Four Mexican Mafia-connected gang members from Pomona were found guilty on a slew of charges, including murder and drug trafficking late last week, federal prosecutors announced.
According to evidence presented during the 20-day trial, 68-year-old Michael Lerma, also known as “Pomona Mike” and “Big Mike,” a member of the Mexican Mafia prison gang ordered the murder of a federal inmate at the Metropolitan Detention Center in downtown Los Angeles more than four years ago, prosecutors said in a news release announcing the verdict.
In June 2020, three other inmates, 41-year-old Carlos Gonzalez, 33-year-old Juan Sanchez and 44-year-old Jose Valencia Gonzalez, carried out the fatal hit of the inmate identified only as S.B. in court documents.
“The defendants murdered S.B. in retaliation for S.B. failing to pay drug theft debts deemed owed to Lerma’s cell of the Mexican Mafia prison gang,” the release noted.
Authorities added that for more than eight years, from Feb. 2012 to June 2020, Lerma controlled Latino street gangs in and around Pomona, as well as Latinos in Calipatria State Prison in Imperial County, and extorted drug proceeds from them.
“Members of Lerma’s criminal enterprise also engaged in robberies, identity theft and fraud, drug trafficking and other acts of violence,” prosecutors said.
All four men, who have been in federal custody since 2018, were guilty by a jury of racketeering, conspiracy to commit violent crimes in aid of racketeering, murder and first-degree murder.
Lerma and Valencia Gonzalez were also found guilty of conspiracy to distribute controlled substances at MDC and in the Pomona area. Both Gonzalez and Valencia Gonzalez were found guilty of being felons in possession of a firearm and ammunition, while Sanchez was found not guilty of the same charge.
“This case makes it clear that gang violence by Mexican Mafia members and associates has not only been directed from the streets, but also from prisons in California,” said Akil Davis, the Assistant Director in Charge of the FBI’s Los Angeles Field Office. “This lengthy investigation exemplifies the commitment by agencies at the federal, state and local level who’ve collaborated for several years on a task force to arrive at justice in this case.”
This is the 16th conviction in the case, including the conviction of 62-year-old Pomona resident Cheryl Perez-Castaneda, a high-level associate of Lerma’s and “señora” who used her power on the street to solicit murder. She is serving a 12-year prison sentence.
A 43-year-old woman from La Verne was also sentenced to more than seven years in prison for her role as Lerma’s “secretary,” where she facilitated a 2013 armed robbery and was involved extortion and narcotics distribution.
A sentence hearing for the four men is expected to be scheduled in the coming months, at which point the defendants will face a mandatory sentence of life in federal prison, prosecutors said.
