BROWARD COUNTY, Fla. – Federal authorities and the Broward Sheriff’s Office have announced the arrests of nine MS-13 gang members connected to multiple cold case murders in Broward and Palm Beach counties.
Officials, including U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, held a news conference on Friday to provide details on the arrests, which authorities say are linked to four gang-related homicides, including a 2021 case where human remains were discovered in Oakland Park.
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According to authorities, the murders occurred in Broward and Palm Beach counties in 2014 and 2015.
Nine people have been arrested in the multi-agency operation known as Operation Sombra De La Bestia, or Operation Shadow of the Beast, six of whom have already been convicted.
Those already convicted have been identified as Wilson Tirado-Silva, Andy Tovar, Miguel Angel Cabrera-Granados, Kevin Ricardo Gamez-Melendez, Melvin David Cruz-Ortiz and Wilber Geovanni Vigil-Benitez.
Those indicted were identified as Jose Ezequiel Gamez-Maravilla, Hugo Adiel Bermudez-Martinez and Wilber Rosendo Navarro-Escobar.
The Four Cases
In May 2021, the FBI unearthed a body from one of the murders in the 4200 block of North Dixie Highway in Oakland Park.
Video from Sky 10 captured agents retrieving what appeared to be an article of clothing from the dirt.
Authorities say the land was undeveloped at the time of the burial, but townhomes now stand on the property.
According to a BSO news release, the victim in that case was identified as Joel Canizales-Lara, who was reported missing in 2014.
Detectives said they discovered that Canizales-Lara was killed because he had falsely claimed to be a member of the gang from El Salvador.
Authorities said in November 2014, Tirado-Silva, who is a South Florida leader of MS-13, Granados and Cruz-Ortiz lured the victim to the vacant field where he was stabbed to death and then buried in a makeshift grave.
In January 2015, a man identified as Omar DeJesus Gutierrez, 18, was killed in the 200 block of Northeast Oakland Park Boulevard by Tirado-Silva for allegedly flashing signs of a rival gang, authorities said.
Detectives said Tovar, who is an MS-13 leader, approved the killing, although Gutierrez was not a documented gang member.
A third killing occurred in May 2015 in which eight gang members were involved in the murder of 22-year-old Gerson Vilelo Vasquez-Portillo in western Palm Beach County, authorities said.
In that case, Bondi said the victim was lured into one of the suspect’s vehicles and was then taken to a location where he was stabbed more than 100 times as part of a gang initiation. He was also shot.
The fourth killing occurred in October 2015.
In that case, authorities said the victim, Chrislet Ondina, 25, was hanging out with Tirado-Silva and Cruz-Ortiz in the 100 block of Northwest 41st Street in Oakland Park when the duo decided to stab him to death.
Detectives believe his killing was also part of a gang initiation.
According to the BSO news release, detectives noticed similarities between the four murders, including that three had occurred within a small area in Oakland Park and that all the murders were carried out using knives or machetes.
“Leads were exhausted and the cases went cold,” the news release stated.
Detectives said the cases were reopened in 2020 and “using a variety of investigative techniques and modern technologies,” they were able to link the killings to MS-13, a gang notorious for extreme violence.
The FBI established an MS-13 National Gang Task Force in 2004, and in 2018, President Donald Trump designated the group as a foreign terrorist organization, allowing federal agencies expanded resources to track down and prosecute its members.