''They Wanted All Blacks Out''

Nearly a year later, an informant told police that a fellow gang member from the Avenues said he and another gangster had done the “murder on the hill.” On December 5, 2001, with the aid of the informant’s statement, Avila was arrested for the murder of Prudhomme. Avila was later accused of murdering Bowser, when ballistics evidence found that the same gun was used in both Prudhomme’s and Bowser’s murders. Avila was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole for the two murders. His accomplice was never charged.

In federal court last week, prosecutors aired a jailhouse phone call between Avila and another Avenues member shortly after Bowser’s murder, in which Avila boasted that he and other Avenues members, including Martinez, had been “fucking up” Bowser for weeks. “Yeah,” he said. “That fool is fucking gone, eh.”?

Porfirio Avila (top) and Alejandro Martinez (bottom) face hate-crime charges in federal court. Codefendant Merced Cambero is a fugitive.

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More About

• Kenneth Kurry Wilson
• Highland Park (Brooklyn)
• Brooklyn (New York City)
• Hate Crimes
• Gang Violence

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Martinez’s attorney, Sonia Chahin, said that portion of the recording was taken out of context. “This case is about that all Avenues have a policy of running black people out of the neighborhood. It is simply not the case.”?