Gang member gets 35 years for murder
A member of the MS-13 street gang was sentenced to 35 years in prison Monday for murdering a 16-year-old girl whom he and other members mistakenly believed had turned informant, according to officials.
The body of Olivia Melendez Mendoza, of Hempstead, was found in September 2004 in a wooded area of Old Westbury, the same day that the body of another MS-13 member was found 13 miles away in Bethpage.
The two had been killed by different cliques, or chapters, of the gang that was trying to purge its ranks of suspected informers.
But it was just a bizarre coincidence that the two bodies were discovered the same day, according to an investigation by the FBI and local police.
The killer of Melendez Mendoza, Edwin Henriquez of Hempstead, who was 19 at the time of the murder, declined to comment before the sentence was imposed by U.S. District Judge Leonard Wexler in federal court in Central Islip.
Henriquez stared back unemotionally while Melendez Mendoza's mother Maria addressed the court before sentencing through a Spanish interpreter.
"My daughter got involved in incorrect things in life," she said. "I thank God and the justice system that he will not be out for many years to take another life."
Henriquez father, Rene, who was in the courtroom for the sentencing, declined to comment.
"Olivia Melendez Mendoza had her whole life before her," said federal prosecutor Richard Donoghue, who brought the case along with Assistant U.S. Attorney John Durham. "Edwin Henriquez shot her in the head from behind" just because he was a member of MS-13.
Henriquez's attorney, Norman Trabulus of Manhattan, said after the sentencing, "it was a fair and just sentence."
The body of Melendez Mendoza was found the same day as that of Genaro Venegas, 24, of Central Islip, who was found shot to death in Bethpage.
Melendez Mendoza and Venegas were killed as part of an attempt by MS-13 in 2004 to purge its ranks after arrests on Long Island had decimated its traditional membership, according to officials.
In December, Wilver Lopez, 29, of Central Islip, the head of an MS-13 clique in the Brentwood-Central Islip area, was sentenced in federal court in Central Islip to 35 years imprisonment for killing Venegas.
'We have to do better' Newsday high school sports editor Gregg Sarra talks about a bench-clearing, parent-involved incident at a Half Hollow Hills West basketball game.
'We have to do better' Newsday high school sports editor Gregg Sarra talks about a bench-clearing, parent-involved incident at a Half Hollow Hills West basketball game.
