MS-13 Gang Member Sentenced After Confessing To Murder At Glen Burnie Eatery: Officials

EDGEWATER, MD — An MS-13 gang member from Edgewater was sentenced to 30 years in prison for murder, officials announced Monday. Prosecutors said the 23-year-old suspect confessed to fatally stabbing a man at a Glen Burnie restaurant in 2020.

Authorities identified the arrestee as Cristian Pleitez-Tejada and the victim as Jose Salvador Mancia Aguilar. Court records show that the suspect pleaded guilty on Oct. 14, 2021 to second-degree murder.

“The defendant had an ongoing disagreement with the victim and sought him out at a local restaurant to attack him, unprovoked and without warning," Anne Arundel County State’s Attorney Anne Colt Leitess said in a press release.

The Stabbing

The deadly encounter happened on Oct. 4, 2020 at El Norteno Grill, located in the 600 block of Crain Highway North. Medics pronounced the victim dead on the scene, the release said.

The Anne Arundel County Police Department reviewed surveillance video showing the victim and a young male walking toward the rear exterior of the business around 7:45 p.m. The video later showed the victim stumbling and collapsing at the bar's main entrance around 8 p.m. The suspect then pulled up his hood and ran away from the back of the establishment, officials said.

A witness told authorities that they heard the victim and the suspect arguing moments before the stabbing, the release said. Investigators later found out that the disagreement stemmed from an unknown incident in their mutual home country of El Salvador.

The Investigation

The Maryland Office of the Chief Medical Examiner ruled the death a homicide, prosecutors said.

Detectives eventually named Pleitez-Tejada as the suspect and learned that he planned to leave the United States. Officials said FBI agents caught the accused man in Arkansas on Oct. 22, 2020.

Assistant State’s Attorneys Glen Neubauer and Brian Pritchard prosecuted the case, and Judge Robert Thompson presided over it.

"I am grateful that the judge recognized the defendant’s dangerousness as a verified gang member, and sentenced him to the maximum sentence for this crime,” the state’s attorney said. “It’s my hope that this outcome provides the victim’s family and friends some peace as they have suffered a terrible loss.”

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