COLUMBUS – A Columbus man accused of being a member of the international criminal gang MS-13 pleaded guilty in federal court in Columbus Wednesday to taking part in three murders, including that of a 17-year-old who was killed with a machete.
Pedro Alfonso Osorio-Flores, 41, admitted to participating in a racketeering conspiracy to playing a role in the murders of three people, according to a release from the office David DeVillers, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio.
Osorio-Flores, also known as “Smokey,” is the 19th of 23 associates of MS-13 in Columbus charged in a 2018 indictment to plead guilty.
The defendants are charged in a conspiracy that includes five murders, as well as attempted murder, extortion, money laundering, drug trafficking, assault, obstruction of justice, witness intimidation, weapons offenses and immigration-related violations.
He is the nineteenth defendant to plead guilty.
Osorio-Flores admitted to his role in the November 2015 murder of 17-year-old high school student Wilson Villeda, who was killed with a machete and buried in a shallow grave near in Innis Park, near the body of another victim, DeVillers said.
Osorio-Flores and other conspirators beat and stabbed Carlos Serrano-Ramos to death before leaving his body in a shallow grave in the woods in Innis Park.
In December 2016, authorities say Osorio-Flores stalked Salvador Martinez-Diaz home from the Resolute Athletic Complex and provided location updates to fellow gang members so that they could shoot him, DeVillers said.
Osorio-Flores pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit racketeering.
Parties involved in the case have recommended a sentence of 40 to 45 years in prison, DeVillers said.