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2024-03-29T12:19:31Z
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WATCH | Former MS-13 boss reveals the gang’s inner workings, rules, and tattoos
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/watch-former-ms-13-boss-reveals-the-gang-s-inner-workings-rules-a
2024-03-29T06:09:13.000Z
2024-03-29T06:09:13.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
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<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/12405438700?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>MS-13 has grown into one of the most feared gangs on the planet. Founded in the United States it was transported to El Salvador after convicts were deported. From there the gang grew into a beast. It is now working closely with drug cartels and terrorizes neighborhoods throughout the Americas. Now, a former high-ranking member tells us what MS-13 is really like.</p>
<p>Alex Sanchez was once a proud leading figure in MS-13. He became involved in the gang in the 1980s in Los Angeles and participated in its expansion. He was deported to El Salvador in 1994 along with 4,000 other Salvadorans. There, he began to recruit young members into the gang. He was involved in robberies, street fights, and carjackings, and he survived being shot four times. Sanchez decided to leave MS-13 in the mid-1990s and is now the executive director of Homies Unidos and is a violence-prevention worker and expert on gang culture.</p>
<p>He spoke with Business Insider about the Los Angeles Police Department, tattooing, rules and codes, media perception, and the political language used to depict the gang, such as <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/video-president-donald-trump-s-war-on-ms-13-and-immigrant-gangs" target="_blank">Donald Trump's comments in 2018</a>. Sanchez's story is profiled in the books "MS-13: The Making of America's Most Notorious Gang" and "Unforgetting: A Memoir of Family, Migration, Gangs, and Revolution in the Americas."</p>
<p>Watch the video below:</p>
<p><iframe title="YouTube video player" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/58e8f6p3yh0?si=uoujkQ6se6OzGVXN" width="560" height="315" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe></p>
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Those Who Go By Night: Dominic Di Ciolla and the Los Angeles Mafia
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/those-who-go-by-night-dominic-di-ciolla-and-the-los-angeles-mafia
2023-08-13T06:59:16.000Z
2023-08-13T06:59:16.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
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<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/12188260453?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By Thom L. Jones for <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a></p>
<p>John Derek, the movie actor, once said, “Live fast, die young, and leave a good looking corpse.”</p>
<p>Dominic Di Ciolla managed two out of three, but missed out on the last one.</p>
<p>A lesser known player in the field of American organized crime, he came and went without too much fuss, and perhaps, his only claim to any kind of notoriety is his connection to the early days of the Los Angeles Mafia.</p>
<p>He was born in Bari, in the province of Puglia, a city on the Italian Adriatic, in September, 1902.</p>
<p>He died on a street that apparently never existed, six months shy of his thirtieth birthday..</p>
<p>If life is a conundrum, death by violence, especially in the field of criminal activity, is an enigma that often challenges us for a solution.</p>
<p>Although youth gangs may have emerged in the US early as the late 1780s, as the industrial revolution emerged in the 19th century, so did criminal gangs, most visible and violent during tectonic and rapid population shifts. Like seedlings in a vast field of economic fertilizer, they multiplied across the land, as major cities developed, commerce blossomed and opportunities offered wealth and prestige for those that could succeed. And not only the home-bred versions were present as the brave new world began to welcome the 20th Century.</p>
<p>As millions of Italians emigrated to the Americas, they brought another kind of gang. It would become known as The Mafia, after its namesake in Sicily where it had first emerged, and it may first have established itself in Louisiana, before spreading across the conterminous United States. Not all Italian criminals were Mafia, and in Chicago, there were various groups operating, some Italian, some Irish, some, perhaps Mafia.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}12188260485,RESIZE_400x{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="12188260485?profile=RESIZE_400x" width="350" /></a>Di Ciolla (right) would find his way to The Windy City after moving to America, and it was here, it’s alleged, he began his career on the wrong side of the law.</p>
<p>He was short, about five-four according to one line-up police image, slender of build, dark hair, and because he was from further north in Italy, had a fair complexion. According to statements from his associates, he was unpredictable, easy to fly into rages, and prone to violence. An arriviste. Squared. He has also been described as a skilled politician, strategist and born double-crosser. Like a member of the senate or congress in Washington, he would use these to his advantage in his business, which was crime.</p>
<p>Which a lot of people think is not unlike politics.</p>
<p>In Chicago, he teamed up with a group of Sicilian gangsters, who were brothers. Terrible brothers apparently, because that is how they would become know-The Terrible Gennas-as they went about their business in the city’s Little Italy district located in the near west side on and around Taylor Street. Arriving at various dates from 1906 onwards, from their origins in Marsala, south-west Sicily, they ran coffee shops, saloons, billiard halls and blind pigs-illegal drinking dens.</p>
<p>Operating as their own gang, they were loosely connected to Al Capone and his mob.</p>
<p>During Prohibition they became masters in the business of distilling and selling corn sugar alcohol. Constantly at war with their competitors and enemies, they are gradually eliminated, one by one. Tony is the last of three sibling killings in consecutive months, his in July 1925. The others give up and retire, to die of natural causes.</p>
<p>The year following Tony Genna’s murder, Dominic Di Ciolla is also gone from Chicago and reappears on the west coast. In Los Angeles. Why he moved here rather than say New York or some other major city closer to the action in the eastern states, has never been explained. Maybe he had connection or an introduction to the players in the city of the angels. Maybe after years in Chicago he just wanted sunshine most of the time.</p>
<p>Arriving with a wife, Elizabeth Pinto, and a baby son, he started his “legitimate” working career as a butcher. He gathered together a group of similar Chicago ex-pats and social misfits, and it seems, went after a slice of the local enterprises revolving around the liquor business. Prohibition had been in force as a federal act for six years, and would last another seven, so there was a lot of opportunities for those prepared to risk importing or creating and selling alcohol, as the demand would always exceed the supply. At some stage he and his family move into a house at 3021 West Boulevard in West Adams, one of the oldest neighborhoods in the city. Two more children will arrive in the years ahead.</p>
<p>By the time of his arrival in Southern California, there were close to 20,000 Italians living in the greater Los Angeles area and there was a man allegedly in charge of the Italian Mafia operating here, called Joseph Ardizzone.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}12188260867,RESIZE_710x{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="12188260867?profile=RESIZE_710x" width="679" /></a><em><strong>Photo: Joe Ardizzone</strong></em></p>
<p>From Palermo Province in Sicily, Ardizzone arrived in the US late in the 19th century, settling first in Louisiana, before moving to California. His father and some brothers had preceded him so there was a family base to welcome him. He was soon coming into dispute with a group of Italians already based there, called Matranga who ran a mob called The College Park Gang. Although distant cousins, they were at loggerheads for some reason, and on July 2, 1906, he shot and killed one of their allies, a man called George Maisano, at about six in the evening on the corner of Avenue 19 and Main Street.</p>
<p>Maisano lived nearby at 1822 Darwin Avenue, an area so notorious it become known as “Shotgun Alley.”</p>
<p>It was also home to Osario ‘Sam Matranga,’ shot-gunned to death as he drove into the garage of his house at number 1837. His wife found him in the early hours sitting in the car, engine running, minus most of his head.</p>
<p>We do not know for certain what triggered the Maisano killing.</p>
<p>It may have been a personal beef or related to the criminal activities of warring factions.</p>
<p>Some sources claim it revolved around a dispute which was mediated by one Giuseppe Cuccia, a well-known and respected farmer, who found in favor of Ardizzone. Hardly surprising as they were cousins, although some sources claim they were uncle and nephew. Maisano swore revenge on Cuccia so Ardizzone killed him, then left town. On the lam for eight years. Almost certainly hiding in plain sight.</p>
<p>The Ardizzones, Matrangas and Cuccias were from the same area centered around Monreale and Pianna dei Greci which lie a few miles west of Palermo City. Mafia hot spots for generations. They were all also distant cousins.</p>
<p>The Mafia of Sicily is filled with familial families within criminal families. First cousin marriages in some areas was the norm rather than the exception. Early Mafia clans were dominated by the same groups of related members. Fathers, sons, nephews and cousins. Lots of cousins.</p>
<p>Killing Maisano didn’t help Cuccia, who was shot dead three months later on North Main Street, by a gunman riding a bicycle. The shooter, brandishing a revolver, was never identified, (although the main suspect was Antonio Matranga aka Tony Schino one of the leaders of the College Park Gang,) so we don’t know for sure that is why Cuccia went down. Possible. Always possible. Almost certainly the first drive-by shooting by a cyclist in history.</p>
<p>Perhaps the only one.</p>
<p>Deadly as it was, there was a Keystone Cops element about the incident especially seeing as how Keystone Pictures, the producers of the Cops movies, was based in Edendale, just across Elysian Park, to the west.</p>
<p>For the first twenty or so years from 1900 onwards, there is much coming and going between various criminal cabals in the Los Angeles area and bodies falling with a metronome regularity. There are multiple gangs fighting for control of the spoils- booze, extortion, hi-jacking, gambling-all the good stuff that fills the pages of the crime writers journals. There is probably the Mafia in some form or another although it is difficult to pin down with any real certainty just who this might be and who is running what with whom.</p>
<p>It looked something like this:</p>
<p>Ardizzone arrives, establishes his base, works in the fruit and vegetable business, starts working on his gang credentials. After killing Maisano, he is eventually indicted for the crime but the case is dismissed due to lack of witnesses. A not usual outcome in these kind of murders. Years are passing, things changing. He gets married, buys a ranch, presumably becomes more than a little wealthy.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}12188261655,RESIZE_400x{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="12188261655?profile=RESIZE_400x" width="350" /></a>Into the picture comes another gangster, Vito Di Giorgio (right).</p>
<p>Born in Palermo Province, he moves to America, perhaps in 1904, living first in New York. With his cousin, Giuseppe Morello, a man who would become infamous in the years ahead as perhaps the leader of New York’s first Mafia clan. By 1909, Vito and Maria Cristoforo marry, and in due course, have four children and are living in New Orleans. He runs a grocery shop front end, and does lots of bad stuff on the side. Then, as they almost all seem to do, he ups stakes and moves to Los Angeles sometime before 1921. They settle in a house on East 21 street, in central LA. Somehow he become the boss of the Mafia. His number two man is Rosario Di Simone.</p>
<p>It’s claimed the appointments of Di Giorgio and Di Simone are managed by a Mafia national leadership, although it’s not easy to figure out who that would have been. There is no hard evidence that a formal board of governors existed at this time. Mafia clans emerged and operated as individual criminal conspiracies, and although there was much familial relationships between gangs nothing seemingly confirms there was a structured panel of managers until the Commission was formed following the end of the Castellammarese War** in New York in 1931.</p>
<p>We are pretty certain however that Vito is the boss because of the disclosures of Nicola Gentile. A Sicilian-born gangster, he had moved to America in 1903 and became a kind of Mafia Forrest Gump-everything, everywhere, always at once. In his memoir, published as a book in 1963, he refers to Di Giorgio as the <em>capo</em> of Los Angeles, a Sicilian name for boss.</p>
<p>In the spring of 1922, Vito is visiting Buffalo, New York, for a reason, either mob business or something else. On the way back to California he and an associate, Vincenzo Cammarata, stop off in Chicago, and are shot-gunned to death in a barber shop on Larrabee Street in the Little Italy section of the city. What happens next in Los Angeles is open to debate. Some claim, Di Simone takes over, others that Ardizzone slides back into position number one. He is also a suspect in the murder of Di Giorgio.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}12188263465,RESIZE_710x{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="12188263465?profile=RESIZE_710x" width="621" /></a><em><strong>Photo: Rosario Di Simone</strong></em></p>
<p>For a man with the reputation of killing at least thirty victims, eliminating the man who stole your job, seems child’s play. Joseph is almost certainly number one by 1925, when Di Simone steps down and retires to live out his life as a normal citizen. Although he died in 1947, he wasn't finished with the mob. His second son, Frank, became the family boss in 1956 and ran it for eleven years. There is another interpretation on the Mafia leadership transformation that claims Di Simone stayed boss until his death, with his number two Jack Dragna then taking over</p>
<p>And then, just to confuse the picture even more, there is Marco Albori. A man with so many aliases he must have struggled at times to remember just who he really was, the law knew him, in LA at least, mainly as Albert Marco. </p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}12188262256,RESIZE_710x{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="12188262256?profile=RESIZE_710x" width="710" /></a><em><strong>Photo: Marco Albori</strong></em></p>
<p>Born in Trieste, now Italy, but then part of the Austrian Kingdom, in April 1887, he claimed he arrived in New York in 1906. Moving first to San Francisco, he arrived in Los Angels in March, 1914 and slowly built up his own criminal enterprises revolving around brothels and boot-legging.</p>
<p>Working in conjunction with Charles H. Crawford, an influential political deal-maker, Mayor Cryer who ran perhaps the most corrupt city hall ever, from 1921 until 1928 and a police force almost bent out of shape most of the time, he seemingly had something going as the media referred to him as “the asserted king of Los Angeles so-called underworld.”</p>
<p>An interesting turn of phrase indicating the media’s perception of a scrambled and confusing criminal society operating across the city. The word racket dates back to 1765 although the term racketeer did not enter the popular lexicon until 1928 just as Dominic Di Ciolla was building up steam in his own criminal chicanery.</p>
<p>In June of 1928, Albori/Marco gets into a fight with two men in a bar in the seaside town of Venice shooting them and ends up sentenced to fourteen years in prison. Following his release in 1933, he is deported and his citizenship revoked in 1938, making him well and truly out of the running.</p>
<p>Before 1920, the mob in Los Angeles was perhaps, not so much an organization than groups of local criminals. A loose confederation. It’s possible The Volstead Act* was the glue that joined them together. Their biggest competitor it seems was the “Spring Street Clique”- opportunist grifters, scammers and dishonest businessmen- using City Hall to profit from the same kinds of business the underworld profited from. Sometimes in competition, other times cheek by jowl.</p>
<p>The police vice squad was on the take and mayors like the afore mentioned George E. Cryer often turned a blind eye to the nefarious activities going on around his office. The city was essentially controlled by an unseen, underworld kind of government. Tony Cornero, a well-known gangster and rum-runner allegedly once complained about not getting the police protection he had paid for.</p>
<p>The Hollywood movie business was almost half-way through its second decade when Di Ciolla arrived in Los Angeles. He found himself in the middle of a landscape that could easily have been scripted by one of the movers and shakers of the film industry.</p>
<p>Italians would congregate around a place in down-town that became known as Little Italy, centered on Ord and Broadway, and spreading north into Sonoratown, Dogtown, Lincoln Heights and other areas. Thousands crammed into a few square miles, corralled by poverty, stranded by language and culture, ignored by and mistrustful of the police, they were simply prey to hunters like Di Ciolla.</p>
<p>By the time he arrives, the hierarchy of the Mafia clan seems sorted and Ardizzone has become a successful business man with a ranch near Sunland in the Crescenta Valley, about twenty miles north of down town. He gets the nickname, “Iron Man” for the way he pulls together the various Sicilian gangs into some kind of structure. A respectable restaurateur and businessman he runs his bootleg empire from his ranch in the foothills off Mount Gleason Avenue, now the site of the local middle school. How he and the new guy in town from Chicago interacted has never been fully explained. </p>
<p>Domenic Di Ciolla was probably never a Mafioso. There is no evidence he was made into the Los Angeles Family, which would have to be approved by Ardizzone, as the boss, and the Chicago mob was not connected at the time he left Chicago. Al Capone, again according to Gentile, was “brought into” the Mafia Family ran by Giuseppe Masseria, which was based in New York. This was in 1930, four years after Di Ciolla left Chicago. It was part of a campaign in Masseria’s war against his enemies during The Castellammarese War.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/kill-the-chinaman-1" target="_blank"><strong>Kill The Chinaman.</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Di Ciolla works to establish control over the illegal booze trade in the city’s North End, which is now Chinatown but then was the Italian enclave of the city. He gets arrested numerous times for this activity, the very first the year that he arrives in California. He’s also a suspect in at least two murders.</p>
<p>August Palumbo, age twenty-eight, is found in his quaintly named Willys Knight sedan outside 2912 Hillcrest Drive in West Adams on July 18, 1928. It’s a few hundred yard north of the Di Ciolla family house. Blasted in the head by a shotgun. It was posited that another car had forced him to pull up then bam! The police and the prohibition enforcement and vice detail round up twelve suspects in their hunt for the killer, including Dominic Di Ciolla. Authorities claim a gang war was under way and had been for weeks. At least seven dead, including Palumbo.</p>
<p>Although bound over for trial on August 10, a superior court judge, for some reason, signed an order releasing the suspects.</p>
<p>Palumbo may have been an associate of Albert Marco, and this may have been why he died. Working out reasons and consequences in these mob killings requires a doctorate in confusion-solving.</p>
<p>As part of this problem solving, police and sheriff’s department officers had been tailing a car for some weeks prior to the murder. Nothing like it seems to have been registered by local law enforcement. It had bullet proof glass and parts of the bodywork were armor plated. The vehicle was seen frequently in front of the home of a man called Mike Pupillo and a cafe on Western Avenue owned by him and another man called Vito Ardito. It’s been alleged they were imports from Chicago, brought in to boost Di Ciolla’s group.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}12188262472,RESIZE_584x{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="12188262472?profile=RESIZE_584x" width="556" /></a><em><strong>Photo: Mike Pupillo</strong></em></p>
<p>Four months after the Palumbo killing, a mysterious explosion demolishes a house on the corner of Tellfaire and Filmore Streets in Pacoima, in the San Fernando Valley. Three men were rushed to the hospital-Di Ciolla, and Leo Gargano, along with Rocco Gravino-who will die from his injuries. All three were suspects in the Palumbo hit. It’s been claimed the attack on the property, owned by Antonio Martino, was an extortion plot that went wrong. </p>
<p>Initial reports indicated that the two survivors were to be charged with murder for Gravino’s death, although this went nowhere.</p>
<p>In April 1929, Di Ciolla along with Mike Pupillo and Vito Ardito went to trial for the murder of Palumbo, and were found not guilty on May 15. As he left the courthouse, Di Ciolla had less than two years to live.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}12188262700,RESIZE_584x{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="12188262700?profile=RESIZE_584x" width="538" /></a><em><strong>Photo: Vito Ardito</strong></em></p>
<p>Whatever he was doing that final evening of his life, death would have the final word.</p>
<p>On a lonely and desolate country road, to the north-east of Van Nuys, he pulls over the car he is driving, and parks facing north. It is late evening early morning March 18 through 19, 1931. Leaving the headlights at full beam, he leaves the vehicle and walks forward to meet someone or some ones. His footprints are still visible in the dust the following morning. Whoever was there waiting, may have been drinking. The only thing found at the murder scene, apart from a not so good looking corpse, is a partly filled bottle of whiskey.</p>
<p>His body is found on Arleta Street, about five miles from the town, a few hundred feet north of the Van Nuys Boulevard according to a newspaper report. He had been blasted in the head by a shotgun leaving the body badly disfigured.</p>
<p>There is an Arleta Avenue, which does bisect the boulevard, but no street by this name listed on city maps. Maybe the reporter in the LA Times got his facts mixed up or the printer screwed up the plate. It wouldn’t be the first time that the news would be less than perfectly reported in a newspaper. Italian names are often misspelt, facts confused with theory or even fiction. Bias is founded on newspaper ownership. There’s a lot going on keeping the public informed, and not all of it helpful when its analyzed years after the event.</p>
<p>Within days, police arrest five men at an address-13252 Vaughn Street- in Pacoima, about three miles to the north and east of the murder scene. The detective leading the enquiry is certain at least one of these men is the killer, although in typical mob-murder fashion, the investigation goes nowhere. No forensics, no eye witnesses, not CCTV cameras on every street corner in those days. And not a snitch in sight to help the cops.</p>
<p>The suspects were released due to the efforts of their young attorney, one Sam Rummel, who ironically, is himself shot-gunned to death outside his home in December, 1950. He had become famous over the years as a mob lawyer for those in need in Los Angeles. LA’s version of Roy Cohen, one of New York’s most infamous attorneys.</p>
<p>On March 21st, two days later, another body is found. This one in a ditch. In Downey, thirty miles to the south and east of the scene of Di Ciolla’s murder. We don’t know if this was linked into the killing of Dominic. It’s possible.</p>
<p>That evening, Ardizzone and a man called Jimmy Basile had visited the home of De Simone for dinner. Later, driving home, their car is overtaken and multiple shots are fired at the vehicle from three men wielding sawn-off shotguns. Ardizzone is seriously wounded but survives, Jimmy not so much. He’s the one in the ditch.</p>
<p>What was happening here is another Fabergé Egg kind of thing. Opening one simply reveals another, identical. Some sources claim the real target of this attack is Ardizzone and Jimmy is collateral damage. That the killers were part of his own crime family after the boss for reasons unknown. Others, that the shooters were part of DiCiolla’s group, which also ironically seems to have included Basile, out for revenge, and that poor Jimmy was not meant to get hit. It’s even been suggested Joe himself shoots Jimmy, and then, just like that, a group of killers arrive after him.</p>
<p>The law it seems believed Ardizzone had a dispute with Basile and his partner in the bootleg business, Di Ciolla. These two had invested $1,000 in a "still" to start making alcohol. Ardizzone tried to move in but was rejected. It was alleged he told Di Ciolla that he had killed 30 men and he would make Di Ciolla the thirty-first-if the partners didn't "cut him in." This information presumably came from an informant and was covered in a special investigation on organized crime at state government level.***</p>
<p>Investigators believed the boss was the killer of Basile, taking him for a ride, which of course he was, after dining with him and others that night.</p>
<p>Whatever and whoever, it seems that seven months later all things would pass.</p>
<p>Early in the morning of October 15, Joe Ardizzone left his home in a dark blue 1930 Ford coupe. Formally dressed for the journey in a suit, shirt, tie and fedora, he’s also carrying a .41 caliber revolver. His wife, Elsie, the former Miss Ellenberger, remembered waving him off, and watching as he stopped the car and picked up a man standing on a street corner. Then he was gone, for good.</p>
<p>His journey was to the ranch of a cousin, another Cuccia, this one Joe, in Etiwanda, about fifty miles east. He was going to pick up yet another cousin, Frank Borgia, who had recently arrived from Italy. The police searched the route for a week, but found nothing.</p>
<p>It was speculated he had been murdered and his body buried somewhere in the endless deserts in this northern area of the Los Angeles basin. He was a big man for a Sicilian, five ten, over two hundred pounds and armed. It’s easy to assume he did not go quietly into whatever night awaited him. </p>
<p>His brother Frank, who lived in Lincoln Heights, told the police officer who interviewed him, “Don’t bother looking for enemies. It will be one of his friends that did it.”</p>
<p>In a barbarous cruelty to verbs, they were “exiting” him.</p>
<p>Police have suspects, and arrest Antonio Bartolotta aka Tony Bruno, Antonio Trapani and a man called Mazzola, on December 3, and as usual, nothing develops. The suspects are just that, nothing more. Its was also suggested that one of his killers was his cousin Frank Borgia, who was himself, three years later already in prison for conspiracy to violate the internal revenue laws.</p>
<p>Seven years later Ardizzone’s wife declared him legally dead.</p>
<p>Whether she knew about her husband’s criminal activities will never be known. Secrets and lies bind families together like the chains in the building block of DNA. She will live another fifty-six years until her death at the age of eighty-nine.</p>
<p>They had married when she was just sixteen, on Boxing Day in 1914, and he was almost twice her age. They have a son and a daughter. A seemingly perfect family within a Venn overlap of another kind of family linking so much violence it can be hard to comprehend.</p>
<p>Someone once said the bad moments in life will pass. Even the good moments will pass. This is our existence. Ardizzone and the men who travelled his highways probably thought of themselves as deal makers and businessmen. Violence, intimidation and murder was simply part of doing business. They lived in a parallel universe to the rest of society, governed by their own rules and regulations.</p>
<p>Another wife, Elizabeth Pinto Di Ciolla and her children would also live long and hopefully fruitful lives, unlike the husband and father, who found out how short and deadly it is for those who go by night.</p>
<p><em>* The Volstead Act, officially known as The National Prohibition Act, was an act of the 66th United States Congress designed to execute the 18th Amendment (ratified January 1919) which established the prohibition of alcoholic drinks. Passed in October 1919, it came into effect January 16, 1920.</em></p>
<p><em>** The Castellammarese War was a period of intense conflict between various Mafia-type gang factions in the greater New York area in 1930 through 1931.</em></p>
<p><em>*** State of California Special Crime Study Commission on Organized Crime, Sacramento. January, 1953.</em></p>
<p><span style="text-decoration:underline;"><strong><em>Acknowledgement:</em></strong></span></p>
<p><em>My thanks to crime historians, Tom Hunt, Richard Warner, Justin Cascio and J. Michael Niotta for their extensive research and biographies on LA’s underworld, The Los Angeles Times, Foothill Reader, and all the websites that dipped in their ten cents worth.</em></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/thom-l-jones-mob-corner">Thom L. Jones' Mob Corner</a> or the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/organized-crime-in">Organized Crime in North America section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Thom L. Jones & Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
Wanted: “Chesapeake Bandits” sought by FBI for series of robberies targeting armored vehicle employees
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/wanted-chesapeake-bandits-sought-by-fbi-for-series-of-robberies-t
2023-03-03T07:23:01.000Z
2023-03-03T07:23:01.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/10979148868?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>The FBI, the United States Attorney’s Office, the LAPD, the Hawthorne Police Department, and the Inglewood Police Department joined on Tuesday to announce an investigation and reward offer related to a series of armed robberies over the past year in Los Angeles County targeting armored vehicles committed by a group of suspects nicknamed the “Chesapeake Bandits.”</p>
<p>The group has been nicknamed the Chesapeake Bandits since investigators believe the group is meeting and staging the robberies at a residence on Chesapeake Avenue in the West Adams neighborhood of Los Angeles.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>WATCH: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/video/us-marine-became-successful-bank-robber-shares-experiences" target="_blank"><strong>US Marine became successful bank robber, shares experiences</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Collectively, the group has been linked to robberies with losses in the hundreds of thousands. Investigators believe the group will continue to commit robberies until all suspects are identified and arrested. Investigators believe the armored vehicle drivers were surveilled in advance of the robberies.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>The Chesapeake Bandits</strong></span></p>
<p>Two individuals, Deneyvous Hobson, 36, of Los Angeles, and James Russell Davis, 34, of Los Angeles, were charged federally in a criminal complaint filed on February 17, 2023, in the United States District Court in Los Angeles with Conspiracy to Interfere with Commerce by Robbery. Hobson was arrested on Tuesday, February 21, 2023, and was detained at his initial appearance in federal court. He is being held in federal custody in Los Angeles as he awaits prosecution and is scheduled to be arraigned on March 16.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}10979148275,RESIZE_400x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="330" alt="10979148275?profile=RESIZE_400x" /></a>Davis (right) is being sought and is considered a fugitive. An arrest warrant has been issued for Davis, a description of Davis can be found here: <a href="https://www.fbi.gov/wanted/additional/james-russell-davis" target="_blank">Wanted: James Russell Davis</a></p>
<p>At least five other individuals are believed to be part of the Chesapeake Bandits and are currently unknown subjects. Surveillance photos of the unknown subjects can be found here: <a href="https://www.fbi.gov/wanted/seeking-info/armored-car-robberies" target="_blank">Wanted: Unknown Subjects</a></p>
<p>Anyone who may recognize suspect clothing or may have heard someone discussing their involvement is urged to call the FBI with a tip. A reward of up to $25,000 is being offered by the FBI in exchange for information leading to an arrest in this case.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/the-blood-life-how-robbery-led-to-double-homicide-earning-two-uni" target="_blank"><strong>The Blood Life: How robbery led to double homicide earning two United Blood Nation leaders life in prison</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Anyone with information may remain anonymous, and confidentiality is guaranteed, the FBI added.</p>
<p>This group has targeted drive-thru ATMs and other businesses, including check-cashing locations. The suspects operate by overtaking the armored car driver when they service drive-thru ATMs or exit businesses. During the robberies, the victim drivers are zip-tied and held at gunpoint. They then enter the armed vehicle and steal the money.</p>
<p>On one occasion, a shot was fired, but no one was harmed to date. Investigators believe that if the Chesapeake Bandits are not caught and become more brazen, someone will be harmed or killed.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Tipsters </strong></span></p>
<p>Anyone with information about Hobson, Davis, or the unknown subjects alleged to be part of the Chesapeake Bandits, is urged to contact the FBI's toll-free tipline at 1-800-CALL-FBI (1-800-225-5324).</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/film-producer-runs-out-of-money-so-goes-back-to-old-job-robbing-b" target="_blank"><strong>Film producer runs out of money so goes back to old job: robbing banks</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Anyone who would like to provide a tip online can do so at Tips.FBI.gov.</p>
<p>Brinks, one of the victim companies, has offered to match the FBI’s reward offer of up to $25,000 in exchange for information leading to the arrest and indictment of a person or persons involved in the robberies of Brinks Armored Vehicles in the Los Angeles, California region. The reward will be paid to Crimestoppers or a related organization if it results in the case closure.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/ralph-demasi-ex-mobster-and-pal-of-whitey-bulger-found-not-guilty" target="_blank"><strong>Ralph DeMasi, ex-mobster and pal of Whitey Bulger, found not guilty of 1991 murder of armored truck guard</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Additional details about each robbery and the vehicles fugitive Davis may be driving are listed below.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Details of the robberies</strong></span></p>
<p>Investigators believe that Davis may be driving one of the vehicles registered to him, as follows:</p>
<ul>
<li> 2008 White Chevy Tahoe 4-door SUV: CA 7ABW490</li>
<li> 2015 White Lexus GS 350 4d Sedan: CA 9BNL712</li>
<li> 2020 Black Chevy Blazer 4d SUV: CA 8ULA955</li>
</ul>
<p>Vehicles described as getaway vehicles used during the commission of the robberies are described in detail below.</p>
<ul>
<li> On 2/14/22, at 8:48 a.m., multiple suspects robbed a Sectran Security armored car driver at the Wescom Credit Union on 2871 W. 120th Street in Hawthorne. Seen was what was described as an AR-15 with optic and a black semi-automatic handgun, as well as a late model white Honda Accord sedan as the getaway vehicle.</li>
<li> On 6/9/2022, at 7:50 a.m., multiple suspects robbed a Loomis armored car driver at the Bank of America at 11525 Crenshaw Boulevard in Inglewood. Seen was what was described as a dark short-barreled assault rifle, as well as a late model silver or gray Chevrolet Equinox SUV as the getaway vehicle.</li>
<li> On 9/15/2022, at 12:20 p.m., multiple suspects robbed a Brinks armored car driver at the PLS Check Cashers at 2601 S. La Brea Avenue in Los Angeles. Seen was what was described as a black assault-style rifle with an optic, as well as a late model gray Ford Explorer SUV as the getaway vehicle.</li>
<li> On 1/9/2023, at 7:15 a.m., multiple suspects robbed a Brinks armored car driver at a 99 Cents Only Stores location at 3060 S. Crenshaw Boulevard in Los Angeles. Seen was what was described as an AR-style rifle, as well as a late model black Kia K5 as the getaway vehicle.</li>
<li> On 2/25/2023, at 9:56 a.m., multiple suspects robbed a Brinks armored car driver at a PLS Check Cashers at 2601 S. La Brea Avenue in Los Angeles. Seen was what was described as a rifle with a green laser, as well as a late model tan/light colored SUV; possibly a white Toyota RAV4 SUV as the getaway vehicle.</li>
</ul>
<p>...</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/organized-crime-in">Organized Crime in North America section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
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</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
South Los Angeles Bounty Hunter Bloods gang boss admits running crack cocaine ring in Watts
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/south-los-angeles-bounty-hunter-bloods-gang-boss-admits-running-c
2023-02-27T15:31:18.000Z
2023-02-27T15:31:18.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/10973795079?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>A leader of the Bounty Hunter Bloods (BHB) gang pleaded guilty on February 17 to federal drug and firearms charges for running a manufacturing and distribution of crack cocaine conspiracy in and around the Nickerson Gardens public housing projects (photo above) in the Watts neighborhood of Los Angeles.</p>
<p>45-year-old Damion “Fatts” Baker, of Compton, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to manufacture, distribute, and possess with intent to distribute cocaine, and one count of being a felon in possession of a firearm. He is the lead defendant in an April 2021 indictment targeting members and associates of the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/street-gangs" target="_blank">BHB street gang</a> for drug- and firearm-related crimes.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:12pt;"><strong>Cooking crack</strong></span></p>
<p>Baker organized and led a drug trafficking conspiracy in which he and his accomplices agreed to distribute cocaine. Specifically, he arranged to obtain powder cocaine from at least two drug suppliers. He then directed his underlings to cook, and would himself cook, the powder cocaine and manufacture it into crack cocaine to sell to customers, including back to his powder cocaine suppliers to sell in crack form.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/sex-money-murder-the-violent-rise-and-fall-of-deadly-bronx-gang-i" target="_blank"><strong>Sex Money Murder: The violent rise and fall of Bronx gang ingrained in New York underworld’s history</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Baker directed his accomplices in the packaging, sale, and delivery of crack cocaine to customers, which included co-conspirators and other BHB gang members. Baker also directed the receipt and storage of drug proceeds throughout BHB-claimed territory in South Los Angeles.</p>
<p>As part of these activities, Baker arranged for an accomplice’s residence in the Nickerson Gardens housing projects in Watts to be used as a stash house in which Baker and his associates continuously sold crack cocaine over a period of many months. Baker recruited and hired individuals to work at the Watts stash house and directed them in selling narcotics to customers there and in nearby areas, restocking the stash house’s drug supply, and transporting drug proceeds to Baker and other accomplices at various locations.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/drug-kingpin-freeway-rick-ross-moving-tons-of-cocaine-with-a-nod" target="_blank"><strong>Drug kingpin “Freeway” Rick Ross: Moving tons of cocaine with a nod of approval from the Reagan White House</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Baker admitted in his plea agreement to possessing a firearm in May 2020. He was not permitted to do so because he previously had been convicted of felonies in Los Angeles Superior Court, including a cocaine possession charge in 1998 and a domestic violence-related charge in 2001. He admitted in his plea agreement that he possessed the firearm for the purpose of protecting his crack cocaine distribution business.</p>
<p>He also agreed to forfeit the firearm and $44,600 in cash law enforcement seized at his residence in Compton and at another residence in San Pedro.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:12pt;"><strong>Sentencing</strong></span></p>
<p>United States District Judge Fernando L. Aenlle-Rocha scheduled a July 14 sentencing hearing, at which time Baker will face a mandatory minimum sentence of five years in federal prison and a statutory maximum of 40 years in federal prison for the drug trafficking conspiracy charge, and up 10 years in federal prison for the firearms offense.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gang-rules-growing-up-inside-the-la-gang-life" target="_blank"><strong>Gang Rules: Growing up inside the LA gang life</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>The other 11 defendants in this indictment either have pleaded guilty or signed plea agreements in this case and await sentencing. Another BHB gang member, and Baker’s second in command in the drug trafficking conspiracy, Tony Carr, 52, a.k.a. “T-Bone,” of Watts, pleaded guilty in July 2022 to one count of cocaine trafficking conspiracy and one count of being a felon in possession of a firearm. Judge Aenlle-Rocha sentenced Carr to 188 months in federal prison.</p>
<p>In April 2021, law enforcement conducted a takedown in which 22 BHB members and associates were charged in a total of nine federal grand jury indictments. Of those 22 defendants, prosecutors have secured 19 convictions.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/street-gangs">Street Gangs section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
“The system of America is scared when they see us unite” – Profile of devil-worshipping East Coast Crips boss Paul Wallace
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/the-system-of-america-is-scared-when-they-see-us-unite-profile-of
2022-04-22T10:11:48.000Z
2022-04-22T10:11:48.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/10414196455?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By David Amoruso for <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a></p>
<p>The gang life is for the young and up-and-coming. You make a name for yourself in this ultra-violent environment and usually end up in a coffin at an early age. But not Paul Gary Wallace. At 56, he has seen it all and then some as he leads the South Los Angeles-based East Coast Crips with an iron hand in a velvet glove.</p>
<p>Beware of an old man in a profession where most men die young. Especially in the volatile world inhabited by hungry teenage gang bangers of all creeds and colors, surrounded by beautiful women, junkies, and the boys in blue, creating a place where death is around every corner.</p>
<p>Yet, somehow, Wallace managed to not just survive over 30 years of being a member of the East Coast Crips, but rise to become its leader. According to prosecutors, he was the most influential member of the gang’s “6-Pacc” set, a series of cliques of the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/street-gangs" target="_blank">gang</a> responsible for control over territory in South Los Angeles.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>INTERVIEW: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gang-rules-growing-up-inside-the-la-gang-life" target="_blank"><strong>Gang Rules: Growing up inside the LA gang life</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Wallace, who went by the nickname “Little Doc”, maintained his control over the gang through violence and intimidation, authorities alleged. He murdered and conspired to commit murder to enhance the gang’s violent reputation and subsequently his own status within the underworld.</p>
<p>Having a fearsome reputation is good as gold on the streets. It helped with doing business. Wallace and his gang extorted local businesses operating in their territory, presided over robberies, and trafficked drugs. </p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Devil worshipping</strong></span></p>
<p>But one can always add some flavor to such a reputation. In Wallace’s case that meant worshipping the devil. He got the idea when he met a white dude in county court, he told the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7aRu4UD2ZE" target="_blank">CaliBanging podcast</a>. “I was in a wheelchair, shot up. Soon as I could walk, got out of the wheelchair. Two years later I get shot 7 more times. So I was just bitter towards God, you know. […] So I wrote these people in Texas, the Devil’s Church, and they sent me a devil’s bible.”</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: “Corey Hamlet is as smart as any CEO we’ve prosecuted” – </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/corey-hamlet-is-as-smart-as-any-ceo-we-ve-prosecuted-profile-of-g" target="_blank"><strong>Profile of Grape Street Crips leader Corey Hamlet</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>He began reading it and immersed himself in all the rituals. He even shot a dog and cut off its paws and placed them inside a circle of candles. His outlandish behavior had his underlings laughing, he says. But it also put some of them on edge: “I ain’t fucking with cuz, he’s a devil worshipper and shit.”</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7aRu4UD2ZE" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}10414351292,RESIZE_584x{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="10414351292?profile=RESIZE_584x" width="418" /></a><em><strong>Photo: "Lil Doc" Wallace during his younger days (via <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7aRu4UD2ZE" target="_blank">CaliBanging</a>)</strong></em></p>
<p>While doing time in prison in the late 1980s, he continued his devil worshipping. His cell wall was covered with “666” and all sorts of names for Satan. He even met a fellow worshipper, Cleamon “Big Evil” Johnson, of the Swan Family Bloods, someone who would have been his enemy on the outside. But inside, they were best buddies, bonding over their shared love for Satan. They lifted weights together and posed for pictures holding blue and red bandanas.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Peace negotiator</strong></span></p>
<p>Despite his violent profession, Wallace tried to use his position to make things better in his neighborhood, StreetTV reported in September of 2019. During that time, Wallace took part in peace negotiations between gangs of the Crips and Bloods. These evolved and grew and eventually resulted in peace talks between Wallace’s East Coast Crips and the Florencia 13 gang.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/fitness-behind-bars-gangsters-tell-how-they-train-their-bodies-an" target="_blank"><strong>Fitness Behind Bars: Gangsters tell how they train their bodies and minds in prison</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>“It felt good, man,” Wallace told <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xix9Wc9JS-Y" target="_blank">StreetTV</a>. “Just to be amongst your people, sitting with them, knowing they was your rivals, and every time the meeting end, we eating with each other, exchange phone numbers with each other. Then we call each other and talk on phones with each other. The next day we meet again and have breakfast together, lunch and dinner with each other. We letting our kids know each other. It’s beautiful, brother, just being amongst your people and not having to watch your back. That’s what every brother needs to understand: We need to come together. Cause we can be so much stronger together than we are trying to be rivals.”</p>
<p>The truce with Florencia 13 was something Wallace was very proud of. “We came together with [Florencia 13],” he told <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xix9Wc9JS-Y" target="_blank">StreetTV</a>. “That’s something that makes history. They propositioned us with it and I respected that, man.”</p>
<p>Skipp Townsend, of 2<sup>nd</sup> Call, who took part in the peace negotiations, said: “Never seen this. Never seen the Eses say: Let’s squash this.”</p>
<p>It’s an example of the influence Wallace has and how much respect he gets from other gangs. He feels gangs play an integral role in society: “The structure is very important for the black race in these black tribes, these gangs. Cause without we continue to be discombobulated. A lot of people are trying to keep the gangs going, keep the killings going, keep the drama going, all the hatred going, all the disrespect stuff that’s going on and making it harder by not having a structure and accept that structure.”</p>
<p>Structured gangs can be controlled and led. Violence and killings can be stopped. Once control is lost, violence increases. Similar to how the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/organized-crime-in" target="_blank">American Mafia</a> tried to control portions of organized crime to make sure business ran smooth.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>FBI and LAPD bring the heat</strong></span></p>
<p>Despite the peace talks, the LAPD and FBI had a different picture of Wallace. They had their eyes on him for big time racketeering crimes and two murders and were hot on his trail. Wallace was arrested on July 22, 2020.</p>
<p>According to the prosecutors, Wallace was far from the peaceful figure he claimed to be. If anyone stepped across a line, they were dealt with in violent fashion. Assaults and shootings were part of doing business. Wallace had no problem with getting his own hands dirty either, they claimed.</p>
<p>On November 13, 2014, he ordered the murder of a rival gang member, drove his men to the victim’s house, and personally handed one of his men a firearm, which was then used to murder the rival gangster.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xix9Wc9JS-Y" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}10414598098,RESIZE_584x{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="10414598098?profile=RESIZE_584x" width="566" /></a>Most men who find themselves in such a position of power tend to opt to let their underlings handle such violent activities. For sensible reasons. Wallace would find that out when the murder weapon, an AK-47-style assault rifle, was later found in his van.</p>
<p>On Monday, April 18, 2022, after an 11-day trial, a federal jury found Wallace guilty of federal criminal charges for conspiring to commit racketeering through various criminal acts including murder, extorting local businesses and the distribution of narcotics.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>INTERVIEW: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/california-crip-went-from-selling-drugs-to-funding-his-own-career" target="_blank"><strong>California Crip went from selling drugs to funding his own career as an author</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>The jury acquitted Wallace of a February 2003 murder of another rival.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>“The system of America is scared when they see us unite”</strong></span></p>
<p>When Wallace is sentenced, on July 29, he will face life in prison. A place he is all too familiar with. Locked up behind bars, he will face difficulties reaching out to youngsters on the streets, who might be getting involved in gang wars over bullshit. Just when he was reaching a point where he could make a serious change for good in his neighborhood and city.</p>
<p>“The biggest challenges are getting my people to understand how important it is for us to drop the guns and stop killing each other,” he told <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xix9Wc9JS-Y" target="_blank">StreetTV</a>. “For us to still be dangerous, you know, but not towards one another. Because the system in America is designed for us to continue to kill one another. And they know if we stop killing one another. Then they scared of us. The system of America is scared when they see us unite, that’s fear, we put fear in them. Cause only one thing is gonna come to their mind and that’s for the black race to get their ass back for enslaving us and then for all the shit they done to us. They think that’s what we gonna do if we get united. They think we gonna look upon them […] and say let’s get the white folks for all the shit they did to us. That’s what they fear.”</p>
<p>“But that ain’t what we up to. We trying to come together as a black race. That’s what I’m pushing today. I wanna see my race come together and love one another. Help one another. And be united. Not trying to kill one another. Despising one another. That’s my whole thing. To see my race like that.” </p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/street-gangs" target="_blank">Street Gangs section</a> or the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/black-organized-crime">Black Organized Crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
Florencia 13 gangsters who robbed and fatally shot LAPD officer charged with federal racketeering offense
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/florencia-13-gangsters-who-robbed-and-fatally-shot-lapd-officer-c
2022-01-16T09:39:12.000Z
2022-01-16T09:39:12.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/10015702295?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>Three members and an associate of Florencia 13 (F13), a Los Angeles street gang, were charged Thursday with violating a federal racketeering statute for their roles in the robbery and fatal shooting earlier this week of Los Angeles Police Officer Fernando Arroyos (photo above).</p>
<p>Prosecutors allege that two of them confronted Arroyos and his girlfriend on the night of January 10, stole items from them, and then shot Arroyos, who died soon after suffering a single gunshot wound.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Exchanging gunfire</strong></span></p>
<p>Arroyos and his girlfriend were looking at a home potentially to purchase on East 87th Street in Los Angeles when a black pickup truck arrived. Rios and Cisneros confronted the victims, pointing guns and removing property from both, including chains from Arroyos’ neck.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/all-in-the-game-two-men-who-went-from-fighting-organized-crime-an" target="_blank"><strong>All In The Game: Two men who went from fighting gangsters to refereeing star athletes</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>“At some point after Cisneros removed victim Arroyos’s chains, Arroyos and the two suspects exchanged gunfire,” the affidavit states. “Arroyos ran toward an alley where he collapsed and the two suspects fled.”</p>
<p>Investigators have obtained surveillance video showing the black pickup arriving at a residence near the shooting, where Contreras is seen exiting the vehicle and helping an apparently injured Cisneros out of the truck, the affidavit states. All four defendants were in the vehicle and allegedly were at the scene of the robbery and shooting.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gang-rules-growing-up-inside-the-la-gang-life" target="_blank"><strong>Gang Rules: Growing up inside the LA gang life</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Florencia 13 is a large, multi-generational street gang that previously has been the subject of federal prosecutions, including two large racketeering cases.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Defendants and outlook</strong></span></p>
<p>The defendants in this case were taken into custody on Wednesday by investigators with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. Those defendants are expected to be transferred to federal custody Friday morning and to make their initial court appearances Friday afternoon in United States District Court.</p>
<p>The defendants charged are:</p>
<ul>
<li>Luis Alfredo De La Rosa Rios, 29, an F13 member also known as “Lil J”;</li>
<li>Ernesto Cisneros, 22, an F13 member also known as “Gonzo”;</li>
<li>Jesse Contreras, 34, an F13 member who claimed a moniker of “Skinny Jack,” but who also may be known as “Flaco”; and</li>
<li>Haylee Marie Grisham, 18, who is Rios’ girlfriend.</li>
</ul>
<p>The defendants face a potential death penalty – and minimum sentence of life in federal prison without the possibility of parole – because Officer Arroyos allegedly was murdered during the robbery.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/street-gangs" target="_blank">Street Gangs section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
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</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
Gang Rules: Growing up inside the LA gang life
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gang-rules-growing-up-inside-the-la-gang-life
2021-08-31T09:01:59.000Z
2021-08-31T09:01:59.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/9506452654?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By David Amoruso for <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a></p>
<p>There are over 26 thousand gangs with around 750 thousand members in the United States. From the East to the West, in big cities and the suburbs; gangs have become an integral part of the social fabric of America. What is it like growing up surrounded by gangs? Crips member-turned-successful author Stanley James II shares his experiences with Gangsters Inc.</p>
<p>Stanley James II grew up in a tough neighborhood in North Long Beach on the borderline of Compton in California. Murders, drugs, prostitution, and crime were an everyday thing. He got jumped in – got his ass kicked by fellow <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/street-gangs" target="_blank">gang</a> members during the initiation ceremony – at the age of 16 and joined the Notorious 4 Corner Bloc Crips, which operated on the Northside of the Long Beach County borderline of Compton, surrounded by Southside Crips and Neighborhood Compton Crips.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/california-crip-went-from-selling-drugs-to-funding-his-own-career" target="_blank"><strong>California Crip went from selling drugs to funding his own career as an author</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9506459068,RESIZE_400x{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9506459068?profile=RESIZE_400x" width="250" /></a>“The Notorious 4 Corner Bloc Crips was originally established in the early 1960s as the Squarehood Crips and later changed its name to 4 Corner Bloc Crips in the early 1980's,” James II tells Gangsters Inc. James II can be seen in the photo on the right holding a photograph of Crips founder Raymond Washington. For youngsters growing up in the decades since, these well-established gangs are part of the neighborhood like certain mom and pop stores. Its members and bosses are viewed as part of the community and forces for both good and evil. </p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Gang roles</strong></span></p>
<p>“There are many roles <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/street-gangs" target="_blank">gangs</a> play in a neighborhood,” James II explains. “For one, the original concept and mission of street gangs was to keep outsiders and rival enemies and different races away from committing various crimes in one neighborhood. But there are many other roles members play within their own area, such as the gang banger who is the poster child for one's set. They got members that make money through various ways such as drugs or robberies.”</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: “Corey Hamlet is as smart as any CEO we’ve prosecuted” - </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/corey-hamlet-is-as-smart-as-any-ceo-we-ve-prosecuted-profile-of-g" target="_blank"><strong>Profile: Grape Street Crips leader Corey Hamlet</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Even within gangs there is a distinction between members. James II: “Within every neighborhood you got gang bangers and gang members. There’s a critical distinction between the two. A gang banger is someone who is on the frontline and still active with everything that's involved with their set and gang. A gang member is one who already went through all the trials and tribulations, has been active and is known throughout their area, but now mostly guides and aides the gang bangers.”</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Born into it</strong></span></p>
<p>With such an organized structure ready and waiting, youngsters are easily absorbed by the gangs. “A majority of members is born into their gangs,” James II explains. “Because their parents or cousins are already well known and established in their neighborhoods with some kind of ranking or stripes within the gang.”</p>
<p>Rankings vary from generations and stripes earned. They contain OOOG (Triple Original Gangsta), OOG (Double Original Gangsta), OG (Original Gangsta), BG (Baby Gangsta), TG (Tiny Gangsta).</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9506463061,RESIZE_710x{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9506463061?profile=RESIZE_710x" width="600" /></a><em>Photo: James II (right) posing with OOOG "Pretty Boy" from the 60s.</em></p>
<p>The other side of recruitment is more brutal. Every new recruit has to fight to show his metal. For those that opt not to, pick your poison. “Some females can be “sexed” into a gang by having sex with various members if they don't want to fight.”</p>
<p>Recruitment starts early. Kids grow up surrounded by gangs and learn from an early age who is who and the wealth, power and respect that comes with their position and status. James II: “Most kids that are being recruited are between 12 years and 16 years of age. Schools are the predominant sites for recruitment.”</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>“One way ticket to prison or a plot in the graveyard”</strong></span></p>
<p>“Kids will see the glamorous life of gang banging, the parties, the fast money that's coming in, the women, but rarely or hardly ever see all the pain, destruction, funerals and gang wars that happen on frequent daily basis,” James II sighs.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9506465093,RESIZE_710x{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9506465093?profile=RESIZE_710x" width="700" /></a><em>Photo: Scene from the 1988 movie Colors</em></p>
<p>“Gangs don't offer anything except a one way ticket to prison or a plot in the graveyard, truthfully,” James II says bluntly. “Gangs we're originally designed to offer protection and the love that was missing from family in one's life. But they have transformed into an all-out clout war for attention and popularity. Gangs today don't really hold as much weight and or adhere to the same principles as they once did in the previous decades, which Bloods and Crips originally stood for.”</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/sex-money-murder-the-violent-rise-and-fall-of-deadly-bronx-gang-i" target="_blank">Sex Money Murder</a>: The violent rise and fall of deadly Bronx gang ingrained in New York underworld’s history</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>Teenagers are easily manipulated and even when they are not forced, the choices they make at that age, are not always in their own best interest. When they join a gang, however, they made a decision that is cast in blood and comes with lifelong consequences.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Reality creeps up on ya</strong></span></p>
<p>“To some - and especially to the real gang members – the gang is for life and even after death. There have been times when it is completely acceptable for some individuals to go and walk a straight narrow honest path. But for the majority of members that been through it all, the good and bad, normally, they can't turn their backs on the gangs. Simply because that is all they know. They have given so much of their life to the gang and know nothing else. A gang member can have done so much in their life that even if they wanted to get out and go straight your past will always creep back up on ya and remind you what your reality really is.”</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/street-gangs" target="_blank">Street Gangs section</a> or <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/black-organized-crime" target="_blank">Black organized crime</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
<p> </p></div>