MS-13 leader to be sentenced in racketeering case involving 8 murders

CENTRAL ISLIP, N.Y. (AP) — The leader of an MS-13 clique in the suburbs of New York City faces sentencing Wednesday in a federal racketeering case involving eight murders, including the 2016 killings of two high school girls that focused the nation’s attention on the violent Central American street gang.

Alexi Saenz pleaded guilty last year for his role in ordering and approving the killings as well as other crimes during a rash of bloody violence that prompted President Donald Trump to make several visits to Long Island and call for the death penalty for Saenz and other gang members during his first term in the White House.

Saenz’s lawyers are seeking a sentence of 45 years behind bars, but prosecutors want the judge to impose the maximum sentence of 70 years.

Prosecutors, who previously withdrew their intent to seek the death penalty, say Saenz deserves to live out his days in prison for his “senseless” and “sadistic” crimes.

“The eight victims who lost their lives did nothing to deserve what the MS-13 did to them,” they wrote in legal filings ahead of Wednesday’s hearing. “The defendant and the others killed them in service of the gang without remorse or any regard for them as human beings.”

But Saenz's lawyers have argued for leniency, saying in their own legal filings that the now-30-year-old is remorseful and “on a journey of redemption” while incarcerated.

"With the passage of time and much reflection, it is hard for Mr. Saenz to reconcile the person he is today with the person he was when he committed the crimes," their sentencing memo reads. “He is profoundly sorry, and although he knows the families may not accept his apology, it is sincere, and he accepts full responsibility for his participation in these crimes.”

Saenz's lawyers also say he suffers from intellectual disabilities and lasting trauma from an abusive father and difficult upbringing in El Salvador. They say Saenz was recruited and unwittingly “groomed” into MS-13 because he was an “easily influenced” and “gullible” high school student on Long Island.

Prosecutors, however, counter that Saenz has remained “firmly entrenched” in MS-13 while in a federal lockup in Brooklyn for the past eight years.

They cited photos of him posing with other gang members behind bars and displaying gang signs and gang paraphernalia. They also say Saenz has been disciplined for assaulting other inmates, refusing staff orders and possessing sharpened metal shanks, cellphones and other contraband.

“Indeed, the same pattern of violence and mayhem that has marked his life on the street has not waned with the passage of time,” prosecutors wrote.

Saenz, also known as “Blasty” and “Big Homie,” was the leader of an MS-13 clique operating in Brentwood and Central Islip known as Sailors Locos Salvatruchas Westside.

He admitted last July that he’d authorized the eight killings and three other attempted killings of perceived rivals and others that had disrespected or feuded with the clique.

Saenz also admitted to arson, firearms offenses and drug trafficking — the proceeds of which went toward buying firearms, more drugs and providing contributions to the wider MS-13 gang.

Among the killings Saenz oversaw were the deaths of Kayla Cuevas, 16, and Nisa Mickens, 15, lifelong friends and classmates at Brentwood High School who were slain with a machete and a baseball bat.

Other victims included Javier Castillo, 15, of Central Islip, who was befriended by gang members only to be cut down with a machete in an isolated marsh.

Another victim, Oscar Acosta, 19, was found dead in a wooded area near railroad tracks nearly five months after he left his Brentwood home to play soccer.

MS-13, or Mara Salvatrucha, is a transnational criminal organization believed to have been founded as a neighborhood street gang in Los Angeles in the mid-1980s by people fleeing civil war in El Salvador.

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Follow Philip Marcelo at https://x.com/philmarcelo