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A sprawling prison in a quaint Venezuelan town served as the birthplace of one of the most notorious gangs within the region, with its infamous leader escaping his life behind bars under the nose of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro – leading to the newly-minted band of criminals wreaking havoc on American cities.
Tocorón, located in a town of the same name, once mirrored a luxury living community – outfitted with swimming pools, a nightclub and even a zoo – for some of the country’s most dangerous criminals.
For years on Maduro’s watch, the Aragua jail operated under the control of its own inmates. Kidnappings, extortions and countless other violent crimes were planned and orchestrated from the confines of Tocorón, according to The Associated Press.
Shortly after Maduro’s presidential election win in 2013, notorious criminal Héctor “Niño” Guerrero returned to Tocorón to serve time behind bars for the murder of a police officer, along with several other convictions. Guerrero seized on the widespread corruption within the prison to expand on his up-and-coming gang – Tren de Aragua, now designated as a foreign terrorist organization by the United States.
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“When a country undergoes a sort of economic whiplash or a sort of economic negative indicator, it can lead groups to come together – especially in places like jails or prisons where you have a collection of people with criminal records [and] violent histories who are competing for control over contraband markets and other things behind bars,” David Pyrooz, a professor of sociology at the University of Colorado Boulder, told Fox News Digital.
Inmates were expected to pay weekly dues to the leaders, amounting to $3.5 million flowing into the new gang annually – with money also streaming in from crimes committed outside the prison’s walls.
“What happens in prison, influences what happens on the street, and what happens on the street, influences what happens in prisons,” Pyrooz said. “So those walls are pretty porous between prisons and the communities.”
“State control, or the lack thereof, has been found in leading to gang activity in the United States, in our prison systems and across the world. So it’s not out of the ordinary, or there’s no reason to believe that Venezuela would be immune to that.”
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The corruption thrived under the Maduro administration, which did not crack down on Tren de Aragua’s grip on Tocorón until a decade later, when 11,000 Venezuelan troops stormed the prison to regain control in 2023.
However, Maduro’s efforts to restore order in Tocorón were perhaps too late. By the time troops arrived, Tren de Aragua had amassed over 4,000 members and had a presence in 11 of the country’s 23 states, according to the Venezuelan Observatory of Violence. As officials worked to dismantle the culture that had been cultivated in Tocorón, Guerrero – who now sat at the helm of the transnational gang – broke out of the prison, along with several other members.
“The fact that it was a leader, there’s no coincidence behind that,” Pyrooz told Fox News Digital. “So it does say a lot that there could be some sort of internal strife or corruption that would lead to that sort of escape.”
Following Guerrero’s escape, crimes involving members of Tren de Aragua began to skyrocket throughout the U.S – with perhaps one of the epicenters of violence landing in a residential Colorado town.
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In 2024, the gang commandeered several apartment buildings in Aurora, making national headlines as violent criminals held the complexes for ransom.
Surveillance video from The Edge at Lowry apartments sparked national outrage after a group of heavily-armed men, believed to be members of Tren de Aragua, were seen pacing the halls of the building.
Additional video showed one of the building’s representatives being violently assaulted after he refused to accept a bribe at the Whispering Pines Complex in 2023, the company told FOX 31.
In a post to X, the company revealed the employee encountered the group living inside a vacant apartment, and was subsequently assaulted after he refused to accept $500 to overlook the situation. Following the attack, the employee reportedly began receiving online threats that included his home address and spouse’s name, which were later tied to Tren de Aragua by the FBI.
“I think they were trying to kill me. I don’t know how I got out, but I got out,” the employee, whose bloodied photograph was posted by the management company on X, told FOX 31.
In another instance, a company property manager was assaulted by known Tren de Aragua member Yoendry Vilchez Medina-Jose in November 2023, according to a police report obtained by Denver 7.
Additionally, a group of gang members took over a tenant’s apartment while they were away on vacation, forcing the renter to find a new place to live.
A Colorado judge later ordered the apartment complex to temporarily close due to an “immediate threat to public safety,” with city officials assisting about 85 families in finding a new place to live where they would not be revictimized.
Surveillance video shows Aurora, Colorado apartment worker allegedly assaulted by Tren de Aragua gang
“The gang specifically targeted its own community, Venezuelan immigrants, through violence, intimidation, extortion and even kidnapping,” Aurora Police Department Chief Todd Chamberlain said at the time. “The complex became a hub for drug trafficking, home invasions, shootings and violent assaults.”
In 2025, Anderson Zambrano-Pacheco was arrested by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents in New York City, with officials alleging the Venezuelan national is the heavily-armed man seen on video kicking down a door inside the Aurora apartment complex.
“There are ways to stamp out these problems before they can rise to the point of Tren de Aragua,” Pyrooz said. “But it can be really difficult to do it, especially when you have very ineffective government mechanisms in place to stop these groups.”
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“And it can lead to the sort of accusations or anecdotal evidence that the government could have led to the migration of Tren de Aragua members to the United States.”
Last year, the Aurora Police Department released a doorbell video showing a group of nine suspected Tren de Aragua members terrorizing an apartment tenant from Venezuela, in an incident officials referred to as “very reminiscent” of the 2024 takeover at a nearby building in the city.
Video shows the group pointing guns and repeatedly knocking on an apartment door in a building near 6th Avenue and Potomac Street in Aurora, Chamberlain said during a news conference.
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“This might sound like déjà vu,” Chamberlain said at the time. “We are addressing this actively, effectively and immediately.”
Authorities ultimately arrested two suspects in relation to the incident, while detaining four other suspected criminals.
However, the influx of activity by the Venezuelan gang within the Colorado community has since diminished, according to Pyrooz.
“It’s quieted down a lot in 2025,” Pyrooz said. “The dynamics of Tren de Aragua in the area did quiet a lot. It does seem like some of the enforcement actions did correspond with lessening some of the influence of groups like Tren de Aragua.”
In December, the Department of Justice (DOJ) announced two alleged leaders of Tren de Aragua were indicted by a federal grand jury in connection with a series of crimes in Colorado.
Brawins Dominique Suarez Villegas and Giovanni Vicente Mosquera Serrano are facing several charges, including a Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization (RICO) conspiracy, marking yet another attempt to hold members of the violent street gang accountable within the parameters of the U.S. justice system.
Similarly, the Southern District of New York unsealed an indictment late last year charging Guerrero – who remains on the run – with various federal charges stemming from his role as the leader of Tren de Aragua.
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However, his capture would likely not be necessary, had he not escaped from Tocorón under the Maduro regime.
“If you let gangs take control of these institutions, it could be related to more of an abject failure of the state to either support the conditions of confinement,” Pyrooz told Fox News Digital. “[Or] to correctional officers having the effective governance in place to stamp out these conflicts before groups can rise to power.”
Fox News Digital’s Sophia Compton contributed to this report.
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