National security expert Joseph M. Humire warns that Venezuela’s deadly Tren de Aragua gang is “the fastest-growing Transnational Criminal Organization in the world,” and, according to multiple reports, its bloodthirsty members are now operating in American cities such as Miami and Chicago, thanks to President Biden’s catastrophic handling of the U.S. border with Mexico.
Tren de Aragua is “less well known than the Mexican cartels or Mara Salvatrucha, commonly known as MS-13,” the Daily Mail reports, but it is “no less violent.”
“Perhaps, they’re even more so,” the outlet states.
In Florida’s Miami-Dade County, a suspected member of the gang, Yurwin Salazar Maita, 23, was arrested for his role in what is being described as a “honeytrap” murder that left a former Venezuelan police officer dead in Miami.
Citing police records, Local10.com reports that Tren de Aragua members “used women as a lure and worked out of hotels in Medley and near the Miami International Airport.”
According to Local10:
A homicide investigation related to the gang started late last year after a 43-year-old Venezuelan man who lived in Doral turned up dead in his car at about 9:50 a.m., on Nov. 28, near the intersection of Northwest 28 Street and 37 Avenue, court records show.
Women lured the victim at about 10:20 p.m., on Nov. 27, to La Quinta Inn & Suites, at 3501 NW 42 Ave., where a group who was in a silver sedan kidnapped him, robbed him, burglarized his apartment, frightened a victim at his apartment, and took his life, according to an arrest warrant in the case.
The motive?
Sanchez Valera’s relatives say the gang members were trying to gain the former police officer’s trust in order to steal the keys to the safe in which Sanchez Valera stashed his savings in gold, Telemundo reported.
In Chicago, Garry McCarthy, police chief for suburban Willow Springs and former police superintendent for Chicago, confirmed to NBC5 that the gang is operating in the Windy City.
“Whether it’s drug trafficking, smuggling, human trafficking, for sexual exploitation, extortion, all those things that this gang is doing in South America,” McCarthy said.
“Through emails reported by Telemundo Chicago, officers alerted their internal units that ‘the gang has strong human trafficking operations in Latin America and that multiple agencies have confirmed its presence within the United States,'” NBC5 reports.
“The United States Border Patrol confirmed to Telemundo Chicago Investiga that 38 members of the Aragua Train were arrested in six different sectors of the United States border in fiscal year 2023,” according to the outlet. “Although they did not detail exactly which sectors, they did explain that arrests at the border often use biometric checks and background investigations.”
Art Del Cueto, vice president of the Border Patrol union, told Telemundo Chicago Investiga that identifying members of Tren de Aragua is challenging.
“There are individuals who are part of this criminal group, but simply because they do not have a criminal record or anything that can distinguish that they are part of that group, they have also been released within the United States,” he explained.
The threat from the gang, McCarthy said, “is as big as they want because it is as if the world is at their disposal.”
In September 2023, Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro N. Mayorkas announced “the extension and redesignation of Venezuela for Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for 18 months, due to extraordinary and temporary conditions in Venezuela that prevent individuals from safely returning.”
“Temporary protected status provides individuals already present in the United States with protection from removal when the conditions in their home country prevent their safe return,” Mayorkas said at the time. “That is the situation that Venezuelans who arrived here on or before July 31 of this year find themselves in.”
“There are currently approximately 242,700 TPS beneficiaries under Venezuela’s existing TPS designation,” Homeland Security said in September. “There are an additional approximately 472,000 nationals of Venezuela who may be eligible under the redesignation of Venezuela.”
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Melissa Fine is the former executive editor of Casino Player, Strictly Slots, and Poker
Digest magazines. She is a UCLA graduate, news junkie, and dedicated Stargate SG-
1 fan. Melissa currently lives with her dog and two cats in a tiny town in the Sierra
Nevada foothills.
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