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Officials in El Paso, Texas are trying to shut down a motel in downtown after they say it has become a crime den controlled by Venezuelan super gang, Tren de Aragua, with police responding to the property nearly 700 times in the last two years.
The vicious South American gang-- best known for selling women and children into sex slavery and exploiting its own countrymen-- most recently made headlines in Aurora, Colorado, where armed thugs were seen storming an apartment complex residents say they have taken control of.
In a lawsuit filed by the El Paso County Attorney alleges Gateway Hotel owner Howard Yun is not trying 'to control the conduct of the guests and is negligently allowing gang activity to infiltrate the area.'
Scenes of drug use, violence, and sexual activity happen within view of children, the suit states, with much of it happening in hallway parties.
While some of the crime goes back two years, the lawsuit alleges the situation has gotten worse since the 'introduction of the Tren de Aragua organization into the hotel.'
Surveillance video recorded in June inside the Gateway Hotel in El Paso, Texas shows Venezuelan migrants partying in the hallway of the hotel, while a man is beaten
The Gateway Hotel, located in downtown El Paso, Texas, is being sued by the El Paso County Attorney for operating without a license and allowing Tren de Aragua members to take over
The El Paso County Attorney detailed a long list of crimes police have investigated at the Gateway Hotel, including 11 drug cases, 10 aggravated assaults, 20 disorderly conduct calls, 13 fights, two terroristic threats and one case of indecency with a child, according to KFOX-TV.
One incident detailed in the lawsuit is from a 14-year-old victim who believed she may have been raped by a migrant.
The teenage girl met a man at a Circle-K convenience store.
The Spanish-speaking hotel guest asked if she had a place to stay the night, and she replied she did not.
She followed the man, who had a tattoo on his forehead with a playboy symbol and had a tattoo sleeve on his arm, back to the Gateway Hotel.
'When they got to the hotel the male subject touched her chest and breast area underneath the shirt,' the paperwork states.
Gateway Hotel surveillance video shows a young child riding his bike down a hotel hallway as chaos and criminal activity goes on around him
As evidence of the alleged chaos happening at the Gateway Hotel, county officials submitted photos of hallway parties. Two men can be seen fighting in the lower right-hand corner of the image
Crime at the hotel has gotten worse since members of Tren de Aragua began operating there
'The Victim and male subject fell asleep till the following day the Victim noticed her pants were hanging off her buttocks and felt a little discomfort in her vaginal area but she was not sure if he penetrated.'
The documents also describe TdA gang members beating up other migrants who live in the hotel or stealing their immigration papers.
Offering low daily rates, the hotel attracts migrants.
The previous owner was convicted for running a human smuggling ring for Asian migrants out of the same property, the suit states.
Local officials additionally claim the hotel is operating without a license is and seeking to close the property down since it has become a 'habitual crime property.'
Dubbed the 'epitome of evil', the notorious criminal organization Tren de Aragua, or TdA as it is known by federal agents, has already unleashed a wave of crime in American cities.
Harrowing new footage appears to capture the moment an armed Venezuelan gang seized control of an apartment complex in Aurora, Colorado
Then other members of the gang rush up the stairwell, bearing weapons. In the background, the men can be heard speaking in Spanish to one anothe
Four members of Tren de Aragua have been arrested in Colorado for alleged crimes in the Denver suburb of Aurora
As DailyMail.com exclusively reported, TdA has set up its new headquarters just across the border from El Paso, in Juarez Mexico.
El Paso officials, who asked to remain anonymous, now fear gang violence will spill over into Texas' sixth largest city - which is currently ranked among the top ten safest in America by the FBI.
'Tren de Aragua is the epitome of evil,' Congressman Tony Gonzales, who represents El Paso, said.
'This gang is known to rape children, spearhead murders, and cause widespread chaos.'
Law enforcement in El Paso is currently working on a confidential plan to address the growing threat, insiders told DailyMail.com
But Mexican authorities have been willing to speak more openly about TdA's troubling arrival in Juarez.
Venezuela's most violent gang Tren de Aragua has moved its headquarters to just across the US border in the Mexican town of Ciudad Juarez
Tren de Aragua gang tattoos (pictured above) were part of a Department of Homeland Security bulletin that was recently shared with federal agents
'We're tracking them in Ciudad Juarez, that's where they specifically have their principal point of operations,' revealed the state secretary of public safety Gilberto Loya.
'They're not an easy gang to track, because they don't act like a traditional gang.'
Members do not look or speak in a specific way - but are up to their old tricks, Loya explained.
Now in Northern Mexico, TdA is once again taking advantage of desperate migrants.
Gangsters are charging huge fees to smuggle migrants to the US border and then into Texas.
However, the mobsters are also kidnapping migrants who have made it to the US-Mexico border without their help in a bid to make even more money.
'According to the security reports we have, this group of Venezuelans, Tren de Aragua, control which migrants can ride the train,' Mexico state prosecutor Carlos Manuel Salas said - referring to the many migrants who ride a top trains in Mexico to reach Juarez to avoid having to make the journey by foot.
The presence of the Venezuelan mob in Mexico has caused panic among migrants, many of whom are fleeing the very violence TdA created in their homeland.
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