Guardian Angels Founder Curtis Sliwa Calls For Special Police Task Force To Tackle MS-13

SOUTHAMPTON, NY — After lawmakers spoke out last week, vowing to tackle the deadly MS-13 violence that's plaguing Long Island, Guardian Angels founder Curtis Sliwa revealed the final part of a multi-pronged plan he's pitching to take down the violent street gang.

Sliwa unveiled the plan in two parts, the first, discussing law enforcement and jails, and the second, focusing on schools and the criminal justice system.

A national spotlight is focused on Long Island after the gruesome discovery of four bodies in Central Islip on Long Island — the four young men are believed to have been victims of the deadly MS-13 street gang — and the heat is on Suffolk County as lawmakers, educators and a horrified public try to shine a light on MS-13 and seek answers on how to stem the tide of escalating violence.

Sliwa, who founded the Guardian Angels, a non-profit volunteer safety patrol organization whose members are known for their trademark red berets, outlined MS-13's migration to Long Island in a previous Patch article, drawing on decades of experience with gangs nationwide.

Lawmakers have visited Long Island in recent days, promising to dedicate resources to eradicating the vicious gang from sleepy communities ravaged by crime.

Suffolk County Executive Steve Bellone spoke out last week, outlining proposed measures to establish clearer guidance and provide additional support to Suffolk County and for localities across the country. Those measures would include making federal funds available to local law enforcement agencies that are combatting MS-13, providing gang prevention funding and local resources to communities where the federal government is placing children so that the obligation is not borne solely by local taxpayers, ensuring that a process is in place that prevents individuals with gang ties from being placed in the community, and establishing a notification procedure from the federal government to local governments and school districts where children are being placed.

"While the vast majority of unaccompanied minors are law-abiding individuals reuniting with family members who have successfully transitioned into the community, there are indications that MS-13 has sought to exploit the program for the purposes of recruiting and victimizing children," Bellone said, adding that one effective strategy to undermine MS-13 would be to adopt comprehensive immigration reform to fix a broken immigration system, securing borders and providing a pathway to citizenship for law abiding individuals.

United States Attorney General Jeff Sessions appeared in Central Islip on Friday, with a message for MS-13 gang members: "We are targeting you." He also outlined plans to "demolish" the gang.

New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo also spoke last week in Brentwood about MS-13.

The governor said plans are in place for New York State Police to "set up a high intensity gang unit," which will focus on gang activity with intelligence expertise and electronic surveillance equipment, vehicles, aviation and other tools to combat gang violence in "select pockets of the state — and especially on MS-13, on Long Island."

State Police, Cuomo said, will work with the FBI and a Suffolk County task force; there will be additional police personnel to patrol Brentwood and Central Islip.

"MS-13 are thugs. They are thugs who prey on young people and recruit young people, often unaccompanied children from Central America, seducing them into a life of gang violence" that includes robbery, drugs, prostitution, grand larceny and kidnapping," Cuomo said. "Our job is to say to MS-13 —enough is enough. We will not rest until MS-13 is out of business."

Sliwa's introduces plan involving special task force

After hearing the plans from Bellone, Cuomo and Sessions, Sliwa said, in his opinion, there is a lack of necessary coordination that could mean limited impact.

Speaking from his perspective, Sliwa suggests looking to the 34,000 New York City Police Department officers, with dozens born in Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador, who were brought to the United States as young children.

"Many of them serve in the gang intelligence division of the NYPD, which has had good results in reining in MS-13 activities in the five boroughs," Sliwa said. "

He pointed to communities such as Elmhurst, Corona, Jackson Heights and Sunset Park where, although there is an MS-13 presence, the impacts are limited.

The reason, Sliwa believes, is because the NYPD's gang enforcement unit utilizes police officers with origins in Central America to "go into those immigrant communities where most are illegals. Their job is to gather intelligence, make friends, support youth activities that exist and, if necessary, do undercover buy and bust operations against MS-13, 18th Street, and other Central American and Mexican gangs. They are an effective force."

Sliwa suggests a special task force comprised of NYPD officers, with ties to Central America, who can be "put on loan" to the ongoing investigation and crack down on MS-13 in Brentwood and Central Islip.

"They clearly know who the gangs are and are comfortable integrating into a predominantly illegal alien community. They are also experienced in working under the conditions of a sanctuary city . . . This would effectively aide the local effort," he said.

Sliwa said there's precedence to the idea; a similar effort was put forth in 2010 when Police Commissioner Ray Kelly sent a contingent of Haitian American police officers from the NYPD to work in Haiti for three months after an earthquake to help local law enforcement and to better aide their training, he pointed out.

"If the NYPD could do this for a foreign country, Haiti, why couldn’t they offer their services 52 miles away into New York City’s backyard of Brentwood and Central Islip? It makes more sense than bringing troopers from upstate," he said.

Patch photo courtesy of Curtis Sliwa.