Months after detaining 47 people accused of being Tren de Aragua in Austin, authorities offer no evidence of gang ties
HAYS COUNTY — In late March, a group of Venezuelan relatives and friends, celebrating a pair of birthdays, rented a six-bedroom house in the southern tip of Austin with a pool and stunning views from every window of Texas’ Hill Country.
They decorated a table for a cake and blew up balloons. As the night faded, the kids went to bed and the adults kept hanging out.
Suddenly, at about 5 a.m. the next morning, the group heard explosions from flashbangs, followed by shouts from law enforcement yelling commands to get out of the house, according to interviews with two attendees.
“We all started shouting that there were babies — ‘Babies, there’s babies,’” recounted a 30-year-old Venezuelan man, who said he was at the house to celebrate the birthdays of his son, who turned 5, and his best friend, who turned 28.
“They were like bombs, like boom,” he said of the disorientating devices.
A cadre of Texas and federal authorities arrived as part of an operation that resulted in the apprehension of 47 people including nine minors — at least one as young as 3 — though it is not clear whether all were at the party. The authorities later claimed they had busted a gathering of members and associates of Tren de Aragua, a violent gang that began in a Venezuelan prison before extending to other parts of Latin America.
https://www.texastribune.org/2025/06/04/texas-immigration-raid-hays-county-austin-venezuelan-gang/
= new reply since forum marked as read
