Posted on 01/30/2008 7:22:26 AM PST by SwinneySwitch
A federal grand jury indicted almost two dozen alleged Texas Mexican Mafia members Tuesday on racketeering charges that involve more than 20 slayings in San Antonio, Austin and Atascosa County.
Most of the 23 defendants, part of the state's largest prison gang, already were in custody on lesser or temporary charges.
FBI agents, San Antonio police and members of a gang task force fanned out to arrest the remaining few only hours after the indictment Tuesday, according to law enforcement and legal sources.
The indictment ups the ante, with charges that could result in the death penalty against some of the defendants, if approved by the Justice Department. One lawyer representing some of the defendants said he learned the charges could include murder, racketeering, drug-conspiracy and money laundering.
The indictment, expected to be unsealed today, ends a four-year investigation into the gang, also known as Mexikanemi.
The gang, founded by San Antonio native Heriberto "Herb" Huerta in 1984, has been recognized as the largest in the Texas prison system. It's not directly related to the Mexican Mafia prison gang of California, which started in that state's prison system 50 years ago.
Experts, however, say Huerta was a member in that gang and eventually got permission to start his own version in Texas. He's serving a life sentence in Colorado for racketeering-related charges.
Outside prison, its members have an ominous presence and are blamed for at least 10 percent of San Antonio's total homicide rate, according to insideprison.com, a Web site about prison life in America.
The Web site estimates that the gang has 30,000 members across the United States.
"This is a hit to the latest leadership," one law enforcement source familiar with the probe said. "This investigation was pretty much all over metropolitan Texas."
Most of the targeted members are from the San Antonio area, where the gang is rooted.
The victims, according to sources, include men shot in broad daylight in vehicles, or whose remains were unearthed from remote locations in Bexar and Atascosa counties months or years after they disappeared. Some were shot in public places as dozens of onlookers watched.
The killings began in 2000 and include members, rivals or those indebted to the gang, which is known to enforce a street "tax" of 10 percent so dealers can peddle drugs on gang turf.
Some of the victims had taken precautions, such as wearing bulletproof vests or carrying guns themselves, but still were hit, according to an analysis of prior newspaper reports conducted by the San Antonio Express-News. Some had even been suspects in killings before they ended up with the same fate, sources said.
The crackdown brought debate about the impact it will have on the gang. Some said the renewed prosecution will further weaken the group, which had been targeted four times by federal authorities in the past 15 years, most recently a drug-conspiracy prosecution in 2004 by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and Bexar County Sheriff's Office.
Additionally, law officers conducted the last leg of the current investigation without the help of one of the foremost experts on the gang, San Antonio Police Officer Val Lopez, who died of natural causes in 2006. Lopez went to high school with Huerta.
"As long as I've known them, they've never been secretive about who they are," said Angel Vasquez, who spent 15 years in gang intelligence with the state's parole system and supervised countless gang members. "If you are going to associate with them in any way, you should know what you're getting into."
Lawyer Jesse Rivera, who has represented gang members, including a key government witness who received immunity for six murders in exchange for his testimony that put several gang leaders behind bars in 1998, said he has learned the charges could include murder, racketeering, drug counts and money laundering.
"Apparently, this is the government's latest attempt to put an end to the Texas Mexican Mafia," said Rivera, who represents two clients he declined to name. "I personally believe that the gang is not as powerful as it used to be. I think the government has done a decent job of crippling the gang with its prior indictments and convictions."
Bob Morrill, a former law officer in California and ex-coordinator of one of the largest gang intelligence sections for the Texas prison system, said the gang may rise again as long as opportunities for crime exist.
"As long as you've got street gangs, you'll have a Texas Mexican Mafia," Morrill said. "They continually go into jail, get schooled and go out onto the street and do what they're told to do."
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gcontreras@express-news.net
Ping!
If you want on, or off this S. Texas/Mexico ping list, please FReepMail me.
I read this and thought, “this is scary”, i.e., I doubt law enforcement is up to this in either personnel or material. The reprisal could be a mess!
Street gangs in SA go back more than fifty years when the old Ghost Town gang ruled the projects on the West side.
Some of these gang members are grandsons and great grandsons of those early gang members.
Law enforcement has been playing ‘whack a mole’ ever since.
It MUST stop!
My wife and I recently watched “Waitress,” a clever and sweet little film written and directed by Adrienne Shelly. Shelly was A VERY talented lady who also played a supporting role.
She was senselessly MURDERED in her NY apartment on November 1, 2006. Her body was found hanging by a sheet from a shower rod – by her husband. She was 40 and left behind a 3 year-old daughter who will never know her real mother.
A 19 YEAR OLD EQUADORIAN — AN ILLEGAL WHO SHOULD NEVER HAVE EVEN BEEN IN THE COUNTRY IN THE FIRST PLACE (THANK YOU CLINTON AND BUSH) — CONFESSED TO HER MURDER.
They are killing 25 of us every day.
IT WILL STOP WHEN THE MORONS IN WASHINGTON GET AS SERIOUS ABOUT THE ILLEGAL INVASION AS THEY ARE ABOUT HARASSING NATIVE BORN CITIZENS AT THE AIRPORTS.
(AND, YES, I INTENDED TO SHOUT BECAUSE I’M MAD AS HELL AND NOT GONNA TAKE ANY MORE OF THIS CRAP!)
How about you???
I’ve been a regular at local congressional town hall meetings for a few dozen years and noted that starting around 10 years ago, the majority of those there were angry that nothing was being done about the illegal invasion.
Why are we still waiting for the clowns in Malfunction Junction – who can produce convoluted legislative proposals to line their pockets or deliver pork back home and ram it through in the dark of night – to secure our national borders?
Perhaps YOU should get on over to those pre-election public meetings and raise some serious hell – before YOU die at the hands of someone who ought not even BE HERE!
We have enough indigenous criminals. WE SURE AS HELL DON’T NEED TO IMPORT MORE.
I’m sure some of these punks are illeglas but, most are generational homegrown Homies.
Which simply begs the question I asked:
“IF we already have out-of-control HOME-GROWN crime problems (and we do), why the hell are we IMPORTING MORE??”
Which will fail as long as this idiot War On (some) Drugs continues.
L
Because criminals from other countries see how easy it is to get into this country with little consequence. They blend into society and do their dirty deeds. If it gets too hot for them, they just hightail it back to where ever.
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