6 San Francisco gang members sentenced for murders committed 11-18 years ago
SAN FRANCISCO - Federal prosecutors have announced the sentencing of six San Francisco men in connection with a string of seven murders and related crimes committed more than 10 years ago.
Eddy Urbina, 35, Weston Venegas, 34, Orlando Hernandez, 41, and Juan Carlos Gallardo, 35, were sentenced Monday while Jonathan Aguilar, 37, and Mario Reyes, 44, were sentenced on April 2 and March 5. All entered guilty pleas.
Their cheerful nicknames -- Rhino, Cartoon, Christo, Huero, Trompo, and Shy Boy -- might make the men from San Francisco's Mission District sound harmless, but prosecutors said they were all members of a criminal racketeering enterprise known as the "19th Street/16th Street Surenos" gang that participated in the pursuit, shooting and killing of rival gang members, as well as drug sales, firearms violations and assaults and robberies.
The sentences -- ranging from 11 to 32 years -- were imposed by U.S. Chief District Judge Richard Seeborg of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.
Prosecutors described the matters as "cold cases."
Cold cases are generally cases that are not solved initially but reopened later after new evidence is discovered. The murders in these cases were committed between 2006 and 2013. The indictment was not filed until March 20, 2018.
The Sureno gang has roots in Southern California, Mexico and Central America and is affiliated with the Mexican Mafia prison gang, prosecutors said.
According to a 2021 indictment by the U.S. Attorney's Office of Jonathan Escobar, an alleged gang member, the 19th Street/16th Street Surenos gang was made up of two street gangs -- the 16th Street Surenos and the 19th Street Surenos -- that had adjoining territories in the Mission District and "essentially functioned as a single, unified association-in-fact ... enterprise."
The combined enterprise's territory was between 16th and 19th streets from Folsom Street in the east to Dolores Street in the west.
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"This Sureño criminal enterprise has terrorized San Francisco's Mission District for decades through shootings, robberies, and drug dealing," said U.S. Attorney Ismail Ramsey. "The sentences in this case make clear that we will pursue the perpetrators of gang violence and seek justice no matter when that violence occurred."
In a sentencing memorandum submitted to Seeborg, prosecutors said, "One of the most pernicious and dangerous aspects of the gang is that violence begets respect and standing, which incentivizes gang members to engage in ever more brazen and violent conduct."
Prosecutors referenced a rival gang, the Nortenos, that also operated in the Mission.
"Norteños generally have roots in Northern California, tend to be more racially and ethnically diverse than Sureños, and recognize the primacy of the Nuestra Familia prison gang."
According to prosecutors, the "culture of violence goes both ways; Sureños and Norteños kill each other with equal disregard for human life. The willingness of enterprise members to resort to deadly violence in public and with little provocation endangers the public, and innocents have been injured and killed by the gang's activities on many occasions."
In the Escobar indictment, prosecutors said, "One rule common to both Sureño and Norteño gangs was that members of each gang must attack members of the other side. In most instances, the more brazen the attack, the greater the respect that was given to the attacker by fellow gang members. As a result, innocent bystanders have been injured and even killed simply for being in the wrong place at the wrong time during a gang attack."
Several of the murders on which the sentences were based were of individuals who were -- or were suspected to be -- members of the rival Norteños gang, although in at least one instance an unaffiliated "civilian" was killed.
The prosecutions resulted from a multi-year investigation by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security aided by the San Francisco Police Department.