Guatemala to try gang leaders for 238 murders

A Guatemalan judge has ordered eight jailed members of the Mara Salvatrucha gang put on trial for the murders of 238 business owners, bus drivers and others who refused to pay extortion money. Judge Carol Flores said she would try the eight, who include Salvadoran Amilcar Torres, after two days of evidence prosecutors presented in her court. The charges include conspiracy, murder and attempted homicide. Prosecutors claim the famously brutal gang formed a leadership council between 2010 and 2011 in the maximum-security Boqueron Prison in Santa Rosa, where they are all still being held. "The judge's decision is important because most of these killings took place while they were inside the prison... But they were still the ones giving orders," Interior Minister Mauricio Lopez told reporters. Mara Salvatrucha and rival gang Mara 18 wage vicious turf wars in poor neighborhoods and other areas of the country. Mara Salvatrucha was formed in the 1980s in Los Angeles by young immigrants from poverty-stricken El Salvador, still reeling from years of civil war. The gang later spread across the United States, making headlines by carrying out murders, assaults, rapes, robberies, and running prostitution rings. Many of its members were deported back to their homeland. Salvadoran authorities believe domestic street gangs count more than 30,000 members, and they blame the gangs for 90 percent of the country's homicides, with most of the dead being gang members.