A 29-year-old leader of the Sunset Trinitarios gang from the Dominican Republic was found guilty on Friday of racketeering conspiracy, murder of two teens in The Bronx, and firearms-related charges in federal court.

 

Damian Williams, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced on Friday, Sept. 20, that a jury found Carlos Ramirez, a/k/a “Guerra” [which means “war” in Spanish] guilty of racketeering conspiracy, murder, and firearms-related charges. They said Ramirez was found guilty following a two-week trial before U.S. District Judge Jesse M. Furman and is scheduled to be sentenced on Jan. 9, 2025.

 

Reacting to the announcement, Williams said, “For more than a decade, the family members of Michael Beltre, also of the Dominican Republic, and Jordanny Correa have waited for justice. Their wait is now over.” He said with the verdict, the jury has now held Ramirez responsible for “nearly a decade of drug trafficking, robberies, and violence, including the murder of these two young men, both teenagers at the time that they were shot to death.”

 

He continued, “It does not matter how long ago their lives were lost to the scourge of gang violence in this city. I promise you that the career prosecutors of this Office and our law enforcement partners will never stop investigating and prosecuting these righteous cases. If any member of the public has information that they wish to share with us about any unsolved murder in this city, then we encourage you to come forward.”

 

According to the indictment, public court filings, and the evidence presented at trial, from 2010 to 2024, members of the Sunset Trinitarios, a violent drug trafficking organization and street gang founded in Sunset Park in Brooklyn, committed a “terrifying” number of violent crimes, including multiple murders and attempted murders and numerous gunpoint robberies all across the metropolitan area.

 

The court heard that Ramirez was one of the members of the Sunset Trinitarios during this period, and rose to multiple positions of leadership within the gang, both out on the street and while incarcerated in the custody of state and federal detention facilities in New York City.

 

Prosecutors said that as a so-called, “devil soldier messenger” of the Sunset Trinitarios, which came to celebrate the murder of innocent victims and their purported delivery to the devil, Ramirez obtained two identical tattoos memorializing the two murders he committed on behalf of the gang.

 

According to court records, on Oct. 23, 2013, Ramirez participated in the murder of Michael Beltre, who was 17 years old. Beltre was shot [at 2622 Jerome Avenue in Fordham Manor] multiple times after Ramirez struck him and held him for another gang member to shoot.

 

The court also heard that on Nov. 2, 2014, Ramirez murdered Jordanny Correa, who was 19 years old, shooting Correa multiple times at point-blank range inside an apartment in The Bronx.

 

Prosecutors said that on Feb. 28, 2023, Ramirez also attempted to murder a former leader of the Sunset Trinitarios gang inside the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn. They said Ramirez did this because he believed this former leader had previously supplied information to law enforcement. They said with the help of others, Ramirez slashed and stabbed the victim with a knife, causing severe injuries to the victim’s face and about his his body.

 

Prosecutors said that ten more of Ramirez’s co-conspirators and fellow members of the Sunset Trinitarios gang previously pled guilty and await sentencing or have been sentenced, receiving sentences to date that have ranged from multiple years through life in prison.

 

They called on members of the public to act if they believe they have information related to Ramirez or the Sunset Trinitarios, and to consider reporting this information, using the following link, https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/report-crime.

 

Ramirez was convicted of conspiracy to commit racketeering, murder in aid of racketeering, and the use of a firearm to commit murder. Each of the three offenses carries a maximum sentence of life in prison, and murder in aid of racketeering carries a mandatory sentence of life in prison.

 

The mandatory and maximum potential sentences in this case are prescribed by Congress and are provided for informational purposes only. Any sentencing of the defendant will be determined by a judge.

 

Williams praised what he described as the outstanding work of the Drug Enforcement Administration’s Drug Enforcement Task Force and the NYPD, which he said also supported the prosecution through trial. He also thanked the Bureau of Prisons and the New York City Department of Correction for their assistance.

 

The case is being handled by the Souther District of New York’s Violent and Organized Crime Unit. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Thomas John Wright, Brandon D. Harper, and Timothy Ly are leading the prosecution, with the assistance of paralegal specialists, William Coleman and Kiersten Luger.