{"id":55402,"date":"2025-04-20T22:05:16","date_gmt":"2025-04-21T02:05:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=55402"},"modified":"2025-04-20T22:05:35","modified_gmt":"2025-04-21T02:05:35","slug":"alleged-tren-de-aragua-gang-member-breaks-down-like-a-big-baby-after-arrest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2025\/04\/20\/alleged-tren-de-aragua-gang-member-breaks-down-like-a-big-baby-after-arrest\/","title":{"rendered":"Alleged Tren de Aragua Gang Member Breaks Down Like a Big Baby After Arrest"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The party is over for alleged Venezuelan Tren de Aragua gang members, dubbed the \u201cScotch Bandits,\u201d nabbed in Florida for a string of retail crimes \u2013 an arrest that caused one member to sob like a child.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd announced the arrest of five young illegal aliens on charges of running an organized retail theft gang that stole thousands of dollars of high-end liquor. But the highlight of the press conference was when Sheriff Judd began displaying the photos of the suspects.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Judd first showed booking photos of all five men. \u201cSome of them are smiling,\u201d he said. Then, he displayed another photo of Ramon Jesus Carpintero-Luna, 26. He was bawling like a baby during a police interrogation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not such a happy time,\u201d Judd said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He added:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Life as he knew it is over. Is he crying because he can\u2019t steal from Americans anymore? Is he crying because he can\u2019t rob people in the middle of the night anymore? Is he crying because he can\u2019t rip off high end liquor. This is the end of the road for him and his companions. I hope he has his traveling clothes on because we want to charge them with racketeering and send them to state prison for a very long time. And then deport them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Besides Carpintero-Luna, also arrested were Alexis Jose Rodriguez-Benavides, Darwins Smith Vasquez-Leon, Ildemaro Miguel Escalona Mendoza, and Samuel Oglis David Anthony Charlie \u2013 all facing charges for organized retail theft and robbery. All, like Carpintero-Luna, appear to be in their twenties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The sheriff said the investigation into the retail crimes began last fall, when Publix reported that a series of high-end liquor items were being stolen from stores in Central Florida. Walmart and Sam\u2019s Club made similar reports of thefts at their stores. Investigators reported 32 theft and robbery cases in Polk County alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The incident that helped detectives bust the suspects happened last month at a Sam\u2019s Club in Lakeland. The thieves were caught on video<\/a> attempting to steal a shopping cart filled with $3,200 worth of liquor, according to the sheriff. In that incident, the suspects injured a female worker who grabbed the cart trying to stop them, Judd said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The group fled to their car but then crashed it in the parking lot before escaping in an Uber. Investigators discovered leads when they searched the car, finding stolen liquor, cellphones, and a passport.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The party is over for alleged Venezuelan Tren de Aragua gang members, dubbed the \u201cScotch Bandits,\u201d nabbed in Florida for a string of retail crimes \u2013 an arrest that caused… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":55403,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"23","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":true,"token":"eyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvaTAud3AuY29tXC9sYWtlbGFuZGdhemV0dGUuaW5mb1wvbmV3c1wvd3AtY29udGVudFwvdXBsb2Fkc1wvMjAyNVwvMDRcL1NjcmVlbnNob3QtODktOS53ZWJwP2ZpdD00MzUlMkM0MzEmc3NsPTEiLCJ0eHQiOiJBbGxlZ2VkIFRyZW4gZGUgQXJhZ3VhIEdhbmcgTWVtYmVyIEJyZWFrcyBEb3duIExpa2UgYSBCaWcgQmFieSBBZnRlciBBcnJlc3QiLCJ0ZW1wbGF0ZSI6ImhpZ2h3YXkiLCJibG9nX2lkIjoxNjMwNDA2NjF9.PsAK7k9_6xPbPVWm0VnaNGZXxYoUSr3KKLCUrlWHEn4MQ"},"version":2,"attached_media":[{"id":55403,"url":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Screenshot-89-9.webp","type":"image\/png"}]},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[23],"tags":[11378],"class_list":["post-55402","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sheriffs-corner","tag-alleged-tren-de-aragua-gang-member-breaks-down-like-a-big-baby-after-arrest"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55402","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55402"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55402\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":55404,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55402\/revisions\/55404"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55403"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55402"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55402"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55402"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}