Two alleged members of the Milwaukee Kings street gang face a federal racketeering charge for the July 2021 murder of an Illinois National Guard soldier who aspired to become a Chicago police officer.
It’s the same investigation that led to a highly publicized FBI raid on West Farragut Avenue in Lincoln Square last month, authorities say.
Gary “Gotti” Roberson, 40, and Joseph “Troubles” Matos, 41, are charged with murdering Chrys Carvajal on July 3, 2021, to maintain and increase their position in the street gang. They were charged in an indictment filed under seal May 14, two days before the Lincoln Square raid. The document was only made public Friday.
Roberson was taken into custody the same day as the raid in Lincoln Square and has been held in custody, records show. Matos is still at large.
The indictment reveals no new details about Carvajal’s murder, but alleges that the Milwaukee Kings operate on the North Side and have been involved in crimes including murder, assault and drug dealing.
Neighbors said last month’s raid involved three flash-bang explosives, a “boom” and a drone seen entering a house. One person saw FBI agents carrying “lots” of boxes and bags out of the house.
Joseph Fitzpatrick, a spokesman for the U.S. attorney’s office, confirmed the Lincoln Square raid’s connection to the new indictment.
Carvajal was fatally shot in Belmont Cragin just one week shy of his 20th birthday.
Family said at the time that the Portage Park resident had attended a house party with his girlfriend and at one point went to get something from his car.
He was later found lying unresponsive on the sidewalk in the 2200 block of North Lockwood Avenue with gunshot wounds to the back and abdomen, police said. He was pronounced dead at Illinois Masonic Medical Center.
“He always was really strong, and he was always like the head of the family,” his sister, Jennifer Ramirez, said at the time. “He helped my mom a lot with, like, making sure that everything that the house was set … and the bills were good.”
The month after his death, police said detectives had identified a high-ranking Milwaukee Kings gang member as a suspect and presented evidence to Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx’s office. Carvajal’s family called on Foxx to file charges, but her office declined.
A spokesman said at the time that the evidence was “insufficient to meet our burden of proof to file murder charges.”
“As prosecutors, we have both an ethical and legal obligation to make charging decisions based on the evidence, facts and the law,” the spokesman said.
Matos was the original suspect in the case that Foxx declined to prosecute, a law enforcement source said.
As the Sun-Times previously reported, police identified the vehicle used in the killing and obtained data putting the suspect’s cellphone in the area of the shooting. They also had a witness who later died, the source said, adding that police went to the feds to pursue charges after Foxx rejected their case.
A federal grand jury handed up a similar, but separate, indictment last month against purported members of the Rack City street gang on the South Side over their alleged roles in the murder of Ogonnia Okeke in June 2021.
Contributing: Jessica Ma and Mitch Dudek
