The FBI Informant Who K*LLED 12 People and Stayed Free for Decades; Juan “Termite” Romero 

Westlake is the kind of place where the block has its own rules, and everybody knows who really runs it. Money moves, doors open, doors get locked, and when a crew feels disrespected, the response is never small. Years later, a name keeps surfacing in whispers, paperwork,  and street talk. Juan Termite Romero.

 To some, he is just another 18th Street figure. To others, he is the link between a brutal old crime and the kind of government deals that make people question everything. Because in this story, the line between gangster and informant gets blurry and the consequences do not stay in the past. But how did one man stay free for decades? And what actually happened when the system needed him more than it wanted him locked up? In the Westlake section of Los Angeles, just west of downtown, there is a part of the city outsiders do not understand until it

died too late. This is MacArthur Park territory, and the 18th Street name is heavy on the block. The area is mostly Latino and this Westlake set has roots going back to the late 1960s. It is also the poorest 18th Street community out of all their varios and that poverty shows up in the worst ways.

 Drug use and abuse are everywhere and the dope trade is not just happening. It is booming. Because drug trafficking is so heavy in this pocket, law enforcement pays more attention here than in a lot of other 18th Street areas. The heat stays on. Patrol cars roll through. Sweeps hit. Gang units try to make a dent. But in neighborhoods like this, pressure does not always break a crew.

 Sometimes it makes them tighten up, get sharper, and move like a real operation. And in Westlake, the street game is already sliding into something more organized, something that makes the whole place feel like it is living under somebody else’s rules. By 1985, One Click is already forming that is about to become the most active group in the Westlake 18th Street world.

 They call it Colia Lil Kikos, known as CLCS. In this life, a click is a smaller crew under the bigger gang name, and CLCS grows into a constant presence in the area. This is not just kids tagging walls and talking tough. This is a crew with money coming in and people getting hurt when they do not play along.

 The drug traffic makes the click stronger, and the police attention does not slow it down the way outsiders think it will. It shapes how they move. It pushes them to find places to duck into, people to lean on, and ways to keep control even when squad cars creep past. West Lake is not a place where the gang simply exists. It operates.

 And once CLCS is active, the next step is always the same. Power. Who collects the money? Who gives the word? Who enforces it? Because every crew that lasts has some kind of structure, even if it is messy and violent. In the early 1990s, that structure in Westlake changes fast. A Mexican mafia member named Veves Vasy Sagato is released from prison, and he pushes a new setup.

 The idea is simple and brutal. tax the gang members and share the profits. In that system, the street crews do not just hustle for themselves anymore. They have to kick up and the rules come with real consequences. Sagato was 31 at the time and he works with another newer Mexican mafia member, Francisco Puppet Martinez.

Together, they show how the rules are enforced in the Westlake community. This is not a suggestion, it is a blueprint. Sagato ends up sent back to prison, but the program does not disappear with him. Puppet still administers the gang business according to Mexican mafia rules.

 That means controlling the gang and receiving profits from drug transactions in the community.  It is a pipeline from street corners to a higher power. And once Puppet is the one pulling strings, the clicks under 18th Street have a reason to stay in line because the top of the food chain is watching. And the penalty for disrespect is not a warning.

 It is violence. Inside CLCS, two names matter. In the early 1990s, Romero Valerio and Juan Manuel Romero Lopez, known on the street as Termite. They are shot callers, meaning they are not just hanging around, they are directing moves and deciding what happens next. Valario is known as the big boss. Termite is known as the brains.

 And at times, he’s also the enforcer. Valario gives the word,  and Termite is the one who makes sure the word gets followed. The shot callers decide how to respond to problems like rival gangs, law enforcement, and local residents who get in the way. Valerio answers up the chain to puppet. In this kind of setup, power is not just about respect.

 It is about money and fear. A boss needs muscle because there are always people who do not want to pay and always somebody who thinks they can ignore the rules. Termite’s role is the pressure, the threat, the force that makes the clicks control feel real on the street. And in Westlake, there is one place that matters so much to their operation that when it gets taken away, the crew does not just get mad, they start thinking payback.

  CLCS controls drug sales around an apartment building at 330 South Burlington Avenue known as the Burlington Apartments. It sits in click territory, and it becomes a key part of how they move. Members and local drug dealers use the building to evade law enforcement. When police enter the neighborhood, the building gives people a way to disappear fast.

 Valerio and Termite are around it constantly, posted up, watching the flow, keeping the hustle running. They manage the drug action around Burlington, collect payments from local dealers, and enforce CLCS control over the territory. Termite also supplies drugs to dealers in the neighborhood. At that time, drug sales around the building are thriving because the building’s manager is paid to provide dealers and gang members access when law enforcement enters the area.

 In other words, the building is not just a building. It is a tool. It keeps money flowing and helps them dodge police. But that only works as long as the doors stay open for the crew. And in early 1993, that situation changes. One decision by a new manager hits the click right where it hurts, their pockets. Around February 1993, a new manager begins supervising the Burlington Apartments.

 The manager changes the locks and stops local drug dealers and gang members from accessing the building. The result is immediate. Drug sales in the neighborhood decline. For CLCS,  that is not just an inconvenience. It is a threat to control and income. And in their world, when somebody blocks a business, they are not seen as doing a job.

 They are seen as disrespecting the click. This is also happening in a neighborhood already under pressure, where gangs terrorize residents, and the area is a first stop for immigrants coming into Los Angeles from Mexico and other parts of Latin America. People are packed into old apartments trying to work and survive. But they are also living around drug dealers selling  rock cocaine to motorists right in the heart of gang territory.

 The whole block feels tense like it is waiting for the next move. And before the blaze, before the rumors, before all of that, there is a smaller moment that matters. A conversation, a plan,  and it happens with the boss and termite right there. On May 2nd, 1993, Johanna Ma Lopez is close enough to hear it.

 Lopez manages a drug dealing operation around the Burlington Apartments. She often hangs out with Valerio and Termite and they allow her to sell drugs in the neighborhood. That detail matters because it puts her near the inner circle. And in gang stories, the people close to the shot callers often end up holding the most dangerous information.

 On May 2nd, 1993, Lopez is hanging out with Valerio and Termite when she hears them talking about the Burlington  Apartments and the new manager. Valerio makes it clear he wants the problem handled. He says he wants Termite to fix the problem with the street. Termite answers that he will fix  it. Then Valyrio says something that turns the air cold.

 Don’t worry. This son of a [ __ ] mother I will put fire to him. Termite tells Valerio to bring him lighter fluid or gas. That is how it is described later. It is not a long meeting. It is not a big debate. It is a boss setting a target, his guy saying he will handle it and a request for fuel.

 And once that request is made, the clock starts ticking. Because in that world, talk does not stay talk for long. It turns into  action fast. On May 2nd, 1993, a little later, the next details move like a nightmare. About 15 minutes after that conversation, a resident sees termite leave the Burlington Apartments. Then the building is on fire.

 People inside are screaming. 12 people who are inside when the fire starts die from smoke inhalation or injuries related to smoke inhalation. The dead include nine children and two pregnant women. The blaze becomes one of the worst arson fires in Los Angeles history. Survivors later tell horrific stories of what it feels like inside that burning building.

As flames spread, mothers throw babies out of windows, hoping someone catches them. People form human chains to hoist residents down from upper floors. One man watches in horror as his wife and three of his children run into the smoke and die, huddled in a hallway. Another  man loses three children and his pregnant wife.

 More than 100 residents are displaced. More than 40 are injured.  The seven children who die range in age from 15 months to 11 years. and two of the women who die are pregnant. In one night, a neighborhood already living under pressure gets hit with a tragedy so big, it changes how the city looks at Westlake.

 But the fire is not just about who lights it. It is also about what the building is and how deadly the conditions inside make everything worse. The Burlington Apartments are not ready for a fire like that. The blaze exposes major flaws in the city’s fire inspection system, and the building has problems before the fire ever starts.

 It is a 69 unit building, old and crowded, a way station for immigrants. Some people live a dozen or more to an apartment to stretch incomes from low-wage jobs. Fire officials say the rapid spread is aided by crowded conditions with personal belongings and furniture crammed into small spaces. After two suspicious fires on the premises the previous month, inspectors note that fire doors are propped open and alarms are not functioning properly.

  They require the owner to conduct fire patrols every half hour, but the patrols never happen, and the fire doors are still open during the deadly blaze. The tragedy prompts widespread calls for reform in city fire inspections. But a year later, many suggested measures like starting a  fire safety inspection task force and creating a computerized record system are not implemented.

  So when the fire hits, it meets a building that is already a hazard, packed with families who have little room to move, trapped by conditions that should have been fixed. It turns one criminal act into a mass death event. And while the city argues about inspections and reforms, the street reality stays the same. The neighborhood is still living under gang control and people are still scared to speak.

 From the beginning, rumors circulate that 18th Street gang members start the blaze. At that time, local gangs are growing increasingly violent and crime in the neighborhood is described as overwhelming by former city councilman Mike Hernandez, who represents the Westlake district. Then he also says there is never an outpouring of grief or activism  because many residents are reluctant to call attention to themselves out of fear of deportation.

 That fear does not just stop people from protesting. It also shuts mouths when detectives come asking questions because on the street speaking up can get you labeled and labels can get you hurt. Retired LAPD homicide detective Robert Bub says that after the fire, police officers are talking to every 18th streeter that came in to try to shake something loose.

 But he  says people are scared to talk because they fear retaliation. That is the trap in a gang neighborhood. If you talk, you might get hurt. If you do not talk, the truth stays buried. Survivors try to rebuild and avoid the building because the memories are too grim. And investigators keep circling the same questions.

 Who does it? Why does it happen? And why does it feel like the people who know are staying quiet? The answer does not come fast. It comes in pieces, years apart, with false starts that make the case feel cursed. Around the time of the fire, Salvador Granados is inside Valerio’s apartment, and the details he later shares sound like panic,  not confidence.

 Granados is a member of the Hoover locos click. Valerio, Termite,  and other CLCS members are hanging out near the Burlington Apartments. Later, Granado sees Valerio, Termite,  and another CLCS member enter the apartment. Valerio and the other member each carry a black trash bag. One of the bags contains a watering can, and  both bags smell like barbecue liquid.

Valerio’s face is red and he looks like he is in a panic. Termite appears upset and says, “We [ __ ] up.” The other CLCS member is red and sweaty. As Granados leaves the apartment, police and firefighters are responding in the neighborhood. That scene matters because in gang life, that kind of moment is dangerous.

 It turns rumors into something that feels real. It also shows something else. This is not just street chaos. This is an organized setup on a block run with rules, taxes, and chains of command. And that is where the federal side of this story starts creeping in. Because while Westlake burns and locals stay silent, the feds are already looking at 18th Street like a criminal enterprise, not just a neighborhood gang.

 In 1998, 5 years after May 2nd, 1993, the case takes a swing, but it does not stick. Two 22-year-old 18 streeters are charged with 10 counts of murder after a gang member arrested in an unrelated killing claims to know who starts the fire. Their names are Roelio Andrade and Alan Lobos. Those charges are later dropped for lack of evidence.

 That is what makes the Burlington case feel like a ghost story in the city. Everybody hears the rumors. Everybody knows the gang name tied to the neighborhood, but [clears throat] proving it in court is another thing. Meanwhile, survivors carry the weight. Most do not return to the apartment building on Burlington Avenue because the memories are too grim.

 A group of them receives $2 million in a civil lawsuit against the building’s owner and managers. One survivor story shows how deep the damage goes. Elias Verdugo Vasquez, the man who watches his wife and three children disappear into the smoke, returns to Chiapas, Mexico with his only surviving child. His dream of a better life in America is shattered.

 And as the years move on, the case does not disappear. It just waits. Because in gang cases, time does not always kill evidence. Sometimes it changes people. It pressures them. It puts them in prison. And eventually, somebody talks. Over the decades, law enforcement keeps coming back to Johanna Ma Lopez, and her story shifts across time.

 In 2000, while she is serving a federal sentence for a different charge, she later tells police she knows nothing about the fire. Years later, the  interviews do not stop. In 2010, over the course of several interviews with law enforcement, Lopez later tells investigators about events leading up to the Burlington Apartments fire that includes conversations where Valyrio and Termite talk about taking care of the building’s manager by starting a fire.

That gap matters because it shows a case that stays alive in the background while everyone else tries to move on. It also shows how gang stories can depend on people close to the action, people around the shot callers, people who see how decisions are made, and now the story has words on record  that point back to the same names.

 But in this world, statements are one thing. Proof is another. And the next part of this timeline shows why the federal side cares so much about wires, informants, and letters. Because the street does not just talk, the street issues orders. By June 2008, the picture law enforcement describes as bigger than Westlake.

 The FBI has been coming at 18th Street for more than a decade, describing it as clicks spread across Los Angeles and even into Central America. One click that keeps popping up as a serious problem is Colombia Lilos. Detective Magdaleno Gomez says the click rules the streets around MacArthur Park and he explains how clicks run a protection racket.

 If you are selling dope, pushing fake documents or hustling anything illegal, they want their cut. Gomez says they even tax illegal vendors, meaning if someone sells food,  counterfeit gear, or anything shady on the street, the click takes a piece. Edgar Hernandez breaks it down even harder. If someone refuses to pay, it can end in getting shot, stabbed, or murdered.

 They point to a moment where a DVD vendor stands up to the gang, gets shot, and a 23-day old baby in a stroller nearby is also hit. That is the kind of street lesson that keeps everyone quiet because people learn fast that saying no can get you touched. Around that same time, the FBI arrests a shot caller named Sergio Pantoia known as Tricky along with his wife and a group of associates and drug dealers on federal charges tied to distributing crack cocaine.

 Hernandez says Pantoga runs a tattoo parlor that is really a front for drug dealing and extortion. But the bigger point is the structure. The street level is only the bottom layer. The chain of command runs from sidewalks to prison and sitting on top is Francisco Puppet Martinez. Puppet is locked up in 1994, but the word is he still runs the little tikos from inside for years, sending orders out and keeping money moving.

 Prison does not mean silence in this world. Prison is an office and the streets still pick up the phone. In 2008, the feds say they see proof of that office in the coldest way. During the dismantle attempt, the FBI intercepts letters written by Puppet from prison, and those letters are not about peace or staying out of trouble.

They give the green light to murder termite in Los Angeles. Puppet suspects Romero is talking to the FBI. One line from a prison letter to a hitman says, “Fumigate the termite. That is not poetry. That is an order. The streets try to carry it out.” Romero is shot several times, but survives. Later, it is revealed that the FBI is using a wire tap.

 Meaning, while The Click thinks it is handling a snitch problem, the feds are listening to the whole machine operate. People involved say the sequence shows an organization so structured, they do not expect to see anything more organized, even on HBO with the Sopranos. Because this is not random violence for chaos. This is business.

 When the business is threatened by the FBI or a disloyal employee, the head of  the business, the Mexican mafia, takes steps to eliminate the threat. In this case, that threat is termite. The attempt fails, but it still proves the point. The click has discipline, orders, and enforcement even from behind bars. This is also where federal cases work differently than local cases.

 Bruce Rearen, assistant to the US attorney, when Colombia Leil Seikos members are first prosecuted, says local police and prosecutors often only reach lower level gang members for individual crimes. The bigger bosses stay out of reach and getting victims to testify  is a problem because people are terrified of retaliation.

 Reorder says federal informants and wiretaps make it possible to lock up higher up leaders and put them away in federal prison. Retired LA Sheriff Deputy Richard Voldemar, who is on the FBI task force going after 18th Street back in the 1990s, has a warning in 2008. He argues that locking up gang leaders can strengthen the Mexican mafia because they still find ways to send orders to street gangs from behind bars.

The system tries to isolate them and take away privileges, but the underground covert system feeds them and keeps them powerful. Valdemar pushes back on the idea that these are dumb kids who fail school and choose a thug life. He says the guys who reach the top in the prison gang food chain can be brilliant and could run corporate organizations if they had a mind to do that.

 There is also another piece that shows how deep the web goes. Martinez’s lawyer, Isaac Guillen, is later locked up after it is revealed he is collecting and laundering money  on Martinez’s behalf. That is not street level hustle anymore. That is the business side, the money side, the keep it running while locked up side.  In the end, the FBI and the US attorney’s office are able to convict Martinez and he gets a life sentence plus 60 years.

 Even so, federal and local authorities only say they put a dent in the 18th Street gang’s criminal enterprise, at least for now, because everybody knows the truth about that kind of life. When one shot caller falls, another one steps up fast. And right here, the story tightens around Termite again. A prison boss gives the green light to erase him.

 A hit goes down. Termite survives. The feds listen. The government builds cases. And in the middle of all that, Termite’s name stays tied to the Burlington fire on May 2nd, 1993. So, the question grows louder. How does someone like that stay free for decades? And what happens when law enforcement needs somebody like him more than they want to lock him up? Years pass, then decades,  and the Burlington fire case starts to feel like one of those Westlake nightmares that never gets solved.

 The neighborhood keeps moving, the faces change, and the old story turns into rumor and street talk. Then, February 4th, 2017, the whole thing suddenly wakes up. Los Angeles police make arrest in the Westlake apartment fire case and law enforcement sources tell the Times  that three suspects are tied to the 18th Street gang.

 When reporters pull up to the Burlington Avenue building that day, it looks like time wipes the block clean. Few people even remember the fire and none of the tenants from that era are still there. But one person remembers it like it is yesterday. Mora Campos, the apartment manager. She lives nearby back then and now she says the neighborhood feels different.

 Residents say there is much less gang and drug activity than there once was. Campos credits LAPD officers who used to keep watch by sleeping on the floor of her living room. Like her home turns into a mini command post like the cops are posted up the same way the click used to post up. Behind the scenes, detectives keep chipping away at this case for years.

 Piece by piece, interview by interview, waiting for the moment the puzzle finally locks in. And on that Friday morning, with the female suspect already behind bars, detectives move in on two men and take them into custody. The street feels it right away.  The whispers that used to stay inside the neighborhood now step into daylight because court paperwork makes everything official.

 The old fire is not just a story anymore. It turns back into a case with names on it. A few days later, on February 9th, 2017, the case hits the courtroom with full force. Three defendants stand in front of a judge and plead not guilty to 12 counts of murder tied to the 1993 arson fire. Prosecutors contend that Romero Valerio, Joseph  M, and Johanna Lopez are gang members.

 And they also say a fourth suspect, Juan Termite Romero, is still at large. That detail lands like a cold slap because it tells you the crew is not fully in custody yet. There is still somebody missing, somebody the system cannot put hands on, somebody who is not walking into court in cuffs. The judge, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Mark Hannisono,  orders Valerio, M and Lopez held without bail, and prosecutors say each is eligible for the death penalty.

 In gang cases, that is the legal version of saying the stakes are life and death. Lopez’s attorney, Robert her, comes out swinging. He says his client is wrongly accused and has always denied any involvement in this fire. He says she already faces charges before  and is set to go to trial the week before, but the district attorney’s office dismisses that case and files new charges alongside Valerio and M.

 claims they’re doing what they’re doing in an attempt to squeeze my client into becoming a witness in the case. That is straight pressure talk. In street terms, it sounds like the system is trying to make someone fold, trying to make somebody tell on the bigger names. Then Valerio’s side adds even more heat. His sister, Dana Gates, calls it a classic case of retaliation.

 She claims LAPD targets her brother because the family files a lawsuit after officers allegedly kill her younger brother, Ismael David Valerio, in 1992. And she says LAPD settles that case. Gates says, “I know he didn’t do these crimes.” And she calls Valerio innocent and a family man. Prosecutors are expected to decide whether to seek the death penalty, and the defendants are scheduled to appear again on February 15th, 2017.

 The street talk is one thing, but now the pressure is legal and public. When the court sets a date, everybody watching knows the same truth. Somebody’s going to crack first because this kind of weight does not sit on people  quietly. As the case keeps pushing forward, prosecutors circle back to the people closest to the old Westlake world.

 In 2020, Johanna Lopez agrees to be interviewed by prosecutors. At first, she denies key parts of what is said about the leadup to the fire. She denies that she tells law enforcement that Valerio and Termite ever discuss starting a fire to deal with the Burlington Apartments manager. She also denies telling law enforcement that she sees Valario hand termite a bag containing a lighter before the fire.

Then prosecutors confront her with a recording from one of her previous interviews with law enforcement.  After hearing that recording, she acknowledges a different version. She acknowledges that the day before the fire,  Termite states he’s going to light a fire at the Burlington Apartments to retaliate against the building’s manager.

 She says Termite asked Valario to bring him everything he needs to set the building on fire. She also acknowledges that on the day of the fire, Valerio hands Termite a black plastic bag. Then Valerio leaves and Termite says he is going to burn the Burlington Apartments. That is the moment that changes everything. A denial can slow a case down.

 But a recording can pull it right back on track because it puts words on a timeline. It pins talk to a date. And once that door opens, it sets up the next move prosecutors love to make when they feel the leverage is real. In February 2020, the case takes a sharp turn from denials to  deals. On February 7th, 2020, Joseph M, 44, pleads guilty to one count of voluntary manslaughter and could face 11 years in prison at sentencing.

 Then on February 19th, 2020, Johanna Lopez, 54, pleads guilty to voluntary manslaughter tied to the 1993 arson fire. She enters a plea to two felony counts and could face 22 years in state prison at sentencing.  Meanwhile, Ramiro Valerio does not take a plea in that moment. He is awaiting trial on charges that include murder with special circumstances, including multiple murders and murder in the commission of an arson.

 The charges include the deaths of two unborn children. If convicted, Valerio  could face life in prison without the possibility of parole. This is how these gang cases split. Some people take a deal because they want a number they can measure. Some people fight it because they think they can beat it. And some people are not even in the room because they are still out there, still at large, still moving like ghosts.

 At trial, the plea deal stops being paperwork and turns into sworn testimony. Lopez testifies that after her interview with prosecutors, she is offered a leniency agreement and she accepts it. She tells the jury she pleads guilty to two counts of voluntary manslaughter and is sentenced to 22 years in prison. That detail matters because it shows the trade happening right in front of everyone.

 It is the courtroom version of a deal being cut. Lopez’s words are no longer just street talk or old interviews or rumor passed around the block. Now, it is sworn testimony tied to a sentence.  In a case like this, the defense attacks that kind of deal and says the testimony is bought. That a person is saying what prosecutors want to hear to save themselves.

 The prosecution argues the opposite, that the deal is accountability and the truth finally coming out. Either way, it changes the air in the room because once someone admits guilt and takes time, the jury starts looking at everybody else differently, especially the person still fighting the biggest charge.

 Valerio takes the stand and denies ordering the fire at the Burlington Apartments. He says he is not present at any CLCS meetings where a plan to start the fire is discussed. He denies believing the building’s manager causes drug sales in the neighborhood to decline, and he claims Lopez never complains to him about the manager.

 Valario describes the day of the fire in a way that tries to pull him out of the crime completely. He says he is hanging out with his girlfriend and other CLCS members at a restaurant when he sees fire trucks and ambulances driving toward the Burlington Apartments. He says when they return to the neighborhood, the Burlington Apartments are already on fire.

 The defense needs the jury to feel that he is just another guy watching chaos, not the boss who orders it. Then June 9th, 2022, a middle-aged man takes the witness stand and says, “I do remember that day.” He says he is eating with friends at a burger stand in Westlake when fire trucks and ambulances scream by.

 He says they follow the lights and sirens and see the fire. He says he helps carry victims across the street and lays them on the pavement, calling it a horrible incident. Then his lawyer asks him the question that cuts through everything because it is the question the city has asked for years. Did you have anything to do with this fire? Valerio answers no.

 That no is the whole defense. The prosecution story works the opposite  way. They build a picture where that no was the cover and where the real truth is in the chain of witnesses who place Valerio and Romero in the mix. Even while defendants argue and deals get signed, the charge list stays brutal.

 The people charge Valerio, Lopez, and a third defendant with, among other crimes, 12 counts of murder. Prosecutors contend the defendants are gang members, and the arson connects to how the crew handles problems on their turf. The defense tries to frame it as pressure tactics, as retaliation, as unreliable witnesses, but prosecutors keep moving with a long timeline, and they bring in witnesses who describe moments that sound like gang business, not coincidence.

 In the June 9th, 2022 courtroom story, witnesses say the property manager goes to police and changes locks to keep dealers and gang members from fleeing inside when cops show up. One witness recalls Valerio saying a beating from the gang fails to bring the property manager in line. And she remembers him saying, “We should do a little fire.

” Then clarifying it as a fire  to scare them. That is not a random sentence. That is a plan being spoken out loud. The kind of talk that turns into action in a click. Another witness describes Lopez saying that before the fire, she sees Valerio hand a bag to Romero and Romero announces, “Better leave here because this thing is going to get hot.

 That sounds like a warning from inside the circle. The kind you say when you know something is about to pop off. A resident says she sees Valerio and Romero standing near an entrance to the building about 15 minutes before the fire breaks out. Romero goes inside while Valerio waits by the door. The resident testifies after Romero leaves through the garage.

The resident says he and Valerio walk off together. Another 18th Street member testifies that after the fire starts, Valerio shows up at an apartment with Romero and another gang member carrying black trash bags and smelling of lighter fluid. Valerio disputes these accounts, but the prosecution’s picture stays steady.

 It is a click move and they are pointing straight at the people who run that click. And once Romero’s name sits in that courtroom story again and again, the next question becomes unavoidable. Why is termite not sitting at that defense table yet if prosecutors say he is part of the same action? During the trial, the case drags the jury back into the old Westlake world like a rewind, and it does it in a way that shows how early the connections start.

 On June 9th, 2022, the story lays out Valerio’s background as he tells it. He says he is four when his family moves from East LA to Westlake. He says at 11, he joins Rockwood, a gang formed by students at Virgil Middle School who play football together. He says most of the boys in Rockwood have older brothers, fathers, or uncles in 18th Street, one of the city’s largest gangs.

 and he says two of his brothers are already in 18th Street. When he is 15, he joins his brother’s click of 18th Street, the Colombia Lil Kikos, and he recalls how three members initiate him with a beating. He takes the nickname greedy. That detail matters because it shows the culture. You do not just sign up, you get put on through violence.

 Valerio also talks about Romero in a personal way that makes the connection feel deep and complicated. He testifies Romero buys him clothes as a child and shows him how to dress like a gangster. He says Romero teaches him how to drive. Those are not small details. In that world, showing somebody how to dress and move is teaching them identity, teaching them how to be seen on the street.

 Then Valerio says something that shows how the power ladder flips as they get older. When Valerio becomes Martinez’s envoy, he says it is his turn to show Romero how to tax the drug trade. Now the younger one is teaching the older one how the business runs under the Mexican mafia rules. That is how the click becomes a machine. Everybody has a role.

 Everybody learns the system. Everybody knows what happens when the system is threatened. The other member in that circle is Anthony Koko Zaragoza, a childhood friend from Valerio’s Rockwood days.  Valerio tells authorities that while Romero is the brains of the clique, Zaragoza is its enforcer. That detail shows the structure from the inside.

Brains. Enforcer, boss. These are job titles on the street, even if nobody calls them that in public. And the money numbers coming out in court show why Burlington’s not just a building. Lopez testifies  that for the right to sell drugs on Burlington Avenue, she initially gives Valerio a car and pays him and Romero about 7,000 a week.

 By 1993, she says the weekly figure rises to 25,000 a week. Valerio tells jurors these sums are inflated, saying Lopez pays him 400 to 500 a week. But either way, the picture stays the same. There is a toll booth. There is a tax. There is a crew controlling the lane. Former tenants recall seeing the dealers fishing drugs out of their mouths.

 The customers driving up at all hours. And the gang members loitering outside to make sure drugs and money change hands uninterrupted. That is what makes Burlington look like a business corner, not a random hangout. In gang language, it is a money spot, a hotline, a place you do not lose without consequences.

 On June 9th, 2022, the curtain is pulled back on another layer of this whole mess. The snitch accusations and the chaos inside law enforcement at the time. Valerio testifies he keeps collecting money for his boss until members of his own gang start accusing him of cooperating with police. In that world, once the word snitch gets put on your name, it sticks like a stain.

Valerio says Anthony Koko Zaragoza once puts a gun to his head and calls him a snitch. He describes somebody trying to calm Zaragoza down, reminding him they have known each other since they are kids. The kind of history that is supposed to mean something on the street. Zaragoza lowers the gun, but the suspicion does not die.

 It just sits there alive like a loaded weapon on the table. Valerio testifies that same year he meets with an officer at the LAPD Rampart division and offers to inform on his gang and he says he believes a corrupt Rampart officer tells either Zaragoza or Romero that he has turned. That detail matters because Rampart is not a clean backdrop in this story.

Valerio testifies Rampart’s gang unit is played at the time by rogue cops who plant guns and drugs on innocent people, beat civilians, and sell dope taken from dealers. So now the street is already paranoid and the cops are not trusted and the line between  enforcement and dirt is not clear.

 It is a perfect storm for a crew to start hunting its own people, even if the proof is just whispers. Valerio also testifies his decision to cooperate is prompted by the death of an older brother in 1992. And he says he sees how much hurt his mother suffers because of her son’s allegiance to  gangs.

 He says, “I promised my mom that I would be the one to get out of the gang.” That line hits hard because it can sound like redemption or it can sound like a story told to survive depending on who is listening. But the timeline does not stop at a promise. The same June 9th, 2022 courtroom account shows Valerio is already deep in a system where prison bosses decide who lives and who gets smoked.

 And the next part shows how the Mexican mafia handles threats like it is boardroom business  with bodies as the paperwork. In the same month, Valerio testifies that year, Mexican mafia members gather in a motel room, and FBI agents and sheriff’s deputies have the room wired with hidden microphones and cameras. The feds listen while Mexican mafia members talk about whether Valerio is presenting himself on the street as one of them.

 And in their rules, that is a violation.  They decide he has, and they devise a plan to kill him, calling it Operation Coke Bottle, named after the thick glasses Valerio wears because of a degenerative eye condition. Even the nickname shows how cold it is. They turn a man into an object, a joke, a target.

 In that same meeting, the men also talk about killing Francisco Puppet Martinez, Valerio’s boss. They hear the two are raking in big money and keeping it to themselves. Retired sheriff’s detective Richard Valdemar recalls monitoring the meeting and says the collection racket is crooked from the start, but Martinez and Valerio are, in the Mexican mafia’s view,  cheating the crooks.

 That phrase sums up the vibe of this world. Even criminals have rules, and breaking those rules gets you buried. Another Mexican mafia member, Ernest Chuko Castro, who is also working as a police informant, is tapped to collect some of the money being generated in Martinez’s territory.

 Castro sends an 18th Street member, Carlos Truco Lopez, to pick up the money. According to Valerio, Martinez sends word from prison that anyone who sees Lopez is to get him. That is the kind of order that turns a street into a trap. One night in September, Lopez pulls his Chevrolet Suburban onto Burlington Avenue. Two gunmen are waiting.

 They rake the SUV with automatic weapons, killing Lopez and a woman in the passenger seat. The street does not need a courtroom to understand what that means. It is a message. It is discipline. It is the business protecting itself. After that shooting, the pressure shifts straight onto Valerio. He testifies. Castro’s people tell him dealers in 18th Street territory need to sell Castro’s drugs.

Valerio refuses and he says Castro and another man drive him into rival territory, beat him and give him 24 hours to start supplying dealers  with Castro’s drugs. He testifies, “I said okay because I wanted to walk away alive.”  That line is not about pride. It is about survival and it shows how this thing is bigger than a click.

It is a whole enterprise with bosses, collectors,  and street crews being forced to sell a product. Valerio then says he returns to Rampart and tells a detective investigating the killings of Carlos Lopez and the passenger that his friends Romero and Zaragoza are the gunmen. Prosecutors charge Valerio with murder, accusing him of planning the ambush, but the case is dropped.

 That detail matters because once a case like that gets dropped, the street starts  doing math. If the law lets you walk, people assume you bought it with information. Back on the block, Valerio testifies the word circulates that he is released because he is working for the government. And if the street believes you are protected by the feds, that does not make you safe.

It makes you a target. It means your clock is ticking again because the same crew that once called you family now sees you as a threat.  Still inside the June 9th, 2022 account, Valyrio testifies that in 1997, FBI agents knock on his door. They show up because while monitoring a wire tap, they overhear members of his gang talking about killing him.

 Valerio says he is not surprised. He tells the agents he has heard Romero and Zaragoza are under orders from Martinez to kill him whenever they can, according to an FBI report. That phrase is chilling because it does not sound like a one-time plan. It sounds like an open season order. And that day, Valerio agrees to become an informant for the FBI.

 He testifies it was time to do the right thing. Frankly, one of his handlers, Carl Sanford, describes how valuable Valerio is in a way that makes him sound like a key to the whole operation. Sanford tells Tom Diaz,  author of No Boundaries, Transnational Latino gangs and American law enforcement, that recruiting Valerio is like arresting Alapone’s bookkeeper.

Because Valerio has firstirhand knowledge of how the enterprise works, Valerio wears a wire and introduces undercover officers to drug wholesalers. The information he gives allows the FBI to tap the phones of Martinez’s wife. Sanford also says their prized informant never directly participated in violence. As far as the FBI knows, although he may have ordered it done now and again, according to Diaz’s book, even that sentence carries the street contradiction. On paper, he is a source.

On the street, he is still a shot caller type, still a guy who can move pieces, and it shows the double life vibe around this whole case. The same people are targets, suspects, and sources. sometimes all at once, sometimes in the same year. Valerio testifies his FBI handlers later tell him LAPD wants to speak with him about an incident and he agrees to go.

 Agents drive him to LAPD headquarters downtown where a detective questions him. Valerio testifies it is the first time he learns he is a suspect. Afterward, he says the FBI asks him directly, “Did you have any knowledge or involvement in the fire?” He says he tells them no. That moment matters because it puts the fire back in the center and shows how slippery this story is.

 A man can be wearing a wire for the government while also being questioned as a suspect in the worst arson case in the neighborhood. In gang terms, that is a wild position. You are walking around with both sides looking at you like you might be lying. And that sets the stage for the name that this documentary is really about. Because even while Valerio’s in court and in the system, another key figure is still not sitting at the defense table. Termite.

The legal ending for Valerio does not match his no. A jury finds Valerio guilty of 12 counts of first-degree murder and as to each count finds true special circumstance allegations  tied to felony murder and multiple murders. The court sentences him to 12 consecutive terms of life without the possibility of parole.

 Later, the appeal record captures how hard the defense fights in court. During closing argument, Valerio’s council attacks the credibility of one of the people’s experts on the Mexican mafia, calling the witness a con artist. Defense council tells the jury, “You may have noticed I used the arson expert just to illustrate in my questioning of the arson expert.

 I don’t know if you caught it, but I was just trying to show you what an expert looks like, what an expert’s qualifications are.” He says an expert has skill, training, experience, consults with other experts, tests theories,  and relies on reliable evidence, then argues the Mexican mafia expert does not even know that the tapes in the letter being analyzed are done with Valerio under FBI supervision.

 The appellet discussion includes the idea that Valerio invites error by eliciting challenged testimony, and that doctrine can block a defendant from complaining about evidence the defense itself brings in. In other words, even after all the courtroom noise, the conviction holds and Valerio ends up with life without parole.

 But the Burlington case still has a missing piece, the one name that keeps hovering at the edge of every timeline. Juan Termite Romero. On January 25th,  2024, the story swings hard toward Romero. Romero becomes the government star witness in a racketeering case that sends dozens of his associates to prison. After that, he disappears into witness protection, living under an assumed name far from his old neighborhood.

 But Los Angeles County prosecutors bring the 57year-old out of hiding. Romero appears in a downtown Los Angeles courtroom and defers entering a plea to 12 counts of murder. The image in court is striking. He is dressed in an orange jumpsuit and the short man with thinning hair hardly resembles the gang member who stares into a camera decades earlier.

 A thick gold chain draped above the words, “Baby, I’m for real” tattooed along his collarbone. The story also shows how close law enforcement comes to grabbing him earlier. Detectives travel to a Phoenix apartment complex where he has been living and find that the protected witness moves just a week earlier. And one detective testifies she finds the timing incredibly strange.

 Deputy District Attorney Victor Avita declines to specify where or when Romero is arrested, but he says Romero was extradited from Mexico. Records show Romero was booked into the Los Angeles County Jail on December 5th. An attorney initially assigned to represent him, Daniel Nardoni, says he knows nothing about Romero’s apprehension  or the evidence against him.

 And a man who loses family in the fire says, “We all have limitations.” Explaining how low income forces people into places they can afford. That  quote pulls the camera back to the victims and the reality of why families are in that building in the first place. Romero’s return to court is not just a new headline.

 It is the moment the whole topic turns sharp because the guy accused in the fire case is also the guy described as a star government witness. Now the question is not only what happens in 1993. It becomes how Romero stays free long enough to build a second life. One where the government calls him useful. As of February 2026, the case against Juan Termite Romero is still moving through the Los Angeles County legal system.

 Romero remains in custody while trial proceedings continue. That matters because it shows this story is not finished history. It is a living case with active court steps, and the stakes are still real for everyone involved. The timeline is long and messy,  full of old street alliances, prison orders, witnesses changing stories, and prosecutors reopening doors that stay shut for years.

 In the gang world, being labeled useful to the feds can be a death sentence. In the legal world, it can also be a shield, at least for a while. And with Romero’s case still in motion right now, the next chapters are set up to answer the biggest question hanging over everything. What the government knows when they know it, and what they are willing to let slide while Termite keeps walking.

 So now it comes down to this. When the papers finally hit the table, what matters more, the bodies or the information? Did the system keep Termite close because he was useful or because he was dangerous? If you are the families from Burlington, what does justice even look like now? And if you are in that gang world, is being called protected just another kind of target? Should an informant ever get this much rope? And what happens if the truth is even uglier than the rumors?