Despite denials from public officials in El Paso, Texas, that the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua is not operating there, at least four mobsters have been charged with crimes and three of those migrants have been released from jail, DailyMail.com can reveal.
At least four men associated with the South American syndicate are currently facing criminal charges in El Paso for a crime that is now becoming public thanks to police reports obtained through a public records request by DailyMail.com.
TdA, as the group is known to law enforcement, has infiltrated the United States in recent years, hidden among the million Venezuelan migrants who entered the country during the Biden administration and are responsible for a wave of crime across the country.
However, the mayor downplayed the gang’s threat to El Paso after state police called Texas’ sixth-largest city “ground zero” for TdA in the Lone Star State.
‘There’s been a lot of talk about TdA… that El Paso is ground zero, which is an inaccurate statement, very inaccurate. There has been a known member of TdA,” Mayor Oscar Leeser said during a September 19 press conference.
“There has only been one and the federal government got involved, and they are no longer in the United States.”
However, police documents obtained by DailyMail.com and multiple arrests made by various law enforcement agencies show that there is much more than one TdA member operating in El Paso.
A TdA thug was identified to police as a gang member by his victim.
Néstor José Ochoa Suescun hit his girlfriend, also a Venezuelan migrant, threatening her that “the only way to leave was dead,” while he hit her against doors, the floor, and pointed a gun at her head.
When the woman went to police on September 10, she told investigators she was afraid of him “because he is a violent member of a Venezuelan gang (Tren de Aragua) and has no one else in the United States to trust,” according to the accusation. document states.
Ochoa was released from jail on Sept. 22 after receiving cash bail or bond for two counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, according to court records.
A woman who was savagely beaten told El Paso Police Department investigators that her boyfriend was a member of the ultra-violent Tren de Aragua gang.
The Tren de Aragua gang tattoos (pictured above) were part of a Department of Homeland Security bulletin that was recently shared with federal agents.
In another case, two other men who were caught driving stolen cars are also free.
Police responded to a Super 8 motel in February looking for a truck stolen from Houston that had been tracked across the state to El Paso.
When police arrived, they found Ubaldo Montes Alonso and Yuniel Hernández Alonso trying to get into the truck stolen from the Texas Auto North dealership in Houston.
Investigators discovered that Hernandez Alonso had the car keys to another truck stolen from Austin. He also took a gun that the owner of the truck had left inside.
Both Venezuelans posted bail days after their arrest on February 19.
A fourth migrant, Miguel Eduardo Terán-Moral, is charged with murder after he shot and killed another migrant on July 7.
The victim, Iván Darío Bello Espitia, lived on a property in downtown El Paso that housed several Colombian and Venezuelan immigrants.
Espitia was executed by Terán-Moral after another unidentified man had already been shot once.
Venezuela’s most violent gang, Tren de Aragua, has moved its headquarters across the border from the United States, in the Mexican city of Ciudad Juárez.
El Paso Police Department records document a murder associated with the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua, obtained exclusively by DailyMail.com
Terán-Moral pulled the trigger twice while Espitia lay on the ground.
Witnesses told police the execution was revenge after Terán-Moral believed Espitia had assaulted his friend.
Terán-Moral is accused of murder since Espitia did not survive his injuries. He’s still behind bars.
Presented with evidence from more than one TdA member in El Paso, the Democratic mayor defended his previous statement.
“Based on information provided by local authorities to the mayor, his statement was accurate; at the time, there was only one confirmed member in El Paso,” Leeser’s spokeswoman told DailyMail.com via email.
Texas’ largest city straddling the US-Mexico border has been considered the epicenter of TdA activity by state law enforcement officials.
As DailyMail.com exclusively reported, El Paso’s Mexican sister city, Juarez, is the gang’s new headquarters.
From their base on the doorstep of the United States, gang members shuttle back and forth between the United States and Mexico, federal sources told DailyMail.com.
‘That’s why El Paso is a kind of center of gravity. El Paso…is really ground zero,” DPS Director Steve McCraw revealed in a Press conference on September 16. during which Lone Star State officials declared war on the South American union.
‘Because (TdA) continues to support the Juarez gangs that are dedicated to human trafficking across the border, and fight with us. We deal with them daily in that sense,” he added.
Texas’ sixth-largest city, the busiest border crossing for most of 2022 and 2023, has also been used as an entry point for many TdA members.
Estefanía Primera, 37, was arrested by police in El Paso, Texas, last week.
Federal agents with Homeland Security Investigations in El Paso arrest a member of the Tren de Aragua gang on October 11 in Sunland Park, New Mexico, outside of El Paso.
A group of about 600 migrants crossed the U.S. border in March in El Paso, Texas.
In March, TdA orchestrated a rare border riot, in which a mob of immigrants overwhelmed members of the Texas National Guard, kicking and overpowering armed soldiers at a border crossing in El Paso, the Texas governor said.
It is unclear how many TdA members have been detained specifically in West Texas, but the US Border Patrol has prevented 64 confirmed gangsters from entering the country since March 2023.
However, other federal agencies continue to take TdA members off the streets – such as the On October 11, arrest of a Venezuelan Wanted for murder by Homeland Security Investigations.
While many immigrants, including TdA, simply use El Paso as an entry and exit point, others have stayed and even helped take over the Gateway Hotel, a low-budget place that many of its guests use as a place to live. .