MS-13 member pleads guilty to 3 murders

An MS-13 gang member, known by his associates as “Cabo” —”cape” in Spanish — pleaded guilty Thursday to his role in the murders of three men in Columbus.

Isaias Alvarado, 46, entered the plea in U.S. District Court in Columbus and will be sentenced at a later date by Chief U.S. District Judge Edmund A. Sargus Jr.

Alvarado faces a potential maximum sentence of life behind bars. He is one of 23 individuals who were indicted in federal court in Columbus in February 2018 in connection with a racketeering conspiracy as purported members of MS-13’S gang affiliate in Columbus.

The defendants are accused of being involved in five murders and schemes that involved attempted murder, extortion, money laundering, drug trafficking, assault, obstruction of justice, witness intimidation, weapons offenses and immigrationrelated violations.

Alvarado accepted responsibility for his role in three murders that occurred in Columbus, according to a news release from U.S. Attorney Benjamin Glassman of the Southern District of Ohio in Columbus.

Two of the three murders were discovered in early December 2015 at Innis Park on the Northeast Side. The body of Wilson Omar Villeda, 17, was found in a shallow grave. His body had 69 chop wounds consistent with a machete, which is a signature of the MS-13 gang.

While Columbus police homicide detectives were excavating Villeda’s body, they found what turned out to be the decomposed remains of 38-year-old Carlos Serrano-ramos. Serrano-ramos is believed to have been a rival gang member who was slain sometime during summer 2015, the U.S. attorney’s office said in the release.

An autopsy by the Franklin County coroner’s office of Serrano-ramos’ body found a number of “sharp force injuries of the torso” consistent with a bladed object.

A year later, on Dec. 4, 2016, the bullet-riddled body of Salvador Martinez-diaz, 25, was found on the street in the 4400 block of Melroy Avenue on the city’s East Side.

The fatal shooting occurred at 3 a.m., shortly after he had been dropped off near the apartment where he lived.

It is believed that MartinezDiaz was shot because he was a rival gang member, the release said.