In a massive anti-gang investigation, more than 100 gang members have been arrested on various federal criminal charges in Southern California. The arrests primarily occurred in San Diego County and spanned 20 different street gangs; all with ties to the Mexican Mafia.
In total, charges were filed against 119 suspects, 104 of whom were arrested in today in an early morning raid. Authorities are still on the hunt for the 15 suspects that managed to slip through this morning’s dragnet. The charges filed against the gang members ranged from kidnapping and murder to drug trafficking and racketeering.
What’s unique about this raid is the fact that all 20 gangs involved in the arrest had common ties to the Mexican Mafia. The gangs were required to pay taxes to the mafia in order to facilitate their illegal activities. Its highly likely that some of the gangs, if not all of the gangs, involved in the raids are rivals of one another, making the common tie all the more interesting.
The US and Mexican governments have been fighting an ongoing war against Mexican drug cartels for years, often turning bloody south of the border and resulting in one record drug seizure after another here in the US. This has resulted in the cartels becoming more sophisticated as well as more brazen in their illegal behavior.
Whether or not these arrests are simply part of an attempt of federal prosecutors to climb the “food chain” and gather evidence against members of the Mexican Mafia itself is unknown. But that is a likely goal of the arrests.
