Jorge Palacios, who was head of a Mara Salvatrucha clique in Los Angeles, became an FBI informant while the police investigated him for the murder of a teenager in Elysian Park in 2001. The case remained frozen for more than a decade. Finally, this man was prosecuted for the murder and could spend the rest of his life in prison.

Of selling drugs in the streets of Los Angeles showing his tattoos with the letters M and S, acronyms of the Mara Salvatrucha gang, Jorge Palacios ended up doing what he never thought: collaborating for the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) ). It was a desperate measure to avoid his deportation to El Salvador. The agency paid him a salary and several expenses in exchange for his participation in operations that overthrew more than 20 members of the gang in California and Nebraska, according to court documents reviewed by Univision Noticias.

Now it is known that while the FBI protected and used the ‘services’ of Palacios, detectives of the Los Angeles Police (LAPD) had already identified him as the man who ordered the murder of a 13-year-old girl, whose body was found naked and with two bullets in the head in Elysian Park on June 28, 2001. The minor, Jacqueline Piazza, was raped before she was killed by three gang members of MS-13. This case remained unresolved for more than a decade.

Palacios, 39, was convicted last Friday of the murder of Piazza and could be sentenced to life in prison. His sentence has been scheduled for next April 11.

Palacios received a payment of about $ 126,500for his work in California and Nebraska. “We pay for their service and costs. We brought him over here, we pay rent and some utilities. He was also paid to work here. This is his job. He comes to information, to buy drugs and weapons. If there is a violent act that is being planned, he informs us as soon as possible and we do something to try to stop him, “explained the federal agent.

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