Three reputed leaders of the Orange County faction of the Mexican Mafia and 28 alleged associates are named in a federal grand jury indictment unsealed Wednesday that accuses those connected with the powerful, prison-based gang of carrying out murders, attempted murders and and a variety of drug and gun-related crimes.

The racketeering indictment – which follows a years-long investigation by federal and local law enforcement known as Operation Night Owl – is meant to deliver a “crushing blow” to “longtime gangsters who control the vast majority of Latino street gangs” in Orange County, U.S. Attorney and FBI officials said at a news conference on Wednesday morning.

“No gang member is beyond our reach,” U.S. Attorney Tracy L. Wilkison said. “Working together, law enforcement intends to dismantle both street gangs and prison gangs from top to bottom, from shot caller to street soldier.”

Earlier Wednesday morning, law enforcement, including multiple SWAT teams, arrested eight people, six in Orange County while serving federal arrest warrants, law enforcement officials said. Two defendants are still at large, officials said, while the other people named in the indictment already were in custody.

The indictment accuses the suspected Mexican Mafia leaders of racketeering, and gang members and associates of committing murders, various attempted murders and the widespread distribution of drugs such as methamphetamine and heroin.

“Our investigation, which was initiated by the Orange County Violent Gangs Task Force in 2017, revealed that the Mexican Mafia shot callers were utilizing members of Hispanic street gangs in Orange County to traffic drugs, commit extortion, and commit acts of violence,” said Brian Gilhooly, an FBI Special Agent in Charge. “These cases are challenging, particularly since the members and associates of the gang speak in code, and members assume they are under surveillance and are being wiretapped at all times.”

Among the violent crimes listed in the indictment are the attempted murders of several individuals who allegedly disrespected or fell out with Mexican Mafia leaders, who violated the gang’s code or who threatened to talk to law enforcement. The indictment also includes a Placentia murder and the killing of a person who was shot to death in Orange.

Comprised of senior members of Latino street gangs, the prison-based Mexican Mafia exerts widespread control over gang activity across Southern California.

The Mexican Mafia “taxes” those who deal drugs in gang-controlled territories and traffics narcotics in and out of prisons and jails. From behind bars, Mexican Mafia leaders issue edicts to local crews, often through the use of smuggled phones, coded written communications, or visiting female associates – known as “secretaries” – who visit them in lockup in order to relay messages to gang members on the streets.

Those who ignore or refuse to follow the Mexican Mafia’s rules or orders are often targeted for beatings or even death.

The indictment alleges that Johnny Martinez, Robert Aguirre and Dennis Ortiz were “made” members of the Mexican Mafia overseeing the organizations criminal activities in Orange County.

Serving as “shot-callers,” or mouthpieces, for the Mexican Mafia leaders were Omar Mejia, Miguel Jose Alvarado, Luis Heriberto Vasquez, Michael Cooper and Abraham Guajardo, the indictment alleges. Brenda Vanessa Campos Martinez and Danielle Canales served as “secretaries” for the Mexican Mafia leaders, according to the indictment.

Operation Night Owl is the latest in a series of large-scale operations that have been carried out by law enforcement over the last few decades targeting Orange County leadership of the Mexican Mafia.

For more than 30 years, the Orange County faction of the Mexican Mafia was run by longtime Santa Ana gang chieftain Peter Ojeda, even after a 2006 federal racketeering conviction left Ojeda confined to a prison cell three time-zones away.

Nearly a decade after Ojeda was sent to federal prison, a power struggle over the control of the Orange County faction of the Mexican Mafia between Ojeda and Armando Moreno – a longtime Orange County gang member and former Ojeda ally turned bitter enemy – led to a wave of violence in local lockup and streets.

Ojeda won the power struggle with Moreno after gaining the support of fellow Mexican Mafia members from Los Angeles, but a large-scale investigation by state and federal law enforcement soon ended with Ojeda convicted once again of racketeering, along with dozens of his gang associates.

Ojeda died in prison in 2016. Two years later, Orange County prosecutors identified Martinez – who goes by the gang moniker “crow” – as the new leader of the Orange County faction of the Mexican Mafia, alleging he ordered his own wave of violence to take power in the void left by Ojeda’s death.

The Orange County District Attorney’s Office in 2018 charged Martinez and his associates with a murder and an attempted murder, both in Placentia. Martinez already was serving a life sentence in prison at the time of the killing and attempted killing, but Orange County prosecutors alleged that he used contraband cell phones to communicate with gang associates and orchestrate the violence in Orange County.

The state murder case was tied to the 2017 killing of Robert Rios, a Placentia man who prosecutors say angered Martinez and another imprisoned gang leader, Greg Munoz, by not paying them “taxes” they believed he owed them for dealing drugs. Three men were ordered to go to Rios’ home and confront him, and Rios was shot and killed during the confrontation.

Months later, after Martinez and Munoz apparently had a falling out, state prosecutors alleged that Martinez ordered two men to kill Munoz, who was shot seven times but survived.

Last year, the murder charge against Martinez was tossed out of state court after a judge determined that a sheriff’s deputy who served as a gang expert was dishonest on the stand when he was asked about his training regarding the booking of evidence.

The Rios murder and the Munoz attempted murder are both included in the new federal indictment.

Officials said the federal investigation involving Martinez and the other alleged gang leaders and associates began in 2017 – years before the state murder charge was dismissed – and did not believe the issues that led to the state charges getting dismissed will impact the federal case.

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