Prosecutor: MS-13 members in Maryland stabbed victim more than 80 times
https://img.washingtonpost.com/rf/im...EeepCKNHB1S7uQ
Jesus Ponce Flores, 18, is charged with murder in Montgomery County. No image of his co-defendant was provided because he is a juvenile. (Montgomery County Police)
By Dan Morse October 19 at 5:47 PM
Two alleged MS-13 gang members — ages 17 and 18 — were ordered held without bond Thursday amid allegations they stabbed a man more than 80 times and left him dead in a creek just north of Washington.
“This is a gangland-style murder,” Montgomery County prosecutor Teresa Casafranca said in court. He said the victim — Cristopher Alfredo Funes Guerra, 20 — was lured to his death last month.
The arrests in the case come as Montgomery County and other jurisdictions in the Washington area have faced a spate of homicides linked to MS-13, a notorious gang that began in Los Angeles and operates with deep connections to members in El Salvador.
In Montgomery County, a relatively safe jurisdiction of 1 million people, gangs have been responsible for 20 murders in the past two years — and half of those have been at the hands of MS-13, according to State’s Attorney John McCarthy. “The numbers are shocking,” he said this week in announcing efforts by his office to work with schools and police to combat violence associated with gangs.
MS-13 is not a problem countywide, McCarthy said, but is actively recruiting in specific neighborhoods and schools in and around Gaithersburg, Wheaton and Silver Spring. Gang members are using extreme violence to intimidate residents and trying to expand extortion efforts, McCarthy said.
In the latest case, David *Lagunes-Bolanos, 17, of Silver Spring and Jesus Ponce Flores, 18, of Takoma Park were charged Wednesday with conspiracy to commit first-degree murder and first-degree murder. Lagunes-Bolanos was charged as an adult. Authorities did not outline a possible motive.
In court Thursday, assistant public defender Christopher Duffner questioned the strength of the cases, saying that police affidavits against the defendants were vague and relied on unnamed witnesses.
“The evidence is weak,” he said. “There are no real facts alleged at this point.”
According to the case against the suspects, they appear to be part of a wave of recent immigrants caught up in MS-13 violence.
Lagunes-Bolanos “self-admitted to detectives in this case that he entered into the country il*legally,” Casafranca said in court.
Records for Flores also indicate he entered the country illegally. He is currently appealing an order of deportation that is part of an immigration case, Casafranca said.
On Sept. 6, a hiker in Long Branch Stream Valley Park came across a body in a creek. Detectives identified the dead man as Guerra, who had been reported missing by his family three days earlier.
Detectives spoke with a relative of the victim, who said that Guerra left his residence at 8 on the night of Sept. 2, saying he was going to meet a friend. He couldn’t be reached later on his cellphone.
In court papers, police alleged the friend was Lagunes-Bolanos. They questioned him about his recent interactions with Guerra, and “Lagunes-Bolanos changed his story multiple times,” detectives asserted in court papers.
The detectives also spoke with two witnesses who said they had heard Lagunes-Bolanos and Flores bragging about stabbing the victim. In addition, a third person told detectives he believed Flores was responsible for the homicide, according to police accounts.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local...=.99e6e6b62482
