Three alleged members of MS-13 have been charged with murdering a former member of the gang while that man, who was cooperating with law enforcement, was on the phone with authorities reporting that he was in danger.
The victim, whose name was not released, was working with “law enforcement on a federal racketeering and methamphetamine trafficking case,” the U.S. Justice Department said in a news release.
He was shot to death at a South Los Angeles grocery store on Feb. 18, and three alleged members of Mara Salvatrucha — the full name of MS-13 — from South Los Angeles are charged with murder in aid of racketeering in two separate indictments.
Reports from February indicate 47-year-old Herlyn Barrientos Funez was killed at Superior Grocers at the intersection of 91st and Figueroa streets in what officers called a gang-related shooting.
One of the indictments concerns Roberto Carlos Aguilar, a 30-year-old from El Salvador who the DOJ says is in the U.S. illegally. He had “what appeared to be a chance encounter” with the victim, who was known to the gang as a government cooperator, at the store about an hour before the killing, authorities said.
“Following that encounter, Aguilar set in motion a series of events that led to [two other MS-13 members] shooting and killing the victim,” the DOJ said.
Those other members, 26-year-old Dennis Anaya Urias and 25-year-old Grevil Zelaya Santiago, were charged together after they allegedly shot the victim.
Urias, a legal permanent resident, and Santiago, who has a pending visa application, may have needed a pair of attempts to kill the victim, as he made two calls to authorities.
In the first call, he told authorities that he had been speaking with members of the gang when “a man whose face was covered approached and tried to shoot him, but the gun did not fire.”
“At one point during the second telephone call, several gunshots were heard,” the release said.
Prosecutors allege that Aguilar, Urias and Santiago all “either avoided discipline or enhanced their status within MS-13” through their role in the death of their former fellow gang member.
All three are being held without bond ahead of their June 3 arraignments.
If convicted, the men face mandatory minimum sentences of life in prison and the possibility of a death sentence.
