(The Center Square) – U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and law enforcement partners continue to arrest MS-13 Salvatrucha Salvadoran transnational gang members and violent illegal foreign nationals in Nebraska.
The latest MS-13 arrest this month was of a man known internationally as “Fantasma” (ghost), an alleged member of an MS-13 assassination squad in Honduras. He was wanted by Honduran authorities for a quadruple homicide after he escaped from prison and illegally entered the U.S. through the southwest border during the Biden administration.
He evaded capture in Honduras and in the U.S. until a multiagency investigation located him and ICE arrested him in Grand Island, Nebraska.
Honduran national Gerson Emir Cuadra Soto illegally entered the U.S. in 2022 at the southwest border and obtained a California’s driver’s license, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said. This was after he was arrested, charged and detained on firearms offenses and a quadruple homicide. He allegedly bribed his way out of a Honduran jail and was wanted by authorities, DHS said.
MS-13 was designated as a foreign terrorist organization earlier this year. It originated in Los Angeles in the 1980s to protect Salvadoran illegal foreign nationals but later expanded its criminal enterprise. Its members engage in “campaigns of violence and terror in the United States and internationally” and present “an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security, foreign policy, and economy of the United States,” President Donald Trump said in a June MS-13 FTO order.
Trump issued the order to expand border crime enforcement after more than 300,000 Salvadorans illegally entered the U.S. during the Biden administration, The Center Square reported. MS-13 members are being prosecuted nationwide for on charges of murder, fentanyl trafficking and violent crimes, The Center Square reported.
In July, ICE arrested a Salvadoran national and MS-13 kingpin on El Salvador’s top 100 most wanted list and an MS-13 associate who were both living illegally in the Omaha area.
The MS-13 leader was wanted for aggravated homicide of five victims; attempted aggravated homicide; deprivation of liberty; and terrorist organization affiliation. His associate was also wanted in El Salvador, accused of ordering fellow gang members to commit multiple homicides, extortion, imprisonment and drug trafficking, ICE said.
The MS-13 leaders were arrested without incident in targeted enforcement actions. “They had embedded themselves in the Omaha area, where they posed severe threats to the local community’s safety,” ICE said.
“These illegal aliens didn’t just sneak into our country; they brought with them a legacy of violence, terror and death,” HSI Kansas City Special Agent in Charge Mark Zito said. “They thought they could hide in America’s heartland, but they were sadly mistaken. Not on our watch.”
Also this month, a Salvadoran illegally in the country was involved in an officer-involved shooting. Although not an MS-13 member, Juan Melgar-Ayala randomly targeted and shot an elderly man multiple times in an Omaha grocery store parking lot, Omaha police said. He fled the scene and barricaded himself inside a nearby gas station bathroom where Omaha Police detectives tracked him down, authorities said. He fired at least 16 rounds at six officers, hitting four. Officers returned fire and shot and killed him, the OPD said. The OPD later learned he was in the country illegally and a convicted felon.
“Despite multiple previous criminal arrests, he remained at large in American communities,” DHS said. His criminal history included charges for assault by strangulation in 2019 and arrests for burglary and possession of a stolen firearm in 2021.
He illegally entered the U.S. in June 2007 as an unaccompanied minor, according to ICE records. Law enforcement authorities are continuing to arrest violent men in major cities years after they illegally entered the country as unaccompanied minors, The Center Square reported.
Illegal foreign nationals have also been arrested in Omaha for assaulting ICE officers during targeted enforcement operations, including at Glenn Valley Foods, where an alleged large-scale identity theft scheme was uncovered. More than 70 were arrested in the largest worksite enforcement action in Nebraska. Several were charged with “assaulting, resisting, opposing, impeding, intimidating, or interfering with a federal officer while engaged in the performance of their official duties” and damaging government property.
Nebraska has been grappling with illegal border crosser crime stemming from a surge of foreign nationals working primarily in meat processing plants and agricultural communities. Authorities have found many are involved in identity theft rings, using fraudulent Social Security cards, state driver’s licenses, and lawful permanent resident cards to unlawfully obtain employment and steal from Americans, The Center Square reported.
A Homeland Security Task Force is also targeting transnational crime in Nebraska including violent Tren de Aragua terrorist members, The Center Square reported. In one case, a TdA member was charged with attempted murder after throwing an ICE agent to the ground, slamming her head on the pavement, ripping off her body armor, and making “repeated and physical violent contact,” in Bellevue, Nebraska, The Center Square reported.
