Feds obtain indictments for Nuestra Familia gang members

By JULIA REYNOLDS – Monterey County Herald
Posted: 01/18/2010 07:22:00 PM PST

More than two years after FBI agents coordinated 30 raids across Monterey, Santa Cruz and other counties, prosecutors have obtained their first major conviction in a sweeping indictment of Nuestra Familia gang members from Salinas and the Central Valley.

The news comes as police and gang investigators say that Nuestra Familia has stepped up its violent activity in Monterey County.

In a document signed Wednesday, Salinas resident Manuel Gauna, 41, pleaded guilty and admitted to conspiring with Nuestra Familia members and associates to sell methamphetamine, cocaine, marijuana and ecstasy.

Jeffrey Staniels, one of Gauna’s attorneys, stressed that his client has not cooperated or debriefed with federal agents.

The statement was apparently made in light of the fact that at least one co-defendant in the far-reaching drug case – former Castroville resident Mario Diaz – has agreed to testify against his one-time gang colleagues.

As an indication that FBI agents believed Diaz was the kingpin of the Nuestra Familia’s statewide drug operations, the government initially labeled the conspiracy behind their case as the Mario Diaz Drug Trafficking Organization.

Now the one-time top target is a witness for the prosecution, having debriefed about his co-defendants only days after he and Gauna were arrested on a federal warrant in May 2007.

The case is the largest federal indictment of alleged Nuestra Familia members and associates since the FBI’s Operation Black Widow sent the gang’s top leaders to a Colorado supermax prison in 2005.

About the time Watsonville was starting an investigation into street-level drug dealers who launched a series of strong-arm robberies to raise money to pay back a debt owed the chief syndicate, the feds were winding down Operation Black Widow, which sent two dozen gang leaders and associates to prison on racketeering charges.

At the time, federal prosecutors thought by sending Nuestra Familia leaders to different prisons in states like Colorado and Louisiana they could keep the gang’s efforts at bay. It didn’t work as well as they had hoped as a new crew assumed leadership at Pelican Bay State Prison.

During Operation Black Widow, Nuestra Familia learned a lot about how the government was investigating them. During one of the early search warrants, Watsonville police discovered the entire Black Widow indictment at a gang residence.

Monterey County investigators say these cases have left the gang’s leadership in disarray, and they attribute at least part of the past year’s increase in Salinas-area violence to a continuing power struggle within the gang.

The federal case, which alleges that large-scale drug operations for the gang took place in Salinas, Los Banos and other Central California cities, points to a nexus that some gang investigators called the “Pacheco Pass corridor,” following a recent migration of Monterey County gang members to the Central Valley.

Gauna has admitted to working with Diaz since at least April 2004.

A statement attached to the plea agreement sheds light on Gauna’s involvement with the Diaz drug deals, as well as the events leading to his arrest:

At Diaz’s behest, Gauna flew to Cleveland in 2006 to straighten out problems with a cocaine delivery. A colleague allegedly working for Diaz had driven there to sell 8 kilos of cocaine because the drug fetched a higher price there than in California.

The stash was sealed in a secret compartment built into a car Diaz bought from “narco-corrido” singer Jose Angel Villaseñor, who was later convicted of drug charges in a separate case last fall.

When the driver arrived in Cleveland, he realized Diaz had forgotten to give him a special tool, and he couldn’t open the hidden compartment.

Gauna had to fly to Ohio with the tool and was able to retrieve the drugs. After his colleagues sold the first 2 kilos, he flew back to California to give the proceeds to Diaz.

Later, according to the statement, Gauna provided security by driving behind a “load car” that picked up 20 kilos of cocaine in Riverside and delivered the drug to his residence in Salinas.

By May 26, 2007, FBI agents had obtained a warrant and began a long day of surveilling Gauna at an associate’s house in Los Banos.

In the morning, the agents recorded a wiretapped line as Gauna called Diaz, who told him he was “getting ready to go to the laundry mat,” which the agents believe meant he was going to pick up methamphetamine. Gauna asked Diaz if he had enough “detergent,” referring to MSM, a substance used to cut meth before it’s sold.

After Gauna phoned Diaz again to complain that a hidden compartment in the dashboard of another car wouldn’t open, Diaz drove from Salinas to join him in Los Banos.

Shortly after Diaz arrived at 9:30 that evening, federal agents swarmed the house. The two tried to escape through the back door, but agents caught up with them in a neighbor’s yard.

Federal agents found 3 pounds of methamphetamine under the front seat of the car, and another 8 in the car’s secret compartment.

Before his plea deal was struck, Gauna was scheduled to be among the first five defendants to be tried as a group in September.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Jason Hitt, who is prosecuting the case, said that Monterey County resident Richard Mendoza, 26, will take Gauna’s place in the first trial group, which includes former Salinas residents Larry “Paqui” Amaro, 43, and Ernest “Powder” Killinger, 32.

Also in the group are Gerardo Mora, 33, of Monterey County, and Los Banos resident Jason Stewart-Hanson, 36.

However, Stewart-Hanson and Mendoza have filed motions asking to be tried separately unless evidence about the Nuestra Familia is excluded from the trial. Both say the government has acknowledged they are not members of the gang.

Hitt has argued in court papers that the gang evidence is relevant because Diaz was a high-ranking Nuestra Familia member and his organization’s drugs sales were financed by the Nuestra Familia.

A ruling on the matter is expected next Monday in a Sacramento federal court.

Gauna is scheduled to be sentenced in March. Under the terms of the plea agreement, the government will ask Judge William B. Shubb to give Gauna “the low end” of a range under federal sentencing guidelines. The minimum term he faces is 20 years in prison, with a maximum sentence of life.