There are a lot of years I stress over as a parent, but the future of my son turning 18 has to be one of the scariest. They are barely out of high school before being considered and adult, and somehow, we just have to let them go off and make their own choices. It’s kind of a terrifying thought. That’s especially true after hearing stories like 18-year-old Rosa Sanchez Merino’s.
In 2023, the suspects reportedly lured a young woman from her home in New Jersey to Maryland and savagely killed her in a wooded area, according to the New York Post. Authorities discovered her skeletal remains four months later. The newspaper further reported that Sanchez Merino knew two of her four alleged killers: Roberto Carlos Rivera-Delgado, Iris Yudella Alonzo-Salgado, Aracely Abarca-Melgar, and a publicly unidentified fourth male suspect who was a minor at the time of the incident.
Alonzo-Salgado and Rivera-Delgado allegedly took the teen girl to visit friends and family when Alonzo-Salgado took her to a wooded area north of Washington, DC, where the attackers gagged her, forced her to kneel, and bludgeoned her to death. Investigators believe
The Maryland State Attorney’s Office says Alonzo-Salgado is an MS-13 associate and now faces two life sentences plus 25 years when she learns her sentence on January 21, 2026, according to Fox 5. Her co-conspirator Rivera-Delgado led detectives to the teen’s burial site and pleaded guilty to both gang and murder charges in July 2024 and is still awaiting sentencing. Abarca-Melgar and the unidentified minor at the time of the murder are awaiting trial.
An investigation shows Sanchez Merino’s death was ordered by MS-13, the transnational criminal organization Mara Salvatrucha that was formed by Salvadorian immigrants in the US escaping the civil war in their home country, according to the US Department of Justice. The well-organized group is notorious for using violence to achieve its goals, with members often using fear and extortion to conduct business in their “territories.”
In September, eight gang members pleaded guilty to a multi-year racketeering operation that involved members murdering people as well as tampering with witnesses.
“These defendants carried out brutal murders in the name of MS-13, killing victims with machetes, baseball bats, and their bare hands, and then sending photos of the victims’ bodies to MS-13 leaders in El Salvador,” Acting Assistant Attorney General Matthew Galeotti of the US Justice Department’s Criminal Division shared in a statement.
“The defendants committed these unthinkable acts to maintain their status in a gang that spread fear in local neighborhoods and targeted those brave enough to cooperate with law enforcement,” the statement continued. “Today’s guilty pleas send a powerful message that the Justice Department will aggressively pursue and hold accountable MS-13 members who use violence and murder to terrorize our communities.”
