A reputed member of the notorious MS-13 street gand plead guilty this week to his involvement in a 2016 East Boston murder and another murder in Lynn two years later.
Henri Salvador Gutierrez, 22, a Salvadorian national, pleaded guilty to racketeering, also known as RICO conspiracy. U.S. Senior District Court Judge Mark L. Wolf scheduled sentencing for Oct. 8, 2021.
Gutierrez admitted he participated in the Christmas Eve slaying of Luis Fernando Orellana at East Boston Stadium in 2016. Orellana’s body was found Christmas day in the ramp that leads up to the bleachers at the stadium.
Orellana’s murder capped a bloody year of teen murders in Eastie during a period of gang violence between MS-13 and rivals.
The violence started on Labor Day weekend back in 2015 when a 15-year-old boy was killed at Constitution Beach. The body of Wilson Martinez was found by a resident walking his dog near the beach’s skating rink.
Martinez’s murder was only the tip of the iceberg and the start of a string of murders in the neighborhood that spanned over a year and shook the neighborhood to its core.
Two weeks after Martinez was killed, Irvin Depazm, 15, was fatally stabbed on Trenton Street. Then on Jan. 10, Christofer Perez-De la Cruz became the third teenager to be murdered in Eastie after he was shot and stabbed to death near 144 Falcon St. Then a fourth muder of an Eastie teen, Blanca Lainez in June 2016 followed.
The murders culminated in the heanoius Christmas Eve murder of Orellana.
According to court records Gutierrez personally stabbed Orellana numerous times and committed the murder because he believed that the victim may have belonged to a rival gang.
Gutierrez also admitted to taking part in the August 2018 Lynn murder of a teenage boy whose body was found in a park in Lynn. The injuries to the victim’s body indicated that the victim had been stabbed dozens of times.
Gutierrez is the fifth defendant in the Lynn case to plead guilty and accept responsibility for his participation in the Lynn teen’s murder.
In July 2020, Erick Lopez Flores, a/k/a “Mayimbu,” 31, of Lynn, and Marlos Reyes, a/k/a “Silencio,” 20, of Chelsea, pleaded guilty in separate proceedings before Judge Wolf for their participation in the Lynn teen’s murder. Last month, Jonathan Tercero Yanes, a/k/a “Desalmado,” 24, a national of El Salvador admitted that on or about July 30, 2018, he participated in the Lynn murder while a member of the MS-13 gang.
MS-13 is a transnational street gang operating in Lynn and numerous other cities across the U.S. The gang’s international influence spreads to El Salvador, where it was founded, Honduras and Guatemala. MS-13 members follow certain core rules and principles, including that members attack and attempt to kill members of rival gangs, and members do not act as informants or cooperate with law enforcement.
MS-13 is organized in Massachusetts and elsewhere in the form of so-called “cliques” or smaller groups that operate under the larger mantle of MS-13. Tercero Yanes was a member of the Sykos Locos Salvatrucha clique of MS-13. Achieving promotion in MS-13 generally requires the commission of a significant act of violence.
The charge of RICO conspiracy involving murder, provides for a sentence of up to life in prison, up to three years of supervised release and a fine of up to $250,000. Gutierrez will also be subject to deportation upon the completion of his sentence. Sentences are imposed by a federal district court judge based upon the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.