The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) on Friday announced that a member of Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) was sentenced to more than a decade in prison after he pleaded guilty to kidnapping, torturing, and repeatedly assaulting a witness who testified against his fellow gang members in a 2023 trial.
Bayron Wuifredo Santos-Recarte, a 27-year-old citizen of Honduras, who immigrated to the United States illegally, was sentenced in the Middle District of Tennessee on Friday to 147 months in a federal prison after he admitted to kidnapping and assaulting a federal witness, as well as to illegally possessing a firearm.
According to the DOJ, Santos-Recarte admitted to the armed kidnapping of a witness who testified against MS-13 gang members during a federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) case conducted in 2023, telling a federal court, “MS-13 members tried to shoot and murder him on two occasions over a drug dispute.”
As a result of the 2023 trial, two MS-13 gang members previously living in Nashville were convicted of murder and attempted murder as part of the racketeering conspiracy, as as well as for drug trafficking and destroying evidence.
The DOJ said that Santos-Recarte and his MS-13 associates held the witness “in a truck for hours,” while repeatedly assaulting the witness “with a firearm, hammer, and machete.”
When the witness was able to escape his tormentors and seek medical attention, the DOJ reported he suffered injuries to his kidney, broken bones, and internal bleeding.
Matthew Galeotti (pictured above), the Head of the DOJ Criminal Division, said in a statement that the type of brutality seen in the attack is what motivated the Trump administration to designate MS-13 as a Foreign Terrorist Organization earlier this year.
“The defendant, an MS-13 member, kidnapped a former federal witness and tortured him with a machete, hammer, and gun,” said Galeotti. “This violence and obstruction of the American legal system is core MS-13 conduct and exemplifies why MS-13 has been designated a foreign terrorist organization.”
The Friday sentencing of an Santos-Recarte, an MS-13 member, came amid scrutiny over the gang’s presence in the United States after it was revealed that Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the Salvadoran national deported to his home country last month by the Trump administration, was determined likely to be a member of the gang by two judges. Abrego Garcia denies this claim, leading an immigration judge to grant a 2019 “withholding of removal” order that prevented his deportation to El Salvador, but not to another country.
President Donald Trump posted an image of Abrego Garcia’s hand tattoos to the social media platform X on Friday, suggesting the marijuana leaf, smiley face, cross, and skull are a symbolic representation of the letters MS-13.
This is the hand of the man that the Democrats feel should be brought back to the United States, because he is such “a fine and innocent person.” They said he is not a member of MS-13, even though he’s got MS-13 tattooed onto his knuckles, and two Highly Respected Courts found… pic.twitter.com/31sNr2k1SK
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 18, 2025
The Tennessee Highway Patrol and U.S. Department of Homeland Security have both confirmed Abrego Garcia was stopped in 2022 for speeding and failing to maintain his lane. Despite transporting eight passengers and being suspected of human trafficking by officers on the scene, THP told The Tennessee Star last week that Abrego Garcia and his passengers were released at the request of the “Biden-era FBI.”
– – –
Tom Pappert is the lead reporter for The Tennessee Star, and also reports for The Pennsylvania Daily Star and The Arizona Sun Times. Follow Tom on X/Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
