Violent Central American gangsters turning up on Metro Vancouver's streets

Ruben Molina, a prosecutor in Honduras, told media yesterday that the gangs are extremely violent - MS-13 particularly. They're known to dismember their victims and a candidate must commit a robbery and murder just to gain entry into the organization.
violent Central American gangsters turning up on Metro Vancouver's streets.
Supt. John Robins, the officer in charge of the B.C. Integrated Gang Task Force, said police have seen several members of MS-13 and M18 - two of Central America's biggest gangs - in B.C., but stressed that the organizations haven't set up shop here.
"It's been an ongoing trend over the last number of years," he said. "We want to make sure it doesn't develop into a huge significant problem in Canada. We have enough of a gang problem as it is."
To get a leg up on the groups, RCMP invited prosecutors from Honduras and Guatemala - where there are up to 200,000 members among the two gangs - to Vancouver during this week's Western Gang Conference.
Insp. Dean Robinson, the officer in charge of the Lower Mainland Violence Suppression Team, said the problems these gangs cause in Central America are "staggering" and reiterated that gang violence has risen to the top of the RCMP's national priority list