3 Texas Syndicate gang members go on trial Monday
09:30 PM CDT on Friday, May 9, 2008
By JASON TRAHAN / The Dallas Morning News
jtrahan@dallasnews.com

Three Texas Syndicate gang members will go on trial Monday on federal racketeering charges involving murder and drug dealing.

The case marks the first time that federal RICO statutes, designed to bring down mafioso, will be used in a North Texas federal court against a gang.

Facing trial are Marco Medina, a former top Texas Syndicate lieutenant in Dallas, and two lower-level soldiers – David Gutierrez, who worked in Dallas and Houston, and Daniel Arredondo, based mainly in Dallas.

Security will be tight for the trial because the structured gang is known to intimidate or kill witnesses, officials say.

At least one Texas Syndicate co-defendant, who has pleaded guilty and is expected to testify, is in the U.S. Marshal's witness protection program, along with family members.

The three men on trial are accused in three gang- and drug-related slayings between 1999 to 2001 in the Dallas area.

One victim was a Texas Syndicate member and one was a rival gang member. The third victim, an associate of a Texas Syndicate member, refused to break off a relationship with the gang member's mother, prosecutors say.

Eleven other Texas Syndicate members who have pleaded guilty are implicated in 10 local murders, officials have said.

The trial is expected to last at least two weeks. Jury selection, which begins Monday, could last a day or more.

The Syndicate is a secretive gang that originated in the 1970s in prisons. Membership is for life, and Syndicate members who are released from prison are expected to do the bidding of those on the inside.

Link