By Maria Ortiz
19 Jul 2024, 20:58 PM EDT
The last of 18 members of the La Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) gang charged in Tennesseein connection with a multi-year investigation by federal, state and local authorities fHe was sentenced on Thursdaythe Department of Justice (DOJ) reported in a statement
Eighteen members of the Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) gang have been sentenced in a Tennessee court (USA) to sentences of between 2 years in prison and life imprisonment, for ten murders, several attempted murders, as well as other serious crimes, committed in that state between 2014 and 2017.
All those sentenced were part of a gang they called Thomson Place Locos Salvatruchaformed by Salvadoran and Central American individuals, dedicated to blackmail, robbery, kidnapping and drug trafficking.
Throughout its three years of activity, until its dismantling, This MS-13 cell killed ten people, almost all of them members of rival gangs or petty criminals. who had not paid a drug debt, although in some cases they were members of the gang itself who had broken one of the internal rules: never cooperate with justice or betray other members.
Usually, the murders were committed by shooting, sometimes in a bar or nightclub and sometimes after road chases, but in some cases they reached extremes of particular cruelty, such as when they burned one of their victims alive inside their vehicle.
Two of the convicted, Jorge Flores (31 years old) and Kevin Tidwell (30), were sentenced to life imprisonment, with other additional sentences of several years; the others (all men, except one woman) were sentenced to sentences of between one and 55 years.
MS-13, which was born in the 1990s among Salvadoran immigrants, over the years expanded its activities throughout the United States, Mexico and Central America.
The Department of Justice reminds that the band’s ‘code of honor’ forces them to fight or kill anyone who shows disrespect for the gang’s authority, power or reputation, or who challenges its control in a neighborhood, and stresses that The usual method of entry into the gang is to commit murder to prove one’s worth..
“The safety of our communities is paramount and TBI remains committed to pursuing, alongside our law enforcement partners, these violent individuals who engage in dangerous and illegal activities,” said Tennessee Bureau of Investigation (TBI) Director David Rausch.
This prosecution was part of an operation by the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF).
Keep reading:
– A high-ranking MS-13 leader was indicted for terrorism in New York
– MS-13’s main supplier of drugs and weapons in Honduras extradited to the US
– Mother sues government for $100 million for rape and murder of her daughter by MS-13 member