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“MS-13 is responsible for a wave of death and violence that has terrorized communities, leaving neighborhoods on Long Island and throughout the Eastern District of New York awash in bloodshed,” Acting U.S. Attorney Seth D. DuCharme said in a statement. More than a dozen of the highest ranking leaders of the notorious transnational gang MS-13 have been charged, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. Earlier today, an indictment was unsealed in Central Islip, New York charging 14 of the world’s highest-ranking MS-13 leaders who are known today as the Ranfla Nacional, which operated as the Organization’s Board of Directors,...

How do armed, nonstate actors such as criminal organizations affect economic growth? Nikita Melnikov, Carlos Schmidt-Padilla, and Maria Micaela Sviatschi explore this question in Gangs, Labor Mobility, and Development (NBER Working Paper 27832), a study of how two of the world’s largest gangs, MS-13 (also known as Mara Salvatrucha) and 18th Street (also known as Barrio 18) affect socioeconomic development in El Salvador. The researchers study a natural experiment that occurred in the 1990s. Before 1997, El Salvador did not have any powerful gangs. In that year, the United States began implementing an immigration policy that made it easier to...

Today, senior law enforcement officials from the United States, El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras announced criminal charges in Central America against more than 700 members of transnational cr57's postiminal organizations, primarily MS-13 and 18th Street gangs, which resulted from a one-week coordinated law enforcement action under Operation Regional Shield (ORS).ORS began in 2017 and is a Justice Department-led initiative to combat transnational organized crime that brings together gang prosecutors and investigators from El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico and the United States. Through quarterly meetings, this group has coordinated multi-country investigations and simultaneous takedowns throughout the region. Authorities also announced the...

An appeals court affirmed a 55-year prison term Tuesday for a member of the MS-13 gang who organized the killings of four teenagers in a Long Island park when he was 15 — but it also expressed regret that the end of parole for federal prisoners means he won’t have incentive to reform. A panel of the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the prosecution of Josue Portillo, now 19, is a “classic illustration of the unfortunate consequences” of a decision by Congress that eliminated parole for federal prisoners sentenced in or after 1987. The ruling, written by...

Justice Amy Coney Barrett Confirmation a Victory for the U.S. Constitution. Biden ‘Unmasked’ General Flynn – Judicial Watch Sues for Answers Burisma Lobbying Firm Tied to Democrats Met with U.S. Officials New Strzok-Page Emails Show ‘Missing’ Meeting Entries Overwhelming Majority of MS-13 Defendants are in U.S. Illegally New Judicial Watch Book Set to Debut on New York Times Best Seller List! Justice Amy Coney Barrett Confirmation a Victory for the U.S. Constitution. Justice Amy Coney Barrett’s confirmation as a United States Supreme Court justice is a great victory for the U.S. Constitution. It is another great victory for constitutional...

In San Antonio, federal, state and local authorities have arrested twelve Texas Mexican Mafia (TMM) members and associates on federal drug charges in connection with a methamphetamine/heroin/cocaine trafficking operation in the San Antonio area, announced U.S. Attorney John F. Bash; Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) Special Agent in Charge Steven S. Whipple, Houston Division; San Antonio Police Chief William McManus; and, Bexar County Sheriff Javier Salazar.A federal grand jury this week returned an eight–count indictment against all twelve defendants (listed below) -- ten who were arrested today and two who were already in custody prior to today.  Charges alleged in...

Five alleged members of the MS-13 street gang in Maryland have been charged in the May murder of a 16-year-old New York girl, according to a report. Baltimore County police said the five suspects lured Gabriela Alejandra Gonzalez Ardon, 16, to Loch Raven Reservoir and killed her because of her possible affiliation with a rival gang. All five suspects — Jonathan Pesquera-Puerto, 19, Edys O. Valenzuella-Rodriguez, 20, Wualter Hernandez-Orellana, 19, Asael Ezequie Gonzalez-Merlos, 16, and Wilson Art Constanza-Galdomez, 21 — are being held without bond.

As national Black Lives Matter demonstrations grow, Latino activists are joining the multiracial protests while trying to draw attention to their deadly police encounters, some of which go back decades. Latino advocates and families of those killed by police say they aren’t trying to pull the focus away from Black lives but want to illustrate their own suffering from policing and systemic racism. Activists say cases from Phoenix to Springfield, Massachusetts, show a pattern of police violence against Latinos like that against Black people. As with the killing of Black men and women, officers rarely face punishment in the deaths...

Six prison guards have been stabbed and left with broken bones after being attacked by 20 inmates in a recreational yard. The guards and two of the inmates were hospitalized following the incident.

The runaway was repeatedly beaten with a baseball bat and forced into prostitution Eleven alleged members of the MS-13 street gang have been charged with sex trafficking after federal prosecutors said a 13-year-old runaway was repeatedly beaten with a baseball bat and forced into prostitution in northern Virginia. A 48-page FBI affidavit claims the girl ran away from a group home in Fairfax in August 2018 with a 16-year-old friend who was connected to MS-13. A child trafficking task force found the girl nearly two months later at an apartment in Mount Rainier, Maryland. The girl told authorities that she...

An investigation led by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Las Vegas resulted in the criminal arrest of 11 members and associates of MS-13 Tuesday in Las Vegas, Nevada, and Los Angeles, California. Another six MS-13 members and associates were also arrested on administrative charges, with criminal charges pending in five of the six cases, for a total of 17 MS-13 arrests made Tuesday in the two cities. HSI was greatly assisted by the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department (LVMPD) and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF). The indictment of 13 individuals was...

Attorney General William Barr announced the indictment of key members of the MS-13 criminal organization as a result of the ongoing Joint Task Force Vulcan initiative in a press release Thursday. The attorney general said two deadly MS-13 operatives were charged in the last week. In the Eastern District Court of Virginia, an MS-13 member was indicted on terrorism charges. In the Eastern District Court of New York, meanwhile, the attorney general has filed a notice of intent to seek the death penalty for another gang member who killed seven people in the span of a year. According to the...

President Trump revealed Wednesday that Attorney General Bill Barr was seeking the federal death penalty for MS-13 gang member Alexi Saenz, who faces multiple murder changes including for the 2016 killings of two New York teenage girls. 'The DOJ has also announced that it will seek the death penalty for a blood-thirsty MS-13 leader responsible for the despicable killing of seven Americans, including two teenage girls,' Trump said in the Oval Office, surrounded by Barr and other law enforcement officials. 'We think the monsters who murder children should be put to death.' Saenz was originally brought into custody in March...

Joint Task Force Vulcan is a Coordinated Effort to Dismantle and Destroy MS-13 Today, President Donald J. Trump and Attorney General William P. Barr announced significant cases related to Joint Task Force Vulcan (JTFV), an initiative launched in August 2019 aimed at disrupting, dismantling, and ultimately, destroying MS-13.President Trump and Attorney General Barr announced a number of significant cases associated with JTFV, including the first time an MS-13 member has been charged with terrorism-related offenses, a coordinated multi-district takedown of the leadership of the Hollywood clique of MS-13, and the Attorney General’s decision to seek the death penalty against...

Oval Office11:32 A.M. EDTTHE PRESIDENT:  Thank you very much.  We have a very important announcement, and we’re going to state some facts and things that have happened recently that are very positive in terms of crime and crime prevention.  This is about MS-13.And we’ll have another announcement next week with the Attorney General, the FBI, and others concerning our cities, because the left-wing group of people that are running our cities are not doing the job that they’re supposed to be doing.  And it’s not a very tough job to do if they knew what they were doing.  So...

Defendants Admitted Orchestrating and Carrying Out Hit on Perceived Rival of Santa Cruz MS-13 Clique SAN JOSE – Tomas Rivera, a/k/a Jonas Portillo Escobar, a/k/a Profugo, a/k/a Caballo, and Alexander Martinez-Flores, a/k/a Pocar, were sentenced to prison for their respective roles in Santa Cruz-based MS-13 gang-related crimes, announced United States Attorney David L. Anderson and Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Special Agent in Charge Tatum King.  Rivera was sentenced today to 27 years in prison for conspiring to engage in racketeering, extortion by force, and murder in aid of racketeering.  Flores was sentenced on June 18, 2020, to 30 years...

Two girls attending a birthday pool party in California were fatally shot and three others were wounded, according to reports.

NEW YORK — Following an investigation by ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) New York with the New York City Police Department (NYPD) and the FBI, four complaints were unsealed Thursday in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York, variously charging 10 members and associates of La Mara Salvatrucha, also known as MS-13, a transnational criminal organization, with murder in-aid-of racketeering, attempted murder, murder conspiracy, related firearms offenses and marijuana distribution conspiracy. This gang investigation was prompted by three murders, occurring on the street, at Kissena Park and on an elevated Subway Platform in Queens. One defendant...

A former leader of a Santa Cruz-level transnational street gang pleaded guilty to federal murder, extortion and other charges this week. Alexander “Pocar” Martinez-Flores was among a dozen men arrested during February 2017 Homeland Security raids around Santa Cruz County and in nearby Daly City. The arrests began as a Santa Cruz Police Department gang investigation in 2011.

The New York City Police Department is warning officers to be "vigilant and alert" following increased "credible" threats toward its officers. Officials are advising all officers to have a heightened awareness "in light of the events that transpired over the past weekend in the Bronx." Officials sent a department-wide email stressing there are "no specific threats against the department," but said desk officers must ensure that every station house security post is assigned and staffed at all times. Law enforcement sources tell ABC News that federal authorities notified the NYPD that they took an alleged MS-13 member in custody that...