the HPD. They obviously aren't interested in rounding up the illegals. At christmas time, there were gangs roaming Houston from Mexico. They would go into a store and pull out hidden bags, fill them up and then race out of the store to a waiting car. When are they going to lock down the Mexican border. If you think about the number of troops we have in Iraq, and the number of these terrorists known to be in the U.S., is there any doubt we have been invaded.
It's all Bush's fault ...
I have posted this to someone else...but, we have what 150,000 troops in Iraq. There are 50,000 of these terrorist that are known. We have been invaded. Yet the Homeland Security Agency acts like it's a SIMPLE immigration problem. Close the borders.
"Close the borders."
Amen.
We have Mexican criminal family cartels operating in my county in northern California. Last year, they busted six gardens of 3,000-6,000 plants with armed attendants. Most were growing on the National Forest. A notebook was found linking them to M13. I was told the armed attendants around harvest time are thought to be AWOL Mexican army.
Indeed. But I guess they've been doing the terrorism that Americans just don't want to do.
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