A Venezuelan gang took over an apartment complex in Colorado more than a year ago, according to a report by a Denver law firm.
The Tren de Aragua, a criminal group from Venezuela, has had a “stranglehold” on the Whispering Pines Apartments in Aurora since late 2023, the law firm Perkins Coie said in a letter to Aurora officials.
The firm found that the gang has engaged in assaults, death threats, extortion and even child prostitution, as reported by CBS Colorado News.
The law firm was hired by the lender of Whispering Pines Apartments, 1357 Helena Street, to investigate the alleged takeover and claims the gang has been extorting “rent” from people who moved into vacant units.
According to the apartment manager, the empty units were used to hold “parties” where the gang offered “drugs and child prostitution,” adding that “minors are a good source of money.”
The Aurora Police Department has denied claims that the complex has been overrun by gangsters.
Footage from a resident of the Aurora complex appeared to show gunmen knocking on the door of an apartment, heightening fears that the Tren de Aragua gang was in control of the complex.
The Tren de Aragua, a criminal group from Venezuela, has had a “stranglehold” on the Whispering Pines Apartments in Aurora since late 2023, the law firm Perkins Coie said in a letter to Aurora officials.
However, the report, released in August, says that “Tren de Aragua has threatened to kill (and, in certain cases, has apparently actively attempted to kill) members of Whispering Pines management.”
In November 2023, a consultant for the complex’s management company was allegedly beaten and trampled so badly by gang members that he had to go to the hospital.
The gang’s activities intensified this year, with a housekeeper claiming in April 2024 that two individuals “went into an apartment, came out with large firearms and came to kill (the property manager).”
The property manager said the two men were gang members and were arrested as they were about to kill him.
The manager also claimed that “gang members allegedly stabbed a Whispering Pines resident for refusing to pay ‘rent’ to the gang.”
He told the law firm that in June the mobsters offered to help him if he paid them 50 percent of the funds raised in rent.
A housekeeper reported that a gang member told her: “This is our business plan… If he (the property manager) doesn’t like it, we’ll fill him with bullets.”
Four alleged members of the Tren de Aragua gang were arrested in Aurora in connection with an attempted murder in July
Former U.S. Attorney T. Markus Funk wrote: “The evidence we have reviewed indicates that gang members are involved in flagrant violations of private property, assault and battery, human trafficking and sexual abuse of minors, illegal possession of firearms, extortion, and other criminal activities, often targeting vulnerable Venezuelan and other immigrant populations.”
The Whispering Pines Apartments has 54 apartments with rents ranging from $1450 to $2000 per month.
Four alleged members of the Tren de Aragua gang were arrested in Aurora in connection with an attempted murder in July.
ICE officials told Fox News that the four are undocumented immigrants who were detained and released after crossing the Texas border.
However, Aurora police said the gang had not taken over any buildings, and city officials said the buildings, along with two other apartment complexes, were abandoned due to the negligence of the property manager, CBZ Management.
On a visit to the apartments where the gunmen were filmed, interim Aurora Police Chief Heather Morris said the gang members had not taken control and were not collecting rent. The comments came after Aurora Mayor Mike Coffman said “criminal elements” had taken over some unspecified buildings and were extorting residents.
Aurora Police Officer Matthew Longshore reiterated in an email to The Associated Press on Thursday that the agency has confirmed residents are not paying rent to gang members, but has found that apartment managers are no longer sending representatives to the complex.
The city of Aurora is already taking legal action against Zev Baumgarten with CBZ for “years of negligence in the treatment of properties and numerous code violations” after another building he managed in Aurora was condemned as uninhabitable. Its residents were evicted in mid-August. Trials against Baumgarten, which had been scheduled for August and September, have been delayed by at least six months.
Among the nearly 1 million Venezuelan migrants who have entered the United States in recent years have been suspected gang members linked to police shootings, human trafficking and other crimes. However, there is no evidence that the gang has established an organizational structure in the United States, Jeremy McDermott, co-director of Colombia-based InSight Crime, told the AP this summer. McDermott recently published a report on the expansion of the Aragua Train.
Many of the immigrants from Venezuela and other Latin American countries who live in the Aurora complex say there are no gangs there and that they are unfairly portrayed as criminals.
Residents fear they could be evicted, but the city said Wednesday there were no immediate plans to pursue that option.
“The only criminal here is the owner of the building,” Moises Didenot, a native of Venezuela, said through a translator at a news conference in a dusty courtyard of the complex on Tuesday.
He showed reporters some mice he recently caught with sticky traps in the basement apartment he shares with his wife and 11-year-old daughter. Only two of the stovetop burners work, the ceiling fan is missing a blade, and as soon as the bathtub is cleaned, mold quickly returns, he said.
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