Alleged MS-13 gang members charged with new killings in Queens, Long Island, U.S. Attorney says

A 49-count indictment unsealed in federal court Monday in Brooklyn added new charges to those already pending against two national MS-13 leaders and other gang members, including six from Long Island, related to three murders in Queens and on Long Island, the U.S. Department of Justice announced.

The superseding indictment additionally charges Edenilson Velasquez Larin, 35, of Thornton, Colorado, and Hugo Diaz Amaya, 36, of Kansas City, Kansas, with the 2022 Nassau County killing of MS-13 Sailors clique member Oswaldo Gutierrez Medrano, 20.

It also charges Velasquez Larin and MS-13 Fulton clique member Jose Espinoza Sanchez, 25, of Carrboro, North Carolina, with ordering the 2016 killing of Kenney Reyes, 18, in Uniondale, and the killing of Eric Monge on Sept. 6, 2020, in Queens. Officials said other members of the Fulton clique previously charged have now also been charged with the murders of Reyes, Monge and Gutierrez Medrano.

"As these charges make clear, our pursuit of those responsible will not be deterred by the passage of time or by the leaders of MS-13's futile attempts to hide in the shadows," U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York Breon Peace said in a statement.

In a statement Monday, officials noted extensive court filings allege MS-13 is "an extraordinarily violent street gang" operating through a series of cliques or chapters on Long Island, as well as in Queens and in communities across the United States, Honduras and El Salvador, in addition to a host of other countries in the Americas and in Europe. Officials said MS-13 "primarily makes money through drug trafficking and extortion" — and is "known for its gruesome murders of perceived gang rivals and gang members and associates who have violated the gang's rule."

Responsible for what the U.S. Attorney's Office said have been "dozens of murders" in the Eastern District jurisdiction alone, officials said since 2021 virtually all MS-13 cliques in the United States have been "united under a single hierarchy known as the 'U.S. Program.'"

That program has been led, officials said, by a group of senior gang leaders, most incarcerated, known as "La Mesa" — or, "The Table."

Officials allege that Velasquez Larin, known as "Agresor," "Saturno," "Tiny," "Erick" and "Paco," and Diaz Amaya, who was known as "Splinter" and as "21," were La Mesa members operating outside of prison prior to their arrests — Velasquez Larin in Colorado; Diaz Amaya in Kansas.

Susan Gail Kellman, the Brooklyn-based defense attorney representing Velasquez Larin, was not available for comment Monday afternoon. A spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York said an attorney has not yet been assigned to Diaz Amaya for these new charges.

As alleged in the filings unsealed Monday, Espinoza Sanchez befriended Reyes, who had come to the United States from Honduras, learning he had been associated with the 18th Street gang, a rival of MS-13. Along with Velasquez Larin, the indictment charges Espinoza Sanchez and other Nassau County members of MS-13 plotted to murder Reyes — Velasquez Larin and Espinoza Sanchez luring the teen to a wooded area in Nassau to smoke marijuana on May 23, 2016. Once there, officials said, the two attacked Reyes with machetes, killing him, then buried his body.

Over the course of the next many years, officials said, the two bragged to MS-13 members about their roles in the murder.

The new unsealed charges also allege that Velasquez Larin and Espinoza Sanchez ordered the murder of Monge — and charges Jose Guevara Aguilar, Jose Arevalo Iraheta and Erick Zavala Hernandez for their participation in that murder. According to the indictment, Guevara Aguilar and Oscar Hernandez Baires shot and killed Monge as he sat in the front passenger seat of his parked car in Queens during the early morning hours of Sept. 6, 2020. The case broken open when a hat dropped at the scene by a fleeing Guevera Aquilar was later traced to him through DNA.

Also as part of the newly unsealed superseding indictment, Velasquez Larin and Diaz Amaya are charged with ordering the murder of Gutierrez Medrano, luring him to a Nassau meeting with other MS-13 members under the false pretense he'd be receiving a promotion in the gang.

Instead, officials said, Gutierrez Medrano was attacked with machetes and knives at that Feb. 13, 2022, meeting — his body dismembered and buried in a wooded area.

Since 2003, officials said hundreds of MS-13 members have been prosecuted and convicted in the Eastern District. Since 2009, the office has obtained indictments related to more than 70 murders.

The current case is the result of an extensive investigation carried out by the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force, a multiagency investigative arm whose principal mission is "to identify, disrupt and dismantle the most serious drug trafficking, weapons trafficking and money laundering organizations" responsible for fueling the nation's illegal drug supply.

With Nicholas Grasso

By John Valenti

john.valenti@newsday.com

John Valenti, a reporter at Newsday since 1981, has been honored nationally by the Associated Press and Society of the Silurians for investigative, enterprise and breaking news reporting, as well as column writing, and is the author of “Swee'pea,” a book about former New York playground basketball star Lloyd Daniels. Valenti is featured in the Emmy Award-winning ESPN 30-for-30 film “Big Shot.”