18th Street Gang Member Gets Prison For Role In Brutal 2017 Hudson Valley Slaying

NEW YORK — A high-ranking member of the 18th Street gang was sentenced Tuesday to more than 35 years in prison for racketeering conspiracy for his role in a 2017 murder in Saugerties, according to federal prosecutors.

U.S. District Judge LaShann DeArcy Hall sentenced Jose Douglas Castellano to 425 months behind bars during a proceeding in Brooklyn, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office for the Eastern District of New York.

Prosecutors said Castellano, a Brooklyn resident, was involved in the Oct. 25, 2017 murder of 20-year-old Jonathan Figueroa in Saugerties, in Ulster County.

U.S. Attorney Joseph Nocella Jr. said Castellano was part of the 18th Street gang, which Nocella described as an international criminal organization that has “left a wake of sorrow and destruction in its path.”

According to prosecutors, gang members suspected Figueroa, a fellow 18th Street gang member, of cooperating with law enforcement’s investigation into a homicide.

Prosecutors said senior gang members, including Castellano, sought authorization from a high-ranking member to murder Figueroa. Once they got authorization, Castellano activated gang members based in Kingston, New York, and directed them to coordinate with Queens-based gang members to see to Figueroa’s execution, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office.

Gang members in Kingston dug a grave in Turkey Point State Forest, a 139-acre property in Saugerties, in anticipation of Figueroa’s arrival, according to the government.

Prosecutors said the victim was lured to the site, and then a group of gang members “brutally stabbed him to death and buried him in the makeshift grave.”

Another gang member, Yanki Misael Cruz-Mateo, ordered the murder to be videotaped, and prosecutors said it captured the victim being stabbed repeatedly. In the video, Cruz Mateo stated Figueroa was being murdered for “being a rat,” and the video was sent to other gang members as a warning, prosecutors said. Cruz Mateo was previously sentenced to 45 years in prison.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation, along with state and local law enforcement, found Figueroa’s body in a five-foot deep grave in February 2018. The victim had suffered more than 100 stab wounds, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office.

Several other gang members have already been sentenced, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office’s Tuesday press release, which outlined the members’ convictions for various murders, shootings and other crimes in New York.

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18th Street Gang Member Gets Prison Term For Two Murders