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Ten alleged members and associates of the bloodthirsty Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua (TdA) have been indicted in a massive arms and drugs-running operation spanning at least six states and prosecutors said they had plans to expand on an international level to Colombia.
In New York City on Wednesday, police said that one of the accused violent migrant gangbangers broke an NYPD officer’s arm after he got into a scuffle during his arrest.
Authorities seized a cache of 34 illegal guns, including AR-15 assault rifles and a Glock 9mm with a trigger modification making it an automatic, tied to the suspects, Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz said.
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Mugshots of suspected members of the violent Venezuelan Tren de Aragua gang appear over a blurred image of an arrest of an alleged gang member in Denver.
Katz said the TDA gang members were also peddling deadly drugs including pink cocaine, a designer street drug that includes a mixture of ketamine, MDMA and ecstasy.
All ten are migrants – including two women – are from Venezuela and entered the country illegally via the southern border, police said.
This subset of the gang was spearheaded by two Venezuelan nationals who came to New York City two years ago and established a gun-running crew that was also comprised of other foreign nationals.
Enyerbert Blanco, 24, the alleged ringleader, has been in custody in Florida since October after being charged in connection with a human trafficking case involving a 15-year-old girl, Katz said.
“We allege that as members and associates, they trafficked weapons and made money in furtherance of TdA’s agenda and as they seek to establish themselves in New York City, we are individually dismantling them,” Katz said.
Katz said the investigation, dubbed Operation Train Derail, began more than a year ago and was carried out by her office and the NYPD.
Five of the 10 are charged with two counts of criminal sale of a firearm and face up to 25 years in jail if they are convicted.
The remainder are variously indicted on firearm possession charges and other crimes. They face a maximum of 15 years in prison. All ten of them are charged with conspiracy to possess and sell illegal firearms in New York City.
Some of the guns the TDA members were running, according to prosecutors (Queens DA’s Office)
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Four are now in custody in New York City, while four others are behind bars outside the state, including two in Texas and two in Florida. The others are still on the loose. Their illicit operation also spanned Connecticut, Pennsylvania and Colorado, Katz said.
Katz didn’t say whether ICE would be deporting the suspects, insisting she was treating the operation as a gun-running case.
She said that the group were brazen in gun dealings.
“In one instance, the defendant transported an AR-15 wrapped in a black garbage bag for sale in the Bronx County. This buy occurred at 3:45 p.m. in front of a residential building.”
Five other firearm buys – between Oct. 30 through Dec. 10 – took place inside a Target car park in College Point, in Queens.
The going rate for an assault weapon is $2,500 to $2,800, while loaded operable handguns sold between $1,200 and $1,800, she said.
“This group was very entrepreneurial. They really made sure that this business was run like a clock,” Katz said. “They stole firearms that were proceeds of burglaries and car break-ins from other states. They relied on use of rental vehicles to come up the iron pipeline and sell them to people in the city of New York. They were aware that they could make money in the city of New York, and they even discussed potentially smuggling them into Columbia due to the success of this investigation.”
Mugshots of suspected members of the violent Venezuelan Tren de Aragua gang appear over an image of guns from a video that a gang member allegedly shared on WhatsApp.
NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch said that the injured officer is set to have surgery after this week and separate charges will be filed.
“TDA is a dangerous transnational gang that has specialized in murder, trafficking, and mayhem,” NYPD Commissioner Jessica S. Tisch said. “The NYPD will always work with our federal and our local partners to take down international gangs like TDA, who would wreak havoc on this city.”
Some of the TDA members indicted include Wrallan Meza, 27; Leoner Aguilera, 21; Brayant Aguilar, 21; Rosemary Sanchez, 24; Enyerling Zambrano, 29; Alejandro Rondon, 19, and Oscar Sosa, 31.
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The bust in Queens came a day after immigration raids in the Bronx which saw gang member Anderson Zambrano-Pacheco, 26, picked up by Drug Enforcement Administration and U.S. Homeland Security Investigations.
Zambrano-Pacheco is wanted by police in Aurora, Colorado, for first-degree burglary and menacing with a firearm from an Aug. 18, caught-on-camera incident where police say he and five other armed men are accused of breaking into an apartment at gunpoint.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem tells that Zambrano-Pacheco is also wanted in part of a gun weapons exchange and was trying to buy grenades. Police say he’s also been charged with kidnapping, extortion, and menacing.
