Bandidos Gang Member In Texas Pleads Guilty To 2002 Slaying
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SAN ANTONIO (CBSDFW.COM/AP) — Prosecutors say a Bandidos gang member blamed for a 2002 retaliation killing in Texas has pleaded guilty and faces life in prison.
Frederick Cortez pleaded guilty Wednesday afternoon to murder in aid of racketeering. The 48-year-old Cortez remains in custody pending sentencing next year by a federal judge in San Antonio.
Investigators say the slaying of Robert Lara in Atascosa County was in retaliation for the 2001 killing of a Bandidos member outside a San Antonio bar.
Cortez was named in a July superseding indictment that also included Bandidos sergeant-at-arms Justin Cole Forster. Forster last week pleaded guilty to racketeering, drug trafficking and extortion. He faces up to life in federal prison.
Two other Bandidos leaders also charged in the superseding racketeering-related indictment await trial.
A 2015 shootout outside of a Twin Peaks restaurant, where members of the Bandidos and Cossacks gang members had gathered, left nine people died and some 20 others injured.
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