ICE Boston arrests illegal MS-13 gang member on gun, drug crimes

BOSTON — Federal immigration enforcement officials are continuing to release details on the illegal criminals they rounded up in their early actions under the Trump administration across the Boston area, with the arrest of a 19-year-old MS-13 gang member the latest coming to light.

Enforcement and Removal Operations Boston grabbed and charged Luis Adolfo Guerra-Perez, an illegally present Guatemalan, with drug and weapons crimes, a day after the agency says East Boston Municipal Court refused to honor its detainer against the criminal.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement highlighted how Boston-based agents issued a detainer against Guerra with the Nashua Street Jail on Jan. 6. ICE claims that the court ignored the detainer and released Guerra last Tuesday.

Guerra remains in ICE custody after his arrest by federal authorities last Wednesday during an operation that included the arrests of at least eight other illegal criminals. He was arraigned earlier this month for the offenses of possession of a large-capacity weapon/firearm, possession of a class D controlled substance, possession of a firearm without a permit, and possession of ammunition.

“Luis Adolfo Guerra-Perez is an illegally present gang member who has shown complete disregard for American laws,” acting Field Office Director Patricia H. Hyde said in a statement on Wednesday. “He is a member of a violent street gang charged with illegally possessing a high-capacity firearm and drugs. We will not tolerate such offenders to threaten the residents of our New England neighborhoods.”

As highlighted in previous cases, court spokesperson Jennifer Donahue told the Herald that Massachusetts court officials are not authorized to hold an individual in custody “solely” on a federal civil immigration detainer.

Detainers request law enforcement or the courts “maintain custody of the noncitizen for a period not to exceed 48 hours beyond the time the individual would otherwise be released.”

Donahue said that the state’s policy is based on the so-called Lunn decision, made by the state Supreme Judicial Court in 2017 which says essentially that Massachusetts authorities cannot hold a suspect for longer than the state-level charges against them allow. The SJC suggested that the legislature would have to act to change the law, and several state Republican lawmakers have filed legislation to make a change.

Court documents show that Guerra posted a $3,000 bail last Tuesday and was placed on a GPS upon release with conditions that included home confinement, no firearms or other dangerous weapons and to remain alcohol- and drug-free, among others.

Guerra is said to have illegally entered the country in March 2021 at the southern border, where U.S. Border Patrol arrested him. Border Patrol authorities issued a notice for Guerra to appear before a federal immigration judge, but ERO Dallas released him not long after, that May.

A federal immigration judge then ordered Guerra removed from the United States to Guatemala last October, ERO Boston said in its release.

A pair of Boston Police officers came across Guerra walking with a group of three other males in East Boston, all wearing hoods and masks, on the night of Jan. 3. The officers noticed that the individuals appeared to be smoking what they believed to be marijuana, “which they found peculiar,” an incident report states.

“It is important to mention that the officers had received intelligence about a feud between two rival gangs — 18th Street and MS-13 — that resulted in a shooting the day before,” the report states, “not far from the location where the group was seen.”

MS-13 has its roots in Los Angeles, forming in the 1980s to protect Salvadoran immigrants who escaped a civil war in their home country from other gangs. The group is “well-organized and is heavily involved in lucrative illegal enterprises, being notorious for its use of violence to achieve its objectives,” according to the Department of Justice.

Citing “recent violent incidents in the area” of Havre and Meridian streets and the “suspicious behavior of the group,” including smoking in public, the officers conducted a so-called “threshold inquiry,” the BPD incident report states.

Two of the individuals, recognized as “known MS-13 members,” reportedly “immediately turned around in an attempt to avoid” the officers. The entire group proceeded to flee the scene, with one of the suspects, Alfredo Benitez, eventually surrendering and telling authorities he was from Honduras but lived in the neighborhood.

The rest of the group allegedly fled to Walgreens in the neighborhood’s Central Square, where two other BPD officers found Guerra reportedly with a “backpack containing six large bags of marijuana, approximately 89 alien graphic baggies, and an empty 12-round large-capacity magazine in a box.”

In a canvas that followed, officers found a discarded firearm inside a satchel bag in a trash can.

Detectives then determined the magazine recovered from Guerra’s backpack was an “exact match to the magazine found in the satchel” and also found “a Taurus GC2 9mm firearm with an empty mag well, along with five 9mm rounds in the magazine.”

This all comes as Mayor Michelle Wu says her administration feels it has “solid legal ground” with its sanctuary city commitment. A mayor’s spokesperson deferred to Wu’s comments from the day before when asked Wednesday if a decision had been made on whether she would be traveling to Washington to testify in front of Congress on the policies in February.

MassGOP Chairwoman Amy Carnevale is calling on Wu to “testify and justify her extreme stance before the American people.”

“Every time the Mayor prioritizes her own pride and politics over common sense, more criminal illegal immigrants are drawn to Boston,” Carnevale said in a statement Wednesday, “putting Massachusetts residents at risk and forcing federal authorities to step in.”

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