(Reuters) – Dozens of Boston-area residents linked to the Central American-based MS-13 street gang were being rounded up by law enforcement authorities yesterday after their indictments on racketeering conspiracy charges related to murders and other crimes, federal prosecutors said.
The indictment of 56 members, leaders and associates of “one of the largest criminal organizations in the United States” alleges that several of the accused played a role in the murders of at least five people since 2014 in Chelsea, Massachusetts, and East Boston, as well as at least 14 attempted murders.
In Massachusetts, MS-13 is largely composed of immigrants and descendants of immigrants from El Salvador, recruited through intimidation in local high schools in towns with heavy concentrations of residents with ties to Central America, prosecutors said.
“Violence is a central tenet of MS-13, as evidenced by its core motto – ‘mata, viola, control,’ translated as, ‘kill, rape, control,’” the U.S. attorney’s office for the District of Massachusetts said in a statement.