CENTRAL ISLIP, N.Y. (1010 WINS) — An MS-13 gang member pleaded guilty Tuesday to three murders on Long Island, according to the Justice Department.
Jhonny Contreras, 28, a member of the Brentwood Locos Salvatruchas clique of La Mara Salvatrucha, also known as the MS-13, pleaded guilty in federal court in Central Islip to racketeering and related firearms charges in connection with his involvement in two murders over Memorial Day weekend in May 2013 and one murder in November 2015.
According to court filings and statements by Contreras at the guilty plea proceeding, he admitted to participating in the murders of Derrick Mayes, Keenan Russell and Cesar Rivera-Vasquez.
On May 26, 2013, Contreras and another MS-13 member traveled through Central Islip in a stolen minivan, with a .25 caliber handgun and a 20-gauge shotgun, looking for rival gang members to kill.
While on Wilson Boulevard, Contreras and his co-conspirator saw Mayes, an African-American man, whom they did not know and wrongly assumed to be a member of the Bloods street gang because he was wearing an article of red clothing, according to prosecutors. The MS-13 members approached Mayes and shot him multiple times, killing him.
The next night, Contreras and several other MS-13 members, who were armed with the same .25 caliber handgun and 20-gauge shotgun, as well as a 9mm handgun, again drove around Central Islip in the stolen minivan and other vehicles, looking for rival gang members to kill, and observed several African-Americans, including Russell, outside of a house party on Acorn Street.
The department said they again mistakenly assumed Russell to be a member of the Bloods, approached him and fatally shot him.
After learning that the minivan had been linked to the murders, the MS-13 members agreed to destroy it, officials said, Contreras and several other gang members drove the minivan to a wooded area in Ronkonkoma, wiped it clean of fingerprints, doused it in gasoline, and set it on fire.
Contreras also admitted to killing Rivera-Vasquez with other MS-13 members on November 19, 2015, in Babylon because they suspected him of belonging to a rival Mexican gang, Raza Loca.
According to prosecutors, Contreras and his co-conspirators saw Rivera-Vasquez at a deli located near the Babylon Long Island Railroad station.
They convinced the victim to leave with them to smoke marijuana, and brought him to an isolated area behind a nearby baseball field, where they persuaded him to remove his shirt so they could see a tattoo they believed signified the victim’s membership in the rival gang, and then beat him with a bat, repeatedly stabbing him before one member slit his throat.
After Rivera-Vasquez was dead, the MS-13 members buried his body near a large mound of dirt, and Rivera-Vasquez’s body was not discovered until April 2018. When sentenced, Contreras faces a maximum sentence of life in prison.
"With today’s guilty plea, the defendant has admitted to participating in a murderous rampage that was senseless and demonstrated a total disregard for human life by hunting down victims based on an offending article of clothing or a tattoo, said U.S. Attorney Breon Peace.
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