NYPD, Queens DA investigate possible gun smuggling in migrant shelters

The NYPD and the Queens district attorney’s office are investigating claims that some migrants are using food delivery bags to sneak guns into city shelters, according to officials from both agencies.

The investigations were launched after Bernardo Raul Castro Mata, 19, was arrested for allegedly shooting and injuring two NYPD officers earlier this month. He was arraigned in Queens Supreme Court Wednesday.

According to a prosecutor who spoke at the arraignment, Castro Mata told police about the gun smuggling scheme while detained in a hospital room after his arrest. Police and prosecutors said they don’t know yet if his statement was true, or if so, how widespread the practice is.

“Right now, there’s a lot of allegations,” Queens DA Melinda Katz said after the court proceedings. “We are investigating all of them.”

Neither the NYPD nor the Queens DA’s office would provide additional information while their investigations are ongoing. But Castro Mata’s arrest and subsequent statements could fan the flames of an already truculent debate about immigration in New York City and across the country.

Castro Mata pleaded not guilty to multiple charges Wednesday, including attempted murder, criminal possession of a weapon and riding a motorcycle without a helmet. His attorney declined to comment.

“We live in a society where everyone is entitled to due process, and this individual is also entitled to due process,” said Murad Awawdeh, president of the New York Immigration Coalition. “A court, as well as his peers, will determine what happened.”

Police attempted to pull Castro Mata over in early June after spotting him riding an unregistered motorcycle in the wrong direction near LaGuardia Airport, Queens Assistant District Attorney Lauren Reilly said in court. He ran away, Reilly said, and officers chased after him.

When police caught up to Castro Mata and tried to handcuff him, according to the DA’s office, he took out a gun and fired, hitting Officer Christopher Abreu in the leg and Officer Richard Yarusso in his bulletproof vest. Police also shot Castro Mata in the ankle, according to the NYPD. The officers have been released from the hospital, while Castro Mata is still receiving treatment at Bellevue Hospital, prosecutors said.

Castro Mata appeared in court hunched over in a wheelchair, a drain attached to his side filled with blood. During his arraignment, an assistant district attorney read a series of statements the 19-year-old allegedly made to police after his arrest. She said Castro Mata claimed a friend had given him the gun to hold onto and that it fired accidentally while he was trying to show it to police.

Castro Mata also admitted to being a member of the Venezuelan Tren de Aragua gang, that he used to live in a nearby shelter but had been kicked out and that he had been recruited by a friend to commit robberies, Reilly said. The prosecutor said Castro Mata told police the Tren de Aragua gang was smuggling firearms into shelters and using food delivery packages to evade security.

Reilly did not say whether Castro Mata specified what the guns are being used for or how many shelters may have been affected. At Castro Mata’s former shelter on Ditmars Boulevard, there is now a magnetometer and an X-ray machine, and security staff also received refresher training on search protocols after the shooting, according to City Hall spokesperson Kayla Mamelak.

A group of Republican lawmakers wrote a letter to President Joe Biden in March urging him to designate the Tren de Aragua gang as a transnational criminal organization, calling the group an “invading criminal army from a prison in Venezuela that has spread their brutality and chaos to U.S. cities and small towns.”

At least one other New York case has reported ties to Tren de Aragua. Two men charged this winter in the viral scuffle between a group of migrants and the NYPD in Times Square are members, according to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The New York Post has reported on a potential connection between Tren de Aragua and a string of phone robberies. NYPD Deputy Commissioner of Intelligence and Counterterrorism Rebecca Weiner also told Pix11 earlier this year that the department is on the lookout for crimes committed by the Venezuelan group.

“This is a gang that’s been growing tentacles into the U.S., potentially in New York City,” she said. “What does that look like in New York? How can we be ahead of the curve in responding to any problems that it may cause?”

Still, a recent report by the think tank InSight Crime found the gang has “no substantial US presence,” besides a handful of one-off incidents attributed to the group.

Researchers have consistently found that immigrants do not commit crimes at higher rates than the general public, John Jay College of Criminal Justice Professor Jeffrey Butts said. But he said that not being able to get a work permit could tempt new arrivals to make money through illegal means

“That's a problem,” he said. “But that's a function of our immigration policy. That's not a characteristic of someone we call a migrant.”