Schools and migrant shelters are becoming a hotbed of talent for Tren de Aragua, the violent Venezuelan prison gang known for savage murders and human trafficking operations since it infiltrated itself into the country through the porous southern border.
New York City police said the gang has recruited from government-run migrant shelters near Times Square, spawning what NYPD called a youth-led “farm team” of Tren de Aragua that targets tourists in the bustling city center.
Federal officials in Texas also have accused a man suspected of ties to the gang of enlisting students from Houston-area middle schools in hopes of using them in a shoplifting ring.
The neophyte members of TDA, as the gang is commonly called, are quickly catching on to the criminal enterprise’s brutal tactics.
"It started with snatches and then you saw wolfpack-type robberies where numerous individuals surrounding unsuspected tourists, frightening them, and then taking their properties," Detective Bureau Assistant Chief Jason Savino told WABC-TV.
"That graduated certainly into knives and then ultimately there were gunpoint robberies committed by the young crew," he said.
Chief Savino said the up-and-coming gangsters call themselves “Los Diablos de la 42,” or The Devils of 42nd Street, near where the migrant shelter in the old Roosevelt Hotel is based.
He added that 50 arrests have been made, spread over a group of 20 youths, most of whom run 14 to 16 years old. But Chief Savino said perps as young as 11 have been handcuffed in connection to the Diablos’ crimes.
Police said many of those joining the gang are coerced into it. Boys who don’t fulfill dares to commit crimes, for example, have been forced to lick the floor of a subway.
But even those who are arrested often avoid tough punishment. The chief said the young suspects can be offered programs instead of prosecutions, and their reign of terror is allowed to continue.
Part of that stems from a 2018 state law in New York that raised the minimum age someone could be charged as an adult from 16 to 18.
Another part is that the NYPD doesn’t have authority to enter the migrant shelters, which are federal facilities, unless someone calls 911 or they get a warrant to enter.
The federal shelter protects young gangbangers from local police — and also prevents NYPD’s social workers from keeping tabs on the juvenile delinquents.
In Texas, authorities said they recently arrested a suspected TDA member on suspicion of trying to enlist middle-school students into the gang.
The state’s Department of Public Safety said police arrested Jorgenys Robertson Cova, 32, earlier this month on a misdemeanor theft warrant out of the Houston suburb of Pearland.
Federal law enforcement officials said Mr. Cova was trying to train the children for a large-scale shoplifting ring in the state’s largest city, according to the New York Post.
“That brings back memories of how the cartels like to operate and use school students to drive loaded vehicles across the border,” former U.S. Marshal Robert Almonte told the Post. “The reason they do that is they tell these juveniles, ‘Look, you get caught but nothing is going to happen. You’re going to get a slap on the wrist,’ which is pretty much true.”
Mr. Cova, who illegally entered the country in 2022, has been arrested on theft charges in Texas and Arizona, with some of the charges later dropped.
The suspected gang recruiter had a juvenile accomplice join him during an April theft of a Victoria's Secret store in Houston, according to court documents obtained by KTRK-TV.
The filing also said a Pasadena, Texas, police officer had seen Mr. Cova in a school pickup line before.
Mr. Cova is being investigated for his ties to TDA because he has tattoos that are commonly associated with the gang, such as a five-point crown.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican, made cracking down on the gang's "terror and carnage" a top priority last month when he designated Tren de Aragua as a foreign terrorist organization.
The proclamation allows the state to sentence members to longer prison terms and to seize their property through civil forfeiture.
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