What to Know
- Two MS-13 gang members will spend decades behind bars after they were sentenced for their roles in the August 2017 machete murder of a 22-year-old man whose body was eventually discovered in a wooded area in Uniondale, according to prosecutors.
- Luis Alejandro Varela, 24 and from Mineola, as well as William Reyes-Fuentes, 27 and from Uniondale, pleaded guilty on June 24 to charges of murder in the second degree and conspiracy in the second degree in connection to the hacking death of Carlos Rivas-Majano, Nassau County District Attorney Anne Donnelly.
- Prosecutors said that on Aug. 11, 2017, Rivas-Majano told a relative that he was on his way home from a deli in Uniondale. However, the young man never returned home.
Two MS-13 gang members will spend decades behind bars after they were sentenced for their roles in the August 2017 machete murder of a 22-year-old man whose body was eventually discovered in a wooded area in Uniondale, according to prosecutors.
Luis Alejandro Varela, 24 and from Mineola, as well as William Reyes-Fuentes, 27 and from Uniondale, pleaded guilty on June 24 to charges of murder in the second degree and conspiracy in the second degree in connection to the hacking death of Carlos Rivas-Majano, Nassau County District Attorney Anne Donnelly. Varela was sentenced to 21 years to life in prison and Reyes-Fuentes was sentenced to 20 years to life in prison. Both are said to be members of the Downtown Criminals clique of MS-13.
Prosecutors said that on Aug. 11, 2017, Rivas-Majano told a relative that he was on his way home from a deli in Uniondale. However, the young man never returned home.
Rivas-Majano was lured into the woods near the Meadowbrook Parkway and Glen Curtiss Boulevard in Uniondale, where he was hacked and stabbed to death with machetes for being a perceived enemy of the MS-13 gang, according to the district attorney's office. His body was discovered in a sump more than a year later on Aug. 29, 2018.
Cases against co-defendants Carlos Benitez-Hernandez, Jose Quintanilla-Cruz and Nerlin Chacon-Ruano are pending, according to the prosecution. Attorney information for the three was not immediately available.
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Another co-defendant, Edar Ventura, was sentenced to 32 years to life in prison in 2019 after pleading guilty to two counts of murder, and related charges, for the deaths of Rivas-Majano and Alexon Moya.
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“MS-13 members Luis Alejandro Varela and William Reyes-Fuentes participated in one of the most violent murders this county has ever seen,” Donnelly said in a statement. “The defendants and their co-conspirators mercilessly hacked Carlos Rivas-Majano to death and left his body in a nearly inaccessible place near the Meadowbrook Parkway. Thanks to extraordinary work from our prosecutors and detectives, we were able to find Carlos’ body and bring his killers to justice.”
