© JASON MINTO/DELAWARE NEWS JOURNAL / USA TODAY NETWORK
(New York, NY) — Ten Venezuelan gang members, all in the U.S. illegally, have been indicted in New York City for gun trafficking. Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz and Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch say 34 guns and pink cocaine were seized in a long-term undercover investigation called “Operation Train Derail.”
All ten are alleged members of the notorious gang known as Tren de Aragua. They say the scope of their gun trafficking extended from New York to Texas and Colorado with plans to expand into Colombia. Some of those indicted have been in the U.S. since 2023, all allegedly entering the country illegally through the southern border.
Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz said, “The geographic scope of their alleged conduct extended on a national level to include Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Texas, Florida, Colorado and internationally to Colombia. As a result of our investigation, 34 dangerous weapons are now off the streets, and we are dismantling this gang as it attempts to establish itself locally,”
Officials said many of the weapons were sold in broad daylight including several transactions in a shopping center parking lot in College Point. In another transaction, an AR-15 was placed in a garbage bag and sold in the middle of the afternoon in the Bronx.
