A New York woman is being accused of inviting a group of teen boys to the woods on Long Island, where they were beaten to death, People reports.
The incident unfolded in 2017, when the now-21-year-old woman and alleged MS-13 associate, Leniz Escobar, asked five teens—Alexander Ruiz, Michael Lopez, Justin Llivicura, Jorge Tigre, and Jefferson Villalobos—if they wanted to smoke weed in the woods, WNYW reports. That’s when over a dozen MS-13 gang members allegedly descended upon the boys and started beating and attacking them with machetes, knives, and tree limbs. Four of the teens died.
Ruiz, the lone survivor, took to the stand in Escobar’s trial, where she’s facing up to life in prison. He described how he ended up escaping by fleeing the scene, and that members of MS-13 masked their identities with sweatshirts.
According to prosecutors, the gang saw the beating as payback, since they had been “disrespected” online. The victims were also allegedly members of the 18th Street gang, adversaries of MS-13.
Escobar has pleaded not guilty to murder and racketeering, among other charges. Prosecutors claim that she made herself out to be the victim when she was actually boasting about the murders to her then-boyfriend, who was higher up in the MS-13 organization. She also allegedly threw out her cell phone and the bloody clothes she wore on the night of the incident. In court documents, prosecutors reportedly called the murders a “horrific frenzy of violence.”
Court docs also say Escobar instigated “the murders, along with another juvenile female, by locating photographs of some of the victims flashing MS-13 gang signs on social media … and then showing those photographs to MS-13 members.”
Four other MS-13 members have pending trials for the murders, and two have been sentenced to 50 and 55 years in prison.
