MS-13 Arrests in Huntington Machete Murder

A member of the notorious Salvadoran gang MS-13 was caught and arrested in Maryland for the brutal 2016 murder of an 18-year-old Huntington youth.

Arrested is Carlos A. Lopez-Campos, age 26, who fled the area and was hiding-out in Owings Mills, Maryland. Lopez-Campos was extradited back to Suffolk County, New York, last week, where he was charged with second-degree murder in the death of 18-year-old Estiven Abrego-Gomez.

Local residents found Abrego-Gomez's mangled and mutilated dead body on August 20, 2016, in the bushes behind a concession stand at the Little League baseball complex in Greenlawn Park in Huntington.

Two men have previously been charged in the horrible murder. They are Elmer Gilberto Santos-Contreras of Roosevelt, and Anthony Gutierrez-Meza of Valley Stream.

According to police, the three murderers are all MS-13 gang members.

Santos-Contreras has admitted in a written statement to ordering the killing of Abrego-Gomez after he thought he saw the 18-year-old on social media flashing signs associated with the rival 18th Street gang.

Santos-Contreras is due back in court on Nov. 10th.

Prosecutors said in 2019 that Gutierrez-Meza was in custody in Virginia and that he would be arraigned when he is extradited to Suffolk County. He has a criminal case in Virginia that is still pending, and he will be extradited once that "has reached a disposition," according to the Suffolk County District Attorney's Office.

MS-13 is a notorious criminal gang that was founded by prison convicts in American prisons, and has spread into the Central American immigrant communities in America, and back to El Salvador.