Federal sweep nets 40+ Mexican Mafia members in OC crackdown

Federal and local agents swept across Southern California last week, arresting more than 40 members and associates of the Mexican Mafia, with 43 people now indicted on charges including murder, kidnapping and drug trafficking, ABC7 Los Angeles reported.

The case centered on Orange County, where a single imprisoned Mexican Mafia member allegedly used contraband cellphones to direct a network of street gang associates across Santa Ana, Tustin and Anaheim, federal prosecutors said.

The FBI and partner agencies executed search and arrest warrants at approximately 30 locations across Southern California, seizing 120 pounds of methamphetamine, more than eight pounds of fentanyl, 25 firearms and more than $30,000 in cash, according to ABC7.

First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said the crackdown targeted the street-level associates who carried out orders from an incarcerated Mexican Mafia member. "One person inside of California state prison was controlling all the Latino gangs in Orange County — Santa Ana, Tustin, Anaheim — engaged in sweeping amounts of criminal activities," Essayli said.

Essayli described the organization's prison-based structure as the source of its outsized reach. "They have very few members; all the members are in prison, they're incarcerated, and they exert a tremendous amount of control over street gangs, Hispanic street gangs — also known as 'associates,'" he said.

The imprisoned leader allegedly directed the sale of fentanyl, methamphetamine, heroin and cocaine, as well as extortion, kidnapping and assault. Investigators also connected the network to a suspected murder at a gang-controlled motel in Anaheim. Essayli noted the leader faces a long sentence on a murder charge, but said confinement provided little check on his criminal influence — explaining that gang membership offers money, family support and power.

"What this operation did was: We were targeting all those people on the outside that were taking his orders and were actually carrying out his criminal activity at his direction," Essayli told ABC7.

The Mexican Mafia was founded in the 1950s at a California juvenile detention facility and has since operated through an imprisoned membership that exerts control over affiliated street gangs statewide, according to ABC7.