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MS-13 member who overslept and missed helping to carve up a rival gang member is sentenced to 8 years

A federal judge today sentenced Modesto "Snoopy" Ramirez to 97 months, or a little more than eight years, in federal prison for RICO violations related to his membership in a local MS-13 gang.

Unlike other members convicted recently, Ramirez was not charged with involvement in any murders or large-scale drug dealing.

But ne came close.

Ramirez, a member of the Trece Locos Salvatrucha MS-13 "clique" of Somerville, was originally supposed to participate in the group murder of Cristofer Perez de la Cruz on Falcon Street in East Boston, for being an alleged member of the rival 18th Street Gang. The 16-year-old was stabbed more than 40 times by several members even as another member was shooting him repeatedly on Jan. 10, 2016.

But, Ramirez's lawyer told the judge, Ramirez overslept and missed the 1:35 a.m. murder.

Ramirez's lawyer pointed to this as proof that his client was, at best, a reluctant MS-13 member and that he should get no more than the 97 months recommended by prosecutors as part of a plea deal.

[H]is colleagues, apparently cognizant of Mr. Ramirez’s failure to appear and inferred lack of participatory enthusiasm, questioned Mr. Ramirez's real commitment to participating in the homicide.

The lawyer added that Ramirez showed real anguish over the death of his closest MS-13 member - killed by other MS-13 members who thought he was cooperating with the feds, and concluded:

Mr. Ramirez is a defendant with virtually no criminal history who was recruited into the MS-13 criminal organization through fear, threats and intimidation like many others. Once there, however, it was evident that Mr. Ramirez had little fortitude to carry out the murderous agenda of his co-conspirators resulting in a very minor role to play compared with his co-conspirators.

Federal prosecutors, however, argued Ramirez had shown an eagerness to move up the gang ranks and that it was only a matter of time before he attacked somebody with a machete.

Ramirez, a Honduran national, faces deportation after completing his sentence, according to the US Attorney's office.

Ramirez was one of 61 people arrested in raids aimed at MS-13 in 2016 - most of whom have since either pleaded or been found guilty.

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Comments

Three articles today involving MS-13-related crimes. These people are starting to make the Bulger-Flemmi-Cosa Nostra crown look like pre-schoolers. Do we need another reason to keep ICE and to build the wall??? MAGA!!!

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How do you know “these people” are undocumented? Answer: you don’t, and your comment drips with racism.

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Uhhh, newsflash, this has nothing to do with 'the wall' and MAGA.

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But -

No wall - period - even if Mexico is paying for it.

No MAGA - contrary to Andrew Cuomo's thoughts - America was already great. We can certainly be greater - but MAGA is an illusion.

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America is a very good country which is getting less good. It has never had the best standard of living, literacy, life expectancy, poverty, and a whole host of other "great" metrics.

Saying "America was never great" is perhaps the most honest and truthful statement a politician has said in my lifetime.

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Apparently, Alfred Nobel didn't like math.

Top 5 Countries receiving medals
1 United States 13 Medals
2 France 12 Medals
3 Russia 8 Medals
4 United Kingdom 7 Medals
5 Germany 5 Medals

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Leave

Or tell me where you'd rather live. I've been fortunate to travel the world and I haven't found somewhere I'd rather be.

Maybe not best in any single category, but in the aggregate pretty much impossible to beat.

Not great? With all our flaws, imagine a world without the US. Now that's frightening.

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I feel like all this talk about "great" vs. "not great" is a bunch of semantics bull, and it's really distracting from more substantive discussion.

It would be 'great' if we could all talk about ways to improve our country, since we can always be better.

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Since, you know, MS13 is home grown and originated in LA.

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1. $50 says the guy in question got here using a route that no wall could have deterred
2. MS-13 leadership is based in El Salvador. $50 more says you couldn't locate El Salvador on a map with a color-coded relief map and three chances
3. I've never met a single goddamn one of you MAGA-hats with more than about a third-grade education, so I'll spell out the subtext that I'm 100% certain you'll otherwise miss: this is the reason your kids don't call you. Sit down, shut up, and stop making a goddamn fucking spectacle of yourself in a state with a functioning secondary educational system. There's an entire Trump-voting wasteland out in the midwest; go live there if you're going to insist on being militantly ignorant as a matter of political faith. Meanwhile, you're going to want to pick up a Wikipedia article or something, and read about what happens to fascist sympathizers. They don't always get prison sentences, but you're going to have a hell of a difficult time remaining part of polite society when your trail of verbal diarrhea can be linked back to your real name and the 21st century version of the Nuremberg trials happen.

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There are people who can help with that amger.

And way to classify the entire country outside of coastal hubs as a "Trump voting wastland". It's that mentality, along with assuming all conservatives are uneducated racists, that helped get Trump elected in the first place.

Newsflash, people can be conservative and anti illegal immigration without being a big Trump fan.

That may not compute for you and your superior intellect but it's a reality.

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Tough day for the Trumplestiltskins. Manafort AND Cohen flat out says Trump was a co-conspirator in a felony. Innocent etc until impeached.

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Slept in? Go figure! Those late night crime doings will get to ya..

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If his dog ate his homework that day too..

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That wouldn't happen. Any dogs that an MS13 member ever owned ended up either dead or rescued by the Animal Rescue League.

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In less than 24 hours Adam you have posted 3 stories on these gang members.
A Honduran national. Who's to be deported means he got here for all the wrong reasons.
KEEP ICE. EW SUCKS

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You know we can still deport people without ICE, right?

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Let's all assume this guy is getting deported after serving his term. Upon release, who would take custody of him? Who would transport him out of the country? Would whoever it is in charge of releases of criminals just hand him a note and tell him he has to leave the country?

Hate the policies they enforce and they way they enforce them all you want, but at the end of the day, we need someone in charge of immigration enforcement (just like we need someone in charge of customs enforcement.)

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n/t

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And the Immigration and Naturalization Service also did things like raiding businesses looking for illegals and taking non-citizens convicted of crimes and repatriating them. Then, border protection was reorganized under the Department of Homeland Security.

But if ICE were abolished, who would do it then?

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Here's a good take from the Atlantic:

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/07/how-to-counter-dona...

Calls to “abolish ice” will resonate on the left flank of the Democratic Party, and they will also resonate with libertarian-inclined people like me, for reasons articulated well in Reason magazine by Shikha Dalmia:

Quoting Shikha Dalmia after that,

But there is no need for a dedicated entity that only goes after immigrants in the first place. The 1980 Libertarian Party platform demanded the abolition of several of ice's less draconian predecessor agencies. It's time to renew that call. Regular law enforcement can handle the truly bad hombres. Congress should dismantle ice and thoughtfully reassign its legitimate functions.

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So, in the end that would mean 51 different immigration policies (one for each state, plus DC, though if we could overseas territories, we're up to 56) or more likely the libertarian dream of open borders.

However, in the real world, federal agencies enforce federal law. Isn't that one of the takes with this whole "sanctuary" business that local law enforcement shouldn't be involved with enforcing federal immigration law?

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That you think this is the only way is a failure of your imagination. And, it's probably painfully obvious, but I'm not even a libertarian.

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That's where the libertarian side comes in.

But again, is the proposal really to have local law enforcement handle immigration issues?

Reform ICE? Okay. Abolish ICE? And what will replace it. Perhaps we can just rename it the INS and make everybody happy.

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Is not to enforce laws. The purpose of ICE is to terrify illegal immigrants. It's part of Trumpski's policy to realize immigration law principally through self-deportation. The architects of the policy want illegal immigrants to be so terrified they leave the country on their own account, and potential illegal immigrants to be so terrified they won't come. A clumsy, jackbooted ICE is part of the plan.

This country couldn't actually find and deport all of the 11 million (and dropping) illegal immigrants in the US, under any circumstances, not even if ICE were several times its current size. They couldn't even find and deport half of them without a hell of a lot of 'broken eggs,' including a lot of damage to American citizens, especially to children, and profoundly negative social repercussions that would cost this country a lot of money.

If our immigration enforcement service focused on deporting illegal immigrants who have actually committed other crimes in the United States, as once was done in the past, their target population would be too small to justify their current size. Immigrants commit far fewer crimes on average than do American-born people.

The proposal is to return to a situation where people who do not have the proper documentation, or are awaiting regularization or hearings, are not afraid to send their children to school, not afraid to play with their children in the playground, not afraid to seek medical attention or police help - in short, can feel safe and contribute positively to our society in case their legal matters are resolved in their favor so they may stay. The proposal is to behave towards the "least among us" in a way that honors our cultural tradition and values.

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Is to enforce the nation’s immigration laws. Period.

That people cannot handle what our immigration laws are is another issue.

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I hope you come to understand society and policy better someday.

Here's a good place to start:

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/09/trump-ice/565772/

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You might even learn the history of immigration in America. For instance, what did the predecessor to ICE do, specifically when it came to enforcing immigration laws?

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why bother spending the money to imprison him here, rather than just immediately sending him back as his sentence?

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Deporting suspected MS-13 members rather than imprisoning the ones convicted of a crime is how we created its power base in El Salvador.

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So this guy probably deserves to get some time for being an affiliated gang member...

But how on earth does he get more time than the dude in the article right before this one, in which that guy shot up a crowed T?

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First is jurisdiction: The train guy went through the state system, this guy is in the federal court system. They have different potential penalties in general.

Also, this guy was also charged under RICO, the same law used to go after, well, mobsters, and it has some tough potential penalties, even if you agree to a plea deal (as this guy did).

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