Racketeering Earns Manatee Gang Member 60-Year Sentence

A leader of a Manatee County street gang has been sentenced to 60 years after being found guilty of racketeering and conspiracy to commit racketeering, the state attorneys office announced Thursday.

Manatee County is now a safer place with this gang member behind bars, Attorney General Pam Bondi stated in a release. We will continue to prosecute these cases and prevent gang activity in our state.

The Bradenton Herald reported that Judge Harry Rapkin sentenced Eric Santiago, 25, to two consecutive 30-year sentences Tuesday.

Santiago was prosecuted by the attorney general's office of statewide prosecution in partnership with the state attorney's office of the 12th Judicial Circuit.

Santiago and seven other Brown Pride Locos members in 2007 were charged with racketeering because of their criminal activity as members of the gang, according to the Herald.

In 2008, Santiago was tried, convicted and sentenced to 30 years in prison, but that conviction was overturned last year after an appeals court found that two prior drug-related convictions prosecutors had used to build the racketeering case against him had been overturned, the Herald reported.

Real the full story here.