MS-13 gang member pleads guilty to 2011 execution-style murders

A Brentwood man pleaded guilty Friday to the execution-style slaying of two brothers who were fellow members of the MS-13 street gang when he was 18 years old.

Arnolvin Umanzor Velasquez, now 23, said he was sitting in the back seat of a car near Lincoln Avenue and Stockton Street in Brentwood on Dec. 18, 2011, when he fired shots from a .22-caliber pistol into the head and torso of Enston Ceron, 21, and his brother, Ricardo, 19.

Velasquez told U.S. District Court Judge Joseph Bianco in Central Islip that in the kill-or-be-killed world of the MS-13, he knew if he did not carry out the murders, he and his family would be killed by the gang.

Under questioning from the judge, he admitted he was under no direct threat at the time he committed the murders, and was aware of the kill-or-be-killed rules when he joined.

“The threats made to him prior to these murders does not constitute duress” as a defense at trial, the judge said in explaining why he was accepting the guilty plea for causing the death of the two men. “At the time of the murders, he was under no coercion. It is certainly something I can consider at time of sentencing.”

Another MS-13 member who took part in the killing, Sergio Cerna, 31, of Brentwood, was in the back seat with Velasquez that night and his case is pending, Assistant U.S. Attorney John Durham said outside court.

Enston Ceron was marked for death because he was an MS-13 member who “was distancing himself from the gang by not attending meetings or ‘putting in work’ for the gang, and they were concerned he might cooperate with law enforcement authorities if he were arrested,” according to court papers.

His brother Ricardo, who was also an MS-13 member, was killed because gang members believed he would retaliate for his brother’s killing, the papers said.

After the killings, Velasquez, a U.S. citizen, fled to El Salvador. He later returned to the United States and was arrested in Georgia last May.

He faces up to life in prison at his sentencing June 23. The judge made no promise on what the sentence would be, but a plea agreement with prosecutors allows Velasquez to appeal his case only if the sentence exceeds 45 years.