‘Demonic’ Killing Linked to MS-13 Shocks Florida Community in Reminder That Vicious Gang Lurks in U.S.

The alleged “demonic” murder in Florida of an Uber Eats driver by a man with ties to MS-13 is a stark reminder that elements of the much-feared El Salvadoran gang may be active in some parts of the U.S.The Pasco County sheriff, Chris Nocco, announced Tuesday that police arrested a suspect, Oscar Adrian Solis, in the murder of the Uber Eats driver, Randall Cooke, who went missing on April 19. Law enforcement officials say the suspect has ties to MS-13.Solis was initially arrested for failing to register as a felon in Florida and for a parole violation; police later charged him with murder after reviewing footage of Solis carrying garbage bags that were later found to contain human remains.Sheriff Nocco called the murder “demonic” at a press conference Wednesday but said that police have thus far been unable to identify the motive.“What he did was demonic, but at the same time, we couldn’t answer the question, ‘Why?’” Sheriff Nocco said.According to police, Cooke was “yanked” into Solis’s home on the night of April 19 as he was completing his final delivery of the night.Upon investigating the situation, police found several bags containing the dismembered remains of the delivery driver as well as blood in parts of Solis’s home and bloody rags and an Uber Eats bag in Cooke’s car.Solis was later found to be in possession of Cooke’s wedding ring and car keys, law enforcement officials say.Cooke’s stepdaughter, Melany Dzoba, said in an interview with WFTS that Cooke was “the most perfect man” and a good husband to her mother.“I still have a voicemail on my phone from last Monday of just his voice and him telling me how much he loves me and how much he’s there for me,” Ms. Dzoba said.Although police have been unable to identify a motive, they described Solis as a “violent individual” who had been previously convicted of felony assault and burglary in Indiana and has ties to MS-13.MS-13, the colloquial name for Mara Salvatrucha 13, is a transnational gang that originated in the 1970s and ’80s in Los Angeles among Salvadoran immigrants fleeing civil war, according to the Department of Justice.The gang would spread back down to El Salvador in the 1990s, and by the mid-2000s it was responsible much of the terrible violence destabilizing the small Central American country.Back in America, Cooke’s murder in Florida last week is the most recent MS-13-related incident to bring attention to the infamous gang. Earlier this year an MS-13 member allegedly raped and murdered a woman in Maryland, after being detained and released by border patrol.Although there are reports that the gang has recently fallen off of Washington’s radar, it had been a priority for President Trump’s Department of Justice. In May 2018, Mr. Trump held a roundtable at New York’s Long Island, where MS-13 is known to operate, to discuss the gang. The NYPD said that MS-13 was responsible for 17 Long Island murders between January 2016 and April 2016 alone.“We’re here today to discuss the menace of MS-13, a ruthless gang that has violated our borders and transformed our once peaceful neighborhoods into blood-stained fields,” Mr. Trump said at the roundtable.MS-13 was a topic about which President Biden faced criticism early in his administration, for supposedly dismantling Joint Task Force Vulcan, which is responsible for disrupting the gang’s operations.Earlier this year, though, the administration made clear that the task force was still operating, when it announced that the task force had helped in disrupting the gang’s money laundering operations.The FBI is now offering a $5 million reward for the capture of Yulan Adonay Archaga Carias, who is allegedly the leader of MS-13 in Honduras.

‘Demonic’ Killing Linked to MS-13 Shocks Florida Community in Reminder That Vicious Gang Lurks in U.S.

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