Petaluma gang member gets life in prison for three murders

A Petaluma man convicted of three murders who shot at federal agents with an AK-47 rifle when they came to arrest him was sentenced Friday to life in prison, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.

Victor Flores, 23, received the punishment from U.S. District Judge Susan Illston, the federal prosecutors said.

Flores, who went by the nickname “Little Creeper,” was a member of the 500 Block/C Street gang in South San Francisco in 2010 when he and a co-defendant shot at seven suspected gang rivals, killing three, prosecutors said.

When federal authorities came to arrest him two years later at his family’s McNeil Avenue home, he fired two full magazines from an assault rifle at special agents from the Los Angeles response team of Homeland Security investigations, wounding three agents, prosecutors said.

“Nothing can erase the pain and sorrow caused by Flores’ vicious, unrepentant, criminal behavior,” said Melinda Haag, U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of California. “I hope that the life sentence imposed against him brings some measure of relief to Flores’ victims and their families, and that they will at least feel a sense of justice.”

Last fall, jurors in a federal trial found Flores guilty of a number of charges, including racketeering murder, attempted murder and conspiracy.

You can reach Staff Writer Paul Payne at 568-5312 or paul.payne@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @ppayne.