High-Ranking MS-13 Member Confesses to Killing Eight, Including Teenager Girls

High-Ranking MS-13 Member Confesses to Killing Eight, Including Teenager Girls
Image By: ABC News

High-ranking MS-13 gang member Alexi Saenz entered a guilty plea to racketeering charges arising from eight murders on Wednesday in federal court in Central Islip, New York.

Prosecutors indicated that as part of a plea deal, he might spend 40–70 years in jail.

Two Long Island adolescents who died in September 2016—Kayla Cuevas, 16, and Nisa Mickens, 15—were among the deaths to which Saenz entered a guilty plea. The prosecution said that multiple gang members pursued them and used machetes and baseball bats to attack them.

For the 2017 teen deaths, Saenz and multiple other individuals suspected of being members of the MS-13 gang were taken into custody. Jairo Saenz, his brother, who was also detained at the time, is still facing charges.

“To say that Alexi Saenz’s hands are drenched in blood does not begin to describe the multiple killings and extreme mayhem he personally directed and committed in the span of one year in Suffolk County,” Breon Peace, U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, stated on Wednesday. “While those murders and violent crimes were intended to further the sordid mission of the MS-13, the defendant has failed miserably.”

Prior to Attorney General Merrick Garland’s declaration in 2023, prosecutors had planned to execute the two Saenz brothers.

Following the national media coverage of the two girls’ killings, then-President Donald Trump extended an invitation to their parents to attend the 2018 State of the Union address.

“Here tonight are two fathers and two mothers: Evelyn Rodriguez, Freddy Cuevas, Elizabeth Alvarado, and Robert Mickens,” Trump stated. “Their two teenage daughters — Kayla Cuevas and Nisa Mickens — were close friends on Long Island. But in September 2016, on the eve of Nisa’s16th birthday, neither of them came home. These two precious girls were brutally murdered while walking together in their hometown. Six members of the savage gang MS-13 have been charged with Kayla and Nisa’s murders.”

Prosecutors said that Saenz was charged in relation to the killings of six more individuals, all of whom the MS-13 members believed to be connected to rival gangs.

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Saenz was characterized by prosecutors as the mastermind behind these murders, regularly providing the go-ahead or giving orders to other gang members to carry out the attack.

Saenz was also accused of drugs trafficking, arson, three attempted murders, and offenses involving firearms.

Acting Commissioner Robert E. Waring of the Suffolk County Police Department referred to Saenz’s crimes as “senseless and barbaric.”

“The murders of teenagers Kayla Cuevas and Nisa Mickens shook our communities and reverberated around the nation,” Waring stated. “My hope is that this guilty plea will give the victims’ families some closure while also demonstrating our commitment to dismantling these criminal enterprises.”

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With more than two years of expertise in news and analysis, Eileen Stewart is a seasoned reporter. Eileen is a respected voice in this field, well-known for her sharp reporting and insightful analysis. Her writing covers a wide range of subjects, from politics to culture and more.