A man from Derbyshire, a county in the center of the United Kingdom, was stunned to see that one of his tattoos appeared in an American government document to identify members of the criminal gang of Venezuelan origin of Aragua (TDA).
Pete Belton, 44 and resident of Ilkeston, a small city of 41,000 inhabitants, has no connection with that organization or Latin America.
Belton said he was surprised when he discovered that an image of his forearm appeared in a document of the National Security Department (DHS) used to identify alleged members of the transnational criminal organization.
“I am a normal man of medium age from Derbyshire,” he told BBC Verify.
A clock sphere
The British acknowledged that at the beginning the situation seemed “half strange, half funny”, but now he is concerned that the family trip to Miami with his wife and daughter who has planned for August can become “a six -month vacation with all inclusive in Guantanamo.”
Donald Trump’s government has deported hundreds of alleged foreign gang members to a high security prison in El Salvador.
The lawyers of some of the deportees have denounced that they were incorrectly labeled as members of the ADD due to their tattoos.
In the case of Belton, his tattoo – a clock sphere with the date and time of his daughter’s birth – was included in a set of nine images to detect and identify Aragua train members.
Other designs included by the National Security Department include stars, crowns and the famous “Jumpman” logo of Michael Jordan.
“Open source material has shown TDA members with a combination of tattoos indicated below,” says the text, according to judicial documents.
The original image
However, inverse image searches show that several of the photos appeared for the first time on tattoos websites without obvious links with Venezuela or with the Aragua train.
One of these searches directed BBC Verify to an Instagram post for almost a decade ago in which Nottingham’s tattoo artist exhibits the photo of Pete Belton’s tattoo.
The image of the British citizen’s forearm in the American DHS document is of worse quality than the original Instagram publication, shared in 2016, but clearly corresponds to the same arm and presents the same tattoo with the clock sphere.
The same image of the Belton tattoo also appeared in a report from the Texas Public Security Department (DPS) on the activity of the Aragua train in September 2024.
BBC Verify contacted both the US Department of National Security and the Department of Public Security (DPS) of Texas to consult them about the source of the images, but did not receive an answer.
However, in an email, the DHS claimed to trust the intelligence of its forces of order and that its “evaluations go far beyond the tattoos of gang members and social networks.”
It is not clear exactly how the tattoo of this man of Derbyshire ended in the American documents, but he is worried that they link him to the poster.
“I thought: if I worked in the border police and see one as I walk, I would think: ‘Eh! We have one! It is that of the document.”
Belton contributed several images of the tattoo to demonstrate that he is his and says he has no relationship with the Venezuelan poster.
What determines belonging to the Aragua train
The US Government has not deported anyone based solely on its tattoos, according to an authority of the Customs Immigration and Control Service (ICE) in a judicial file in March.
Judicial documents show that immigration officials use a point system known as the “Validation Guide for foreign enemies” to determine if someone is linked to the Venezuelan gang.
It includes a score card and, according to the document, eight points in various categories could be a reason for arrest or deportation.
Having tattoos that denote belonging or loyalty to the Aragua train would add up to half of these points.
The document indicates that if the eight points come from the category of symbolism, which includes tattoos, an additional consultation must be made before designating someone as a TDA member.
The Venezuelan investigation journalist Ronna Risquez, author of a book on the origins of this criminal group, said that tattoos alone do not constitute proof of belonging.
“The Aragua train has no tattoos that identify the band,” he said.
He specified that “to confirm whether a person is a member of the ADD, the authorities must conduct a police investigation to determine if it has a criminal record. A tattoo, their clothing or nationality do not constitute evidence.”
However, there have been cases in which lawyers have argued that people based on their tattoos have been mistakenly identified and subsequently deported.
American media released the case of a man who, as his lawyers claim, was deported by the tattoo of a crown inspired by the Real Madrid football team logo.
In another case, a makeup artist was sent to prison in El Salvador after US officials used, according to his lawyers, his tattoo of a crown with the words “mom” and “dad” as proof of belonging to a gang.
Meanwhile, in Derbyshire, Belton states that his family has considered canceling his trip to the United States due to possible risks, so they will remain attentive to how things are.
“I hope you realize that I am not a Venezuelan Gánster, but I have seen crazy things in the news lately, so we will wait to see what happens,” he says.
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