Hanrahan, 39, is currently in Pelican Bay State Prison serving a 13-year sentence on drug charges. For the FBI, infiltrating such an organization from the outside was virtually impossible. As quoted in Newsweek magazine, p. 13 (June 30, 1986). He later admitted the "golf" trip was to deliver two pounds of methamphetamine to a cousin. The gang has been around since 1965, according to federal prosecutors, started inside Soledad prison to protect Hispanic inmates. The attack occurred in October 1998, after a gangster was shot and wounded as part of a Nuestra Familia internal power struggle in Salinas. 1962(d) Racketeering Conspiracy. Slew of child sexual abuse lawsuits could bankrupt the Diocese of Sacramento, bishop says, ID released of Santa Cruz man killed in Bonny Doon solo crash, Capitola officials share wharf rebuild plans, Weekend solo crash claims life in Pleasure Point, Santa Cruz County supervisors reject Andy Schiffrin Planning Commission nomination, Driver suffers major injuries in Scotts Valley highway crash, Newsom rescinds Californias COVID-19 state of emergency, marking an end to the pandemic era, Former Santa Cruz man victim of fatal Kansas shooting, Cabrillo College appoints Martha Victoria Vega to Area 5 trustee seat, Going with flow: How the Santa Cruz water treatment plant took on Januarys storms. Operation Black Widow Federal law enforcement agencies, long unable to infiltrate Nuestra Familia, began to step up their investigations in the late 1990s. Jorge Salazar and Danny Pereda of San Francisco were also charged. In the aftermath of Operation Black Widow, the five highest-ranking leaders of Nuestra Familia, James "Tibbs" Morado, Joseph "Pinky" Hernandez, Gerald "Cuete" Rubalcaba, Cornelio Tristan, and Tex Marin Hernandez, were transferred to the United States Penitentiary, Florence ADX, the federal supermax prison in Colorado. A preliminary examination in that case is scheduled for April 1. It was not immediately disclosed how many of the 19 remaining defendants were arrested in the law-enforcement sweeps this week. Nevertheless, any sentence following conviction would be imposed by the court only after consideration of the U.S. He also admitted receiving about $7,000 for drugs and other criminal activities with gang members and to participating in other unauthorized drug deals while on the FBI's payroll. While the NF was composed of a relative few, it exercised control and wielded influence over thousands of subordinate gang members in counties and prisons throughout Northern California using such regiments. Hanrahan was a Nuestra Familia leader from Salinas who oversaw drug-dealing crews in that city and conveyed orders to the Nuestra Familias Watsonville regiment. Despite being locked down 23 hours a day in the prison's Security Housing Unit, gang leaders have used elaborate communication systems to send out orders, including writing coded messages disguised as love letters, using urine as invisible ink and sending letters marked "legal mail" to a nonexistent law firm in San Francisco, FBI records show. The investigation into the outfit, which had been going on since 1997, got a break in December 2000, when Daniel "Lizard" Hernandez facing life in prison for charges that included murder plots in the course of a RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations) enterprise contacted the Special Services Unit of the California Department of Corrections to talk about becoming an informer. Following that, the television news show " 60 Minutes " asked if a prison exists that can actually isolate the hardened criminal leaders. Huerta is known among gang members as the wife of Joseph "Pinky" Hernandez, one the Nuestra Familia"s top leaders serving a life sentence in a Colorado "supermax" prison. While the recognized leaders of Nuestra Familia in Pelican Bay ask that members respect the former leaders, they have been effectively stripped of their authority. Zilversmit accuses the government of knowing that the murder was going to happen, but doing nothing to either stop it or warn the victim that he was in danger, and he says the money raised from drug and gun deals, as well as robberies and extortion ordered by Hernandez, went to the FBI, not the gang. The indictment handed down onAugust 25, 2021, and unsealed today, catalogues a litany of crimes allegedly directed by the Nuestra Familias command structure incarcerated in California prisons. State gang experts credit the Nuestra Familia with about 1,000 killings since it began in the late 1960s, with Norteo gang members claiming hundreds more lives. This book on the prison gang, Nuestra Familia is very in depth and gives a firsthand true account of one man's life in the gang. IRS delays tax deadline for Bay Area, but California has not followed: What should you do? In 2000 and 2001, 22 members were indicted on Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) charges, including several who were allegedly serving as high-ranking gang leaders . Credit: Janjaap Dekker FBI informant Daniel Hernandez at a Nuestra Familia gang meeting in Rohnert Park. Salazar was arrested by FBI agents on Thursday and Pereda was due to be released soon from a federal prison. One "test" a prospective member must pass to join Nuestra Familia is to have committed at least one murder for "the cause," according to a gang investigator with the state Corrections Department as well as Al Valdez, an investigator with the Orange County district attorney's office and a gang consultant with the state attorney general's office. The trial of Heredia and the other defendants is scheduled to begin in January. San Francisco, CA 94102, San Francisco: (415) 436-7200 The NF is alleged in the indictment to be a criminal enterprise that was created to organize, protect, discipline, profit from, and maintain the allegiance of gang members on the streets of and within custodial facilities in California. The indictment is the product of a three-year investigation called "Operation Black Widow" that involved the FBI, U.S. The arrests made yesterday, most significantly the arrests of the Nuestra Familia leadership, will severely cripple the ability of this criminal enterprise (and) disrupt the communications and organization structure of a criminal network that has terrorized our neighborhoods for far too long.. They do not have to get involved in this., Seave said the operation fits perfectly into the Ceasefire strategy. You cant win this fight.. Local authorities hope the arrests will cripple the gangs grip on younger gang members in the area and make existing gang-violence intervention efforts, such as Ceasefire, more effective. Government agents knew that working with such violent criminals was risky. This is not done yet.. He has to in order to maintain credibility.". Such would prove the case with Hernandez, who was paid $52,200 over seven months. Among the six men and women indicted March 10 on charges of conspiring to distribute methamphetamine, cocaine and marijuana for the gang were Castroville resident Carolyn Huerta, as well as Salinas residents Robert Bubba Hanrahan, Juan Wino Gallegos and Rebecca Guzman. The allegations about the way Operation Black Widow handled the case are based on information from the government's discovery documents, Zilversmit said. In scale and ambition, the operation dwarfs the two largest cases against the Nuestra Familia: Operation Black Widow ended in 2005, and Operation Valley Star led to a massive trial just under way in a Sacramento federal court. Stats to follow: THE FEDERAL PROSECUTION. [14] At the time of Operation Black Widow, law enforcement officials had estimated that Nuestra Familia was responsible for at least 600 murders in the previous 30 years. 846, 841(a)(1), (b)(1)(B) Conspiracy to Distribute and Possess with Intent to Distribute Methamphetamine. "If (suspects) commit a single overt act that furthers the conspiracy -- buying a gun or a car, for example -- that's enough to arrest them. The FBI has declined to issue any comment on the Black Widow investigation. When he left prison, he became Nuestra Familia's "street liaison commander" in charge of all the gang's operations outside prison, according to court documents. In legal motions filed over the past four weeks, defense attorneys for 15 alleged members of the Nuestra Familia the prison gang that governs the Northern California-based Norteo and. Informant Daniel Hernandez, a former Nuestra Familia leader, is expected to be a star witness in the federal trial under way in San Francisco. IRS delays tax deadline for Bay Area, but California has not followed: What should you do? [23], On June 11, 2013, Santa Clara County district attorney Jeff Rosen announced the indictment of 48 Nuestra Familia associates on 77 felony charges ranging from drug dealing to murder. He was convicted of. An ambitious multi-agency operation aimed at dismantling the Central Coast leadership structure of the Nuestra Familia gang resulted in more than three dozen arrests during sweeps early Thursday. But to those who choose to stop the violence, there are available resources to help them. Assistant U.S. Attorney Jason Hitt said the case against the newly indicted six grew stronger as the Valley Star trial unfolded last fall. Very seldom a white face will have a black mind.Nikki Giovanni (b. both faced life sentences in the FBI's sweeping Operation Black Widow conspiracy case in 2000. Informants, he said, will always be an essential part of investigations. The three Generals of the gangs leadership council were identified as David DC Cervantes, Antonio Chuco Guillen, and James Conejo Perez. Upon being paroled after serving more than six years for assault, he would become a paid informant and would not be prosecuted for racketeering in the current federal case in San Francisco, according to his agreement with the FBI and the U.S. attorney's office. In April 2010, federal and local law enforcement agencies concluded what was considered the most significant effort to dismantle the Central Coast leadership structure of Nuestra Familia. At first, Hernandez came through, providing hours of incriminating tapes. A lock ( For years, investigators have observed Huerta visiting Hernandez in jails and prisons and then delivering messages to local gang members. If I betray you, kill me.. Salcido was convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison. The indictment charges all seven of the members who make up the Nuestra Familias ruling body: the General Council, said Acting U.S. Attorney Hinds. ", Hernandez then lectures Ramirez about how sometimes "we look the other way" when others are selling drugs, though "when they come and try to take over, that's different. Before Ybarra and other gang members arrived at Gallegos' apartment, police parked a patrol unit near the building, according to police and FBI documents. On Nov. 30, 2001, FBI agents overseeing Hernandez wrote in one of their final reports: "Source (Hernandez) participated in unauthorized criminal activity while under the direction of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. U.S. Attorney Steven Gruel declined to comment on whether the informant might lose his protection from prosecution, because Hernandez, by his own admission, violated terms of the agreement in which he said he would not lie to his handlers, commit new crimes, or keep any illegally earned assets. While the Mexican Mafia had initially been created to protect Mexicans in prison, there was a perceived level of abuse by members of La eMe towards the imprisoned chicanos from rural farming areas of Northern California. The attorney is asking for the charges against his client, Heredia, to be dismissed, and the attorneys for 23 other defendants in the case have joined the filing, asking that all charges be dismissed. A decade ago, the FBI"s Operation Black Widow targeted the gang"s top leaders in Pelican Bay State Prison, as well as its out-of-prison regiment commanders for Salinas and other agricultural. Operation Quiet Storm, as dubbed by the FBIs San Francisco area field office, yielded 17 indictments and 55 charged defendants, prompting an array of regional agencies including the FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration, the Santa Clara County Sheriffs Office and San Jose Police Department to serve high-risk arrest warrants Wednesday. The defendants charged in the alleged racketeering conspiracy include the following: 18 U.S.C. The gangsters stopped in front of an apartment building, and Nuestra Familia member Paul Salcido and an associate got out of the car and ducked into an alley. "I find it to be a horse of a different color from using a low-level informant. And John Boxer Mendoza wasn't some minor player, he was right up there under the top generals in the gang, working for them and implementing Nuestra Family policy. Deputy Chief Kelly McMillin said more of Ceasefires signature call-in meetings will be held in coming weeks in an effort to keep potential spikes in violence at bay. At the time of Operation Black Widow, law enforcement officials had estimated that Nuestra Familia was responsible for at least 600 murders in the previous 30 years. [11], Members of Nuestra Familia are known to wear red bandanas ("red rags") to identify themselves. Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information. Sentencing Guidelines and the federal statute governing the imposition of a sentence, 18 U.S.C. Dzubay said that although resisting arrest is usually a misdemeanor, authorities elevated it to a felony because an enhancement charge alleged she committed her crime for the benefit of a criminal street gang.. The gangs targeted in this operation are responsible for much of the illicit drug distribution and violent crime that has plagued areas in the South Bay, Salinas and the Central Valley for years, Fair said. Eventually, three new generals came to power at Pelican Bay, yet two were demoted, . The indictment outlines that the Nuestra Familia used hierarchical and paramilitary structures to control thousands of California gang members and counties across Northern California even while most of the top leadership was incarcerated.. "Nuestra Familia will be back," says law enforcement gang consultant and former Modesto Police Officer Jared Lewis. Nuestra Familia's new leadership General: David "DC" Cervantes Top Commanders: Daniel "Stork" Perez, of Salinas; Anthony "Chuco" Guillen, of San Jose; George "Puppet" Franco, of San Jose Demoted: Jose "Huerito" Gonzalez; James "Conejo" Perez Copyright 2008 Monterey County Herald Copyright 2013 LexisNexis, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. 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