BOSTON — Two MS-13 gang members have been sentenced in a Chelsea murder that went unsolved for nearly 14 years — a killing so vicious it left a man dying in the dirt under a highway ramp, and a justice system that let one of his killers walk right back into Massachusetts.

Both men were sentenced this week in federal court for racketeering charges tied to the 2010 slaying. But what shocks most isn’t the crime — it’s the timeline.

One man fled the country, was deported, slipped back in illegally, and kept committing crimes.

The other was already locked up, sitting in a federal cage, when the feds finally figured out he’d helped carry out the murder.

The sentences

Jose Vasquez, 31, known in the gang as “Little Crazy,” got 25 years. He was already serving time for a separate MS-13 case, and now faces 37 years behind bars.

William Pineda Portillo, 31, a Salvadoran national who had been living illegally in Everett, was sentenced to 16 years. He’ll be deported after he serves his time — assuming immigration authorities can stop him from coming back again.

The Chelsea killing

On the night of December 18, 2010, the MS-13 crew picked up a 28-year-old man in Allston and drove him to Chelsea.

They pulled off near the Route 1 on-ramp, led him beneath the highway, and carried out the ambush.

One gang member smashed the victim in the head with a rock.

Another hacked at him with a machete.

Then Vasquez stabbed him with a kitchen knife — again and again — leaving at least ten wounds in his chest and back.

The man bled out on the ground. He died at the hospital.

Police recovered a silver knife nearby. Vasquez’s palm print was on the handle. The victim’s blood was still on the blade.

The case went cold. For years.

The fugitive who came back

Pineda Portillo fled the country after the murder. He slipped off to El Salvador before investigators could question him.

He was later deported by U.S. authorities — sometime before a federal indictment was returned in 2017.

But by then, it was already too late.

Records show Portillo had illegally crossed back into the United States by early 2015. And once he was here, he didn’t lay low.

On April 29, 2015, he sold a loaded gun to a cooperating witness.

On June 1, he was caught on tape plotting another murder — this time targeting a fellow MS-13 member he wrongly thought was a snitch.

"I want that son of a bitch killed, man," he said. "We are going to do a complete thing to that son of a bitch."

He disappeared again — living in Massachusetts, under the radar, while the Chelsea case remained unsolved.

It wasn’t until May 10, 2022, that Portillo was finally arrested trying to cross the Texas border. He admitted to being MS-13. A fingerprint check linked him to the Chelsea murder.

The killer in the cage

Jose Vasquez was already locked up.

He’d been convicted in 2018 for gang racketeering and was serving a long federal sentence when the Chelsea investigation was reopened.

A new forensic review of the evidence confirmed what had been missed years earlier: Vasquez’s palm print on the knife. Secret gang recordings picked up MS-13 members talking about the murder and who was involved.

Vasquez pleaded guilty in May. This week, he got 25 more years.

The fallout

This wasn’t just a murder. It was a failure — across borders, agencies, and years.

One man was literally hiding in prison. The other had been deported, came back illegally, sold guns, plotted a second murder, and was living freely in Massachusetts for years.

All while a man’s blood was still dried into the pavement in Chelsea.

If this is how Massachusetts handles known gang killers, what else is slipping through?

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