HOW THE U.S. IS WORKING WITH CENTRAL AMERICAN NATIONS TO FIGHT THE MS-13 AND 18TH STREET GANGS

By Brenda Gazzar

Los Angeles Daily News
September 9, 2015

In El Salvador, gangs are attacking police and soldiers with brazen new tactics. Since January, 43 members of the police force have been assassinated.

In the U.S., transnational gangs have become increasingly evident in drug trafficking, extortion and, in some parts of the country, pimping and prostitution, the FBI says.

It is against that backdrop that about 70 law enforcement officials and prosecutors from seven countries gathered Wednesday at the Hall of Justice downtown to swap notes and intelligence in an effort to better combat these increasingly violent and sophisticated groups, especially the notorious Mara Salvatrucha or M-13 and 18th Street gangs.

“There is increasing evidence that gang-related criminal enterprises are undergoing a fundamental shift, as gangs become ever-more sophisticated,” Los Angeles County Sheriff Jim McDonnell said Wednesday in an email sent during the discussions. “Transnational gangs, primarily known to be involved in drug trafficking, are moving into human trafficking in some cases, and their presence is being felt in areas throughout the nation.”

The FBI and U.S. Department of Justice convened the sixth Central American Law Enforcement Exchange this week to allow officials to combine expertise, resources and best practices.

The participants — many of whom could not be photographed or reveal their names because of the danger of getting killed in their home countries — will later be traveling to Houston and then on to El Salvador for the three-week program.

The exchange includes investigators and prosecutors from El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, Mexico, Panama, Belize and from around the U.S., including the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department and the Los Angeles Police Department.

“There’s certainly a recognition that there are major consequences associated with the expansion and the growth of these types of criminal gang organizations,” FBI Supervisory Special Agent Grant Mann said during a break Wednesday. “The levels of violence in Central America are high and that will have an effect not only in Central America but also here in the United States. As law enforcement partners, we recognize the need to do all we can when it comes to these sorts of transnational gangs.”

One well-known transnational gang is currently operating in 42 U.S. states, McDonnell said. Both the M-13 and 18th Street gangs originated in Los Angeles and were later exported to Central American countries, where they found fertile ground to operate.

As these gang members move from place to place and as some flee the violence in Central America, they continue to export their gang culture, Mann said. In addition, it’s not uncommon for gang members who are imprisoned in El Salvador to call people around Central America and even the U.S. to extort money under the threat of violence, Mann said.

U.S. officials are now focused on getting law enforcement agencies across borders to work together to coordinate prosecution of different players “who have an influence across large swaths of the country” and in Central America, he said.

Following decades of crime reduction in Los Angeles, crime and violence are on the rise and “part of what’s driving that is gang violence in Los Angeles,” said LAPD Assistant Chief Michel Moore. “And gang violence in Los Angeles is gang violence in the Americas. ... We need you, we need to understand how MS-13 and other threats to your country are being ... engaged by you and how they relate to us here in Los Angeles.”

El Salvador Consul General Maria Mercedes Lopez said her country has been dealing with transnational gangs for many years, though their members have started adopting new strategies, such as attacking members of their police force and, at times, members of the military. However, the majority of people who are killed by gang members — an average of about 12 a day in recent years — are rival gang members butting heads over competition, control of territory and the ability to use extortion, she said.

El Salvador’s President Salvador Sanchez Ceren has adopted a strategy of not talking or negotiating with gang members but instead confronting their violence and delinquency, she said.

Lopez called the exchange program, which was created in 2006, “a step forward” in helping Central American countries and the U.S. exchange valuable information about these gangs.

“This is extremely important because it permits us to see how they are functioning in each country and it allows us to make decisions about how to deal with them in a given moment,” she said in Spanish during a break Wednesday.