San Diego Gang Member Sentenced to 14 Years in Organized Crime Conspiracy: All 9 Co-Conspirators Now Sentenced
On February 21, 2025, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of California announced that a federal court in San Diego, a city in San Diego County, California, sentenced gang member Odyssey Carrillo to 168 months — 14 years — in federal prison that day. With the sentence, all nine members of a racketeering conspiracy involving coordinated violent crimes by street gangs have now been sentenced.
Carrillo, 23, of San Diego, is a member of the Emerald Hills Bloods gang. He pleaded guilty to conspiracy to conduct enterprise affairs through a pattern of racketeering activity — commonly known as RICO conspiracy — and to Hobbs Act robbery. According to the Justice Department, the crimes committed by the enterprise included armed robbery, sex trafficking, prostitution, violence and other profit-driven illegal activities.
In his plea agreement, Carrillo admitted that he joined the conspiracy and committed racketeering acts himself, including two specific armed robberies. Together with co-defendants Stephen Nathaniel Calhoun, Jr., and Carl Moore, he participated in the January 19, 2019, armed robbery of San Carlos Jewelers in San Diego and the February 11, 2019, armed robbery of Bert Levi Family Jewelers in San Diego. Calhoun also admitted to robbing the Medicine Shoppe in San Diego at gunpoint on May 20, 2019. Calhoun and Moore are members of the Lincoln Park Bloods; Carrillo's Emerald Hills gang is a Bloods-aligned street gang that often works cooperatively with the Lincoln Park Bloods.
The remaining co-conspirators were sentenced earlier, all by U.S. District Judge Cynthia Bashant: Calhoun received 176 months and Moore 105 months; Jerome Brunson, who admitted to the November 19, 2019, armed robbery of a Jared's jewelry store in National City, received 57 months; Dajay Leon Scott and Sergio Valentin Louden, who admitted to robbing numerous women of their purses outside nail salons in January 2020, received 48 months and 72 months, respectively; and Cedric Jordan, Maurice Johnson and Taashawn Henderson, who admitted to sex offenses related to sex trafficking and transportation for purposes of prostitution, received 63 months, 60 months and 58 months, respectively. Carrillo was the ninth and final member to be sentenced.
"Every member of our community is put at risk when criminal street gangs engage in armed robberies, sex trafficking, and other violent criminal acts," said Acting U.S. Attorney Andrew Haden, adding that the case resulted from teamwork between local and federal law enforcement partners and that prosecutors would continue using RICO tools to hold violent groups accountable. Stacey Moy, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI's San Diego Field Office, said the sentencing reflected the hard work and collaboration of multiple agencies to dismantle an organized crime conspiracy, and that the FBI would continue working with partners to disrupt violent crime, human traffickers and violent gangs.
The case number is 21cr2909-BAS. Under the Justice Department's summary of charges, RICO conspiracy carries a maximum of twenty years in prison and a $250,000 fine; Hobbs Act robbery carries the same maximum; and brandishing a firearm during a crime of violence carries up to life in prison with a seven-year mandatory minimum. The case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the San Diego Police Department, the San Diego Human Trafficking Task Force, the San Diego County Sheriff's Department, the National City Police Department and the San Diego County District Attorney's Office, and is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Mario J. Peia, Katherine E. A. McGrath and Matthew Brehm. (Source: U.S. Department of Justice)
Source: U.S. Department of Justice
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：位于圣迭戈的雅各布·温伯格美国联邦法院大楼，本案由美国司法部加州南区联邦检察官办公室起诉（照片：美国总务管理局，公共领域，Wikimedia Commons）。 / Photo: The Jacob Weinberger United States Courthouse in San Diego; the case was prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of California (photo: U.S. General Services Administration, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons).
