Two undocumented migrants of Venezuelan nationality, who were arrested for the assault in the Big Apple against two New York Police officers, are members of the dangerous gang that plagues several Latin American countries.
“Both foreigners have been identified as members of the transnational criminal organization El Tren de Aragua,” Marie Ferguson, spokesperson for the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Service (ICE), told Noticias Telemundo.
He refers to Kelvin Servita Arocha, 19, and Wilson Juarez Aguilarte, 21;
on whom there was an arrest warrant and a deportation warrant, respectively, and were captured on February 13.
Kelvin Servita Arocha (left) and Wilson Juarez (right), are alleged members of the Aragua Train captured by ICE in the Bronx, New York.ICE
Last month Noticias Telemundo reported that local police in Chicago and Miami captured and identified gang members accused of committing crimes in those cities.
ICE's statement represents the first time that a US national security agency has recognized that members of the Aragua Train are committing crimes in the country.
What is The Aragua Train?
The beginnings of the Aragua Train date back to Venezuela, where it began as a prison gang and, according to various official investigations, has become a mafia organization known for engaging in criminal activities such as murders, kidnappings, extortion, sexual exploitation, drug trafficking. and migrants, among other crimes.
The gang has cells in several American countries in addition to Venezuela: local security forces have detected their crimes in Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Chile, Brazil, Panama and areas of the United States, such as Miami and Chicago.
And now in New York.
The Aragua Train began to follow the route of Venezuelans fleeing the complex humanitarian emergency that hit their country hard starting in 2014, Ronna Rísquez, a Venezuelan journalist specialized in security and author of
The Aragua Train, recently told Telemundo Chicago.
: The gang that revolutionized organized crime in Latin America
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This is how the gang expands across the continent and becomes "the transnational criminal organization" that is today under the sights of federal agencies such as ICE and the FBI.
Known cases in the US
The first was reported in January of this year by Chicago Telemundo Investiga, which had access to a police report and court documents about a Venezuelan man arrested in December for selling drugs to an undercover officer in Chicago.
Edwin Camejo, 27, was arrested in Chicago on December 11, 2023. Chicago Police Department
Edwin Camejo, 27, was arrested on December 11, 2023 in the Las Empacadoras neighborhood, after an operation in which more than a dozen Chicago Police officers participated, according to the report, which highlights that it is member of the band El Tren de Aragua.
The second case occurred 1,400 miles south of Chicago, in Miami, where an alleged gang member and Venezuelan immigrant, Yurwin Salazar, 23, faces a murder charge in the death last November of José Luis Sánchez Valera, a retired Venezuelan police officer who lived in South Florida, and is being held at the Metro West Detention Center in Miami-Dade County.
Yurwin Salazar-Maita alleged member of the Aragua Train who was arrested in Florida, on January 16, 2024. Miami Dade Police Department
And now we know of a third case in the Northeast of the country, in New York, where Servita Arocha and Juarez Aguilarte were arrested by ICE agents in the Bronx for their alleged participation in the assault against a lieutenant and an officer of the Police. New York in front of a migrant shelter in Times Square.
The event, which occurred on January 27, has generated national rejection in the United States.
Dozens arrested at the border
The Border Patrol reported at the end of 2023 that in the last fiscal year 38 members of El Tren de Aragua were captured trying to enter the US illegally, something that was first reported by CNN en Español.
Noticias Telemundo consulted the FBI about the gang's presence in the country and said that they constantly share intelligence with different security forces about possible dangers such as "violent transnational organizations that may represent threats against American communities," which are a "high priority." criminal for the FBI."
The agency's New York Field Office said they "are aware of the danger these violent gangs pose to their community."
This Thursday the New York Post reported that the state National Guard was cooperating to identify potential members of the Aragua Train through characteristic tattoos of the gang in the migrant shelters they guard.
In this regard, Eric Durr, spokesperson for the New York Division of Military and Naval Affairs, told Noticias Telemundo that "they constantly work with all levels of security forces to protect public safety," but that "they do not reveal confidential information." about its operations."
The presence of the Aragua Train in the country worries many police chiefs such as Garry McCarthy, who heads the Willow Springs Police Department, a suburb southwest of Chicago.
“If they caught 38, how many did they not arrest?
There are going to be hundreds,” McCarthy recently told Telemundo Chicago about the Border Patrol.