MS-13 gang member sentenced. How Fresno-area authorities used a wiretap to catch him
An MS-13 gang member from Mendota was sentenced to five years and three months in prison for several crimes, including a knife attack that sent a man to the hospital and dealing drugs.
Lorenzo Amador, 23, was sentenced Friday.
Amador is a member of La Mara Salvatrucha or MS-13, a violent criminal gang known for murder, kidnapping and drug trafficking, according to court documents and a news release from the U.S. Attorney’s Eastern District of California office.
He and others are accused of kicking, hitting and stabbing a member of a rival gang in the back with a knife on Aug. 12, 2018, slicing his diaphragm and sending him to the emergency room, where he had life-saving surgery.
Amador used coded language to share word of the attack via Facebook, according to the release. The message was intercepted by a wiretap on a fellow gang member.
Gang members also called each other to warn Amador that law enforcement was coming for him and helped him flee Mendota.
Officers caught him two months later.
Amador is also accused of driving to Los Angeles to pick up drugs, driving them back to Mendota and selling them.
He was convicted of assault with a deadly weapon in aid of racketeering, and conspiracy to distribute and to possess with intent to distribute marijuana.
Several of his co-defendants have been sentenced, with one person to be sentenced in 2022.
At least seven law enforcement agencies were involved in the investigation. The case was prosecuted as part of the joint federal, state, and local Project Safe Neighborhoods Program.
This story was originally published December 20, 2021 at 12:37 PM.
