By Joe Anuta
Two more members of the violent MS-13 gang’s Flushing chapter have pleaded guilty to assault, racketeering and murder conspiracy charges in Brooklyn federal court.
Abraham “Lobo” Iraheta, 22, copped to racketeering and murder conspiracy charges Monday, while Jose “Travieso” Barrera, 24, admitted to assault with a dangerous weapon charges last Thursday, according to U.S. Attorney Loretta Lynch. They both face up to 20 years behind bars when they are sentenced.
“This office will match MS-13’s dedication to violence with our own unwavering commitment to justice. We have now convicted over 200 MS-13 soldiers and leaders in the Eastern District of New York, and we will work tirelessly until this violent gang is eradicated from the district and elsewhere,” Lynch said in a statement. “This week’s convictions are another important step toward ending the gang’s influence in our communities and bringing a measure of justice to the victims and their families.”
MS-13, or La Mara Salvatrucha, is an international criminal outfit based in El Salvador with a membership primarily comprised of immigrants from El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala, according to Lynch.
The street gang, the largest in the federal court’s jurisdiction, has a violent past in Queens and Long Island.
The Flushing-based cell committed murder, murder conspiracy and attempted murder, Lynch said. Iraheta himself was charged with attacking the father of a rival gang member with a machete and admitted in court to conspiring to murder rival gang members and plotting to kill a disfavored MS-13 associate, according to the attorney’s office.
Barrera copped to stabbing a rival gang’s associate.
Barrera and Iraheta, along with a third MS-13 member from Long Island, mark the final pleas in a group of 10 gang members who were indicted in January 2012.
As a result of that indictment, the leader of the Flushing chapter, Hector Aleman Lemos, was sentenced to 30 years in prison in early August.
Lemos “spread death and destruction throughout his community,” Lynch said in a statement following the sentencing.
The Flushing outfit has a history of shooting innocent people they mistook for rival gang members.
In 2007, Lemos shot and killed 25-year-old John Halley in Yonkers, N.Y., and also shot a 13-year-old who was standing on a Flushing stoop, a location the kingpin suspected was a rival gang hangout, prosecutors said.
An MS-13 member killed an innocent 15-year-old boy Christmas Eve in 2006 outside John Bowne High School, and in 2007 two gangsters murdered 21-year-old Flushing resident Maurice Parker, who they falsely believed to be a rival.
Reach reporter Joe Anuta by e-mail at januta@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718-260-4566.
