Two Venezuelans living in the U.S. illegally were recently charged in a December mass shooting that killed three people and wounded five others in Chicago, leading to the arrests of more than a dozen suspected Tren de Aragua gang members.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced on Tuesday that suspected shooters Ricardo Granadillo Padilla, 25, and Edward Martinez Cermeno, 24, are being charged in the Dec. 2 house party massacre.

REPUTED MIGRANT GANG MEMBERS BUSTED IN NYC DRUG, GUN RAID BUT LIKELY TO AVOID PROSECUTION

Eight people were shot, including five men and three women between the ages of 20 and 35, according to a report from affiliate FOX 32 Chicago.

Victims suffered gunshot wounds to the head, abdomen and extremities, according to the report.

Weapons, ammo and narcotics recovered in Chicago. (ICE)

MIGRANT TDA GANG MEMBER BREAKS OFFICER’S ARM AS 10 INDICTED IN MASSIVE GUNS, DRUG RUNNING OPERATION: POLICE

Three men were pronounced dead, including a 26-year-old and a 28-year-old.

Gang-related graffiti was found at the scene, and officials confirmed prior calls for service at the address, FOX 32 reported.

Ricardo Granadillo Padilla, a suspected shooter in the Dec. 2024 Chicago mass shooting, was arrested in Raleigh, North Carolina, on Feb. 8, 2025, by HSI Chicago, HSI Raleigh, ERO Raleigh, U.S. Border Patrol Tactical Unit, U.S. Marshals Service and CBP AMO. (ICE)

MS-13 GANG MEMBER ARRESTED BY ICE PREVIOUSLY RELEASED DUE TO SANCTUARY POLICY

Padilla was arrested in Raleigh, North Carolina, on Feb. 8 in a multi-agency effort, and was sentenced in March for illegally entering the country in 2022 near El Paso, Texas, according to ICE.

Multiple guns, high-capacity magazines, narcotics and fraudulent documents were seized in January from his home in Chicago.

During his arrest a month later, a pistol, ammunition and other evidence were seized, according to authorities.

Edward Martinez Cermeno, a suspected shooter linked to a Dec. 2024 mass shooting in Chicago, was arrested by HSI Chicago and U.S. Border Patrol Tactical Unit on Jan. 26, 2025. (ICE)

VENEZUELAN GANG MEMBERS LINKED TO VIOLENT APARTMENT TAKEOVER ARRESTED IN NEW YORK CITY

Cermeno was arrested in Schaumburg, Illinois on Jan. 26 by ICE Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Chicago and border patrol agents, but officials said he was later released by a federal magistrate judge after a federal detention hearing.

He was arrested again by ICE HSI Chicago on administrative immigration charges for illegally entering the country in 2023 near Eagle Pass, Texas.

Padilla and Cermeno remain in federal custody, according to ICE.

Within the last few weeks, 16 additional TdA members and associates of Padilla and Cermeno in the Chicago and Raleigh areas were arrested by ICE HSI Chicago on immigration charges.

ICE did not immediately respond to further inquiries from Fox News Digital.

• Members of the Fire and Police Commission, the city’s hiring body for its police chief, indicated they were in support of rehiring Jeffrey Norman as the city’s police chief.
• Norman’s current tenure ends in November, but the commission’s chair said the group would make its final decision on June 26.
• Norman has worked for the department since 1996 and been chief since 2020, when he was named acting chief. He was made permanent chief in 2021.

As his contract comes up for renewal, Milwaukee’s police chief received strong signals of support early in his rehiring process.

Almost all of the city’s Fire and Police Commission, the oversight body that handles hiring of the police chief, signaled they were in support of Police Chief Jeffrey Norman’s rehiring. The commission is slated to make its final decision on Norman’s reappointment June 26.

“He’s one of the best qualified chiefs I’ve ever known,” said Miriam Horwitz, the commission’s chair.

With seven of the commission’s nine members in attendance at the meeting, six said they were in support of rehiring Norman, who did not attend the commission meeting. Norman’s current contract expires Nov. 15.

Norman previously told the Journal Sentinel he would take an offer, if the commission extended it to him.

“I believe our department has made great strides,” Norman said at the time. “I desire to continue to build upon that.”

The commission’s support follows Milwaukee Mayor Cavalier Johnson saying he was in support of rehiring the chief as well.

At the June 5 meeting, activist Vaun Mayes and Levi Stein, president of the Friendship Circle of Wisconsin, said they were in support of Norman’s rehiring as well.

Mayes, who leads the organization Community Task Force, said a past police chief indicated he would talk with community groups, regardless of their support, and that did not happen. Norman has done that consistently, he said.

With the Fire and Police Commission no longer having policymaking power for the city’s police department due to a 2023 state law, Mayes said it was important to maintain Norman’s place in Milwaukee’s department.

After that law, called Act 12, was passed, Norman elected to move a new bodycam footage release policy forward, despite opposition from the city’s police union.

“I am very afraid of the wrong person coming in with that kind of power and what they could and couldn’t do,” Mayes said.

Norman, who is in his 29th year in law enforcement, has spent his entire policing career with the city’s department.

He was hired as acting chief of the department in 2020 and named police chief the following year, following the retirement of another acting chief and the controversial removal of former chief Alfonso Morales in 2020.

The Milwaukee native was first hired in 1996 and served as a lieutenant in the homicide unit and captain of District 3, which includes parts of the central city and west side.

Norman was hired as chief, in part, due to his track record of community engagement.

Since being named chief, Norman has led the department through the crime spikes amid the COVID-19 pandemic, heavy local and state policy change after George Floyd’s murder prompted national outrage and policing during the Republican National Convention.

Rocky periods have occurred during his tenure.

During the Republican National Convention, he and the department came under scrutiny after Columbus, Ohio, police officers shot and killed Sam Sharpe Jr. The officers, who did not face charges in the shooting, shot him about a mile from the convention’s perimeter after the officers saw Sharpe appear to move toward another man while wielding knives.

The officers were not accompanied by local police, which top department officials previously indicated any out-of-state officers would be in the lead-up to the convention. After the shooting, Norman later acknowledged local officers should have been with the Ohio police officers.

The department also came under scrutiny for its handling of events in the lead-up to the homicide of Bobbie Lou Schoeffling. Schoeffling, a 31-year-old mother of two, had been reporting abuse and threats from her ex-boyfriend.

Schoeffling was found shot to death on July 26, 2022. Her ex-boyfriend, Nicholas Howell, was convicted of killing Schoeffling last year and sentenced to life in prison.

Norman initially declined an interview with the Journal Sentinel into the department’s handling of the case but after the new organization published an investigation into her death, he ordered a review of every contact the department had with Schoeffling. The review led to the suspension of four officers.

“We have recognized our shortcomings and we, I believe, have a proven track record of … being open to feedback and working with the communities,” Norman said at the time he opened the review.

In 2024, Norman was a finalist for the police chief position in Austin, Texas, but was ultimately passed on for the role. At that time, a department spokesperson said Norman remained “steadfast” in his commitment to Milwaukee.

The chief previously declined to tell the Journal Sentinel in May whether he has applied for other jobs as his term approaches its end in Milwaukee. He said he was focused on reappointment locally.

Norman’s pay appears to have been negotiated in the months leading up to his reappointment discussions. The Fire and Police Commission’s executive committee has met in closed session four times regarding senior law enforcement pay.

While the city of Milwaukee’s Common Council sets the pay range for the chief of police position, the Fire and Police Commission ultimately selects what the salary is in that range.

Leon Todd, the commission’s executive director, said he could not address what was discussed in those meetings.

Norman made a gross salary of $177,112.44 in 2024, according to the city’s online pay databases.

The Fire and Police Commission will hold two public comment sessions for Norman’s rehiring before the June 26 vote.

David Clarey is a public safety reporter at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. He can be reached at dclarey@gannett.com.