BOSTON (AP) - A second man who was part of a gang that kidnapped a man off a Boston street and demanded a $100,000 ransom has been sentenced to 16 years in prison.
Julio Gonzalez, of Lawrence, was also sentenced Monday in federal court to three years of probation after pleading guilty in November to conspiracy to commit kidnapping.
Prosecutors say the 30-year-old Gonzalez was one of five people who kidnapped the victim in Boston’s Jamaica Plain neighborhood in January 2012 and held him for five days. The victim was freed unharmed by law enforcement.
The case is part of a two-year investigation by federal and local authorities into violent kidnapping and home invasion crews operating in Lawrence, known as Joloperros (loosely translated as “Stick-up Guys”). These crews typically kidnap drug dealers for ransom.
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