Federal investigators in New Mexico last week arrested and sent back to Colorado an alleged Tren de Aragua gang member they say is linked to a violent jewelry store robbery in Denver.
On July 31, Homeland Security Investigations officials said that special agents from Las Cruces, New Mexico, had turned over custody of a Venezuelan man believed to be a Tren de Aragua gang member to the Denver County Sheriff’s Office.
The man is a suspect in the June 24 robbery of family-owned jewelry store Joyeria El Ruby in Denver’s West Highland neighborhood, according to Homeland Security investigators.
Federal investigators said the gang is an emerging threat in Denver, where thousands of Venezuelan migrants have resettled, and other U.S. cities, according to a statement from Homeland Security Investigations regional spokeswoman Alethea Smock.
Around 2 p.m. on June 24, eight suspects described as Hispanic men in their 20s committed a violent robbery in the 5100 block of West 38th Avenue — at gunpoint, according to a post from the Denver Police Department.
The block is home to the jewelry store Joyeria El Ruby, a massage parlor, a CVS pharmacy and multiple apartments.
Homeland Security Investigations officials confirmed Tuesday that they were working with the Denver Police Department on the case, but the police department declined to comment.
Officials from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Colorado also declined to comment.
Security footage posted on social media by Lidia Tena, the owner of Joyeria El Ruby, shows multiple men breaking into the store’s backroom, repeatedly hitting two female workers and dragging them across the room by their hair.
Tena also posted a second video feed from the front of the store, which shows two more men threatening people at gunpoint, hopping the counter and grabbing handfuls of jewelry off the shelf and out of the display case.
This is a developing story and may be updated.
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Originally Published: August 7, 2024 at 1:41 p.m.
