MS-13's Leniz 'La Diablita' Escobar, convicted of luring 4 young men to their deaths in 2017, won't get new trial
Victims Jefferson Villalobos, 18, of Florida; Michael Lopez, 20, of Brentwood, Jorge Tigre, 18, of Bellport, and Justin Llivicura, 16, of East Patchogue. Credit: Family handouts
The MS-13 gang associate known as “La Diablita,” who was convicted of luring four young men to their hacking deaths at a Central Islip park in 2017, won’t be granted a new trial, a federal judge has ruled.
U.S. Circuit Judge Joseph F. Bianco, in a memorandum and order issued Monday, rejected a motion for a new trial from attorneys for Leniz Escobar, who argued that prosecutors failed to disclose information about a key government witness who may have testified falsely that could have been presented to the trial jury.
Escobar, then 22 and known as "La Diablita," or "Little Devil," was found guilty in 2022 of racketeering and murder in aid of racketeering on the fifth anniversary of the four victims’ April 2017 hacking deaths.
Escobar’s attorney had sought to have her conviction overturned and have her granted new trial, arguing that the prosecution’s failure to turn over the information constituted a Brady violation. The government’s cooperating witness Sergio Vladimir Segovia-Pineda lied when he testified at trial that he wasn’t present when another MS-13 member raped a female gang associate months before the killings, Escobar’s attorney, Jesse M. Siegel, has argued.
Federal prosecutors had conceded that the material, which consisted of notes from an interview with an unnamed cooperator who said that Segovia-Pineda was present when a woman was raped, should have been provided to the defense before the trial. But they argued that the disclosure would not have changed the outcome of the trial, and therefore the delay in providing the information does not constitute a Brady violation, which requires a “reasonable probability” that a different verdict would have resulted had the information been disclosed.
“In sum, a new trial is unwarranted on the alleged Brady violation, as well as the alleged use of perjured testimony, because it is abundantly clear based upon the overwhelming evidence of Escobar's guilt on each count that there is no reasonable probability or likelihood that the impeachment material regarding Cooperating Defendant #l's statements about Segovia-Pineda's involvement in a rape and/or Segovia-Pineda's allegedly perjured testimony on that issue could have affected the jury's verdict in this case,” Bianco wrote in his order.
“We are disappointed in the decision," Siegel, of Manhattan, said. "Now we will prepare for sentencing.”
Bianco also rejected the defense’s argument for a new trial based on alleged newly discovered exculpatory evidence in the form of testimony from a co-conspirator that Escobar cried after the attack.
“A new trial is unwarranted because there is no likelihood that this potential testimony could have impacted the jury's verdict,” Bianco said in his decision.
Escobar faces up to life in prison when she is sentenced.
Killed in the April 11, 2017, attack were: Jorge Tigre, 18, of Bellport; Justin Llivicura, 16, of East Patchogue; Michael Lopez, 20, of Brentwood; and Lopez’s cousin Jefferson Villalobos, 18, of Pompano Beach, Florida.
Leniz "La Diablita" Escobar. Credit: USANYE
Escobar, who was dating an MS-13 leader at the time of the killings, was both the “bait” that lured the young men to the scene and a “mastermind” who helped plot the crime, prosecutors said at trial. Escobar wanted to enhance her stature as a gang associate, prosecutors argued.
Escobar and her co-conspirator, Keyli Gomez, who also testified as a cooperating government witness, lured the young men, along with their friend Alexander Artiaga-Ruiz, with the promise to smoke marijuana. Escobar had a week earlier reported photos of Artiaga-Ruiz making gang signs on social media, and knew the fate awaiting him and his friends, according to trial testimony.
Artiaga-Ruiz escaped 14 attackers, who were armed with machetes, blades and a chisel, by jumping a fence and a stone wall and later led police to the victims’ remains.
Nicole Fuller is Newsday's senior criminal justice reporter. She began working at Newsday in 2012 and previously covered local government.
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