black - Blog 2.0 - Gangsters Inc. - www.gangstersinc.org
2024-03-28T19:32:30Z
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United Blood Nation gangsters plead guilty to RICO conspiracy involving multiple murders
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/united-blood-nation-gangsters-plead-guilty-to-rico-conspiracy-inv
2019-09-08T06:02:45.000Z
2019-09-08T06:02:45.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/united-blood-nation-gangsters-plead-guilty-to-rico-conspiracy-inv" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237130098,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237130098?profile=original" /></a>By Gangsters Inc. Editors</p>
<p>In the underworld, death is always around the corner. Especially if one was to run into two men nicknamed “Savage” and “Murda Mo,” both are North Carolina members of the United Blood Nation (<a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=UBN" target="_blank">UBN</a> or <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Bloods" target="_blank">Bloods</a>) gang who pleaded guilty Friday to Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) conspiracy involving multiple <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Murder" target="_blank">murders</a>.</p>
<p>“Savage” his real name is Tyquan Ramont Powell, a 24-year-old from Charlotte, while “Murda Mo” is really named Lamonte Kentrell Lloyd, a 25-year-old from Scotland Neck. They admitted their membership in the United Blood Nation and involvement in murder and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Robbery" target="_blank">robbery</a> in support of the organization.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Murder and robbery in North Carolina</strong></span></p>
<p>Powell and Lloyd committed two murders and three attempted murders over the course of less than a month. They committed the first murder in Scotland Neck, North Carolina, in January 2016 by shooting into a car with three occupants because they believed that one of the occupants was cooperating with law enforcement and intended to testify in a criminal case against a close associate of the defendants. Bullets struck all three occupants and the intended target of the shooting was killed. They then fled to, among other places, Charlotte, North Carolina, where they sought and received refuge and resources from UBN members and associates while attempting to evade arrest.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/united-blood-nation-godfather-says-he-is-part-of-the-last-ones-th" target="_blank">United Blood Nation Godfather says he is part</a> of “the last ones that God put in power”</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>Their murderous streak continued a month later in Gastonia, North Carolina, in February 2016, where they attempted to rob four victims using handguns. When the victims resisted the robbery attempt, Powell fired his firearm and killed one of the victims. That same month, Powell and Lloyd attempted to rob another victim. Lloyd shot the victim in the back of the head, but the victim was effectively treated for his injuries at the hospital and lived.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Major hit against UBN</strong></span></p>
<p>In May 2017, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/83-bosses-and-members-of-united-blood-nation-indicted" target="_blank">83 members of the United Blood Nation</a> were indicted in the Western District of North Carolina for crimes including RICO conspiracy. 78 defendants have now either pleaded guilty or been convicted at trial due to this investigation, and 68 have been sentenced. A jury convicted three top leaders of the UBN of racketeering conspiracy in May 2018, and one defendant was convicted of racketeering conspiracy and wire fraud conspiracy at trial in July 2019. 74 defendants have pleaded guilty in this investigation, including four who participated in the racketeering conspiracy by, among other crimes, committing a murder in July 2016 in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Power of the United Blood Nation</strong></span></p>
<p>According to court documents and evidence presented at a May 2018 trial against <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/prison-bars-couldn-t-stop-powerful-godfathers-of-united-blood-nat" target="_blank">the godfathers of the United Blood Nation</a>, the UBN is a violent criminal <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Gangs" target="_blank">street gang</a> operating throughout the east coast of the United States since it was founded as a prison gang in 1993. Its members are often identified by their use of the color red and can also often be identified by common tattoos or burn marks. Examples include: a three-circle pattern, usually burned onto the upper arm, known as a “dog paw”; the acronym “M.O.B.,” which stands for “Member of Bloods”; the words “damu,” or “eastside”; the number five; the five-pointed star and the five-pointed crown. UBN members have distinct hand signs and written codes, which are used to identify other members and rival gang members.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-south-side-cartel-karma-catches-up-to-what-was-once-known-as" target="_blank">The South Side Cartel</a>: Newark’s most violent street gang</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>Members of the UBN are expected to conduct themselves and their illegal activity according to rules and regulations set by their leaders. Prominent among these is a requirement to pay monthly dues to the organization, often in the amounts of $31 or $93. UBN gang dues are derived from illegal activity performed by subordinate UBN members including narcotics trafficking, robberies and wire fraud, among other forms of illegal racketeering activity.</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>
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<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
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High-ranking Bloods gangster arrested for organizing murder of Bonanno family mobster - At behest of Albanian Mob?
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/high-ranking-bloods-gangster-arrested-for-organizing-murder-of-bo
2018-10-12T19:16:37.000Z
2018-10-12T19:16:37.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/high-ranking-bloods-gangster-arrested-for-organizing-murder-of-bo" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237105292,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237105292?profile=original" width="550" /></a>By David Amoruso</p>
<p>New York’s melting pot of an underworld has erupted into a violent volcano with the city’s Bonanno crime family and the Bloods street gang involved in a deadly dance that resulted in the murder of Mafia associate Sylvester Zottola at a McDonald’s drive through in The Bronx last week.</p>
<p>Federal prosecutors charged 34-year-old Bushawn Shelton (photo above) yesterday with federal conspiracy to commit murder-for-hire and brandishing a firearm. He allegedly organized the attempted murder of Salvatore Zottola this summer and the killing of Salvatore’s father <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/murder-at-the-drive-thru-bonanno-family-mobster-shot-in-the-head" target="_blank">Sylvester on October 4th</a>.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/murder-at-the-drive-thru-bonanno-family-mobster-shot-in-the-head" target="_blank">Murder at the Drive-Thru</a>:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/murder-at-the-drive-thru-bonanno-family-mobster-shot-in-the-head" target="_blank"><strong>Bonanno mobster shot in head while getting coffee at McDonald's</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Shelton is described as a high-ranking member of the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Bloods" target="_blank">Bloods gang</a>. According to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/11/nyregion/bronx-assassination-mafia-arrest.html" target="_blank">the New York Times</a>, investigators found $45,000 in cash and loaded guns inside his <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Brooklyn" target="_blank">Brooklyn</a> apartment.</p>
<p>Authorities believe he acted as middle-man in a murder-for-hire plot that went on for several months as hitmen hunted father and son Zottola. Investigators caught a break when one of the hitmen flipped and began cooperating with authorities against Shelton.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>WATCH & READ:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/bonanno-family-mobster-shot-in-front-of-his-bronx-mansion-salvato" target="_blank"><strong>Video shows how Bonanno family gangster is shot in front of his Bronx mansion</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>At this point, that is where the buck stops: Bloods gang boss Shelton was hunting two known associates of New York’s infamous <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-bonanno-crime-family" target="_blank">Bonanno Mafia family</a>, wounding one and killing another. Exactly why Shelton had such animosity towards the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Zottola" target="_blank">Zottolas</a> remains unclear. It also remains a mystery whether he had any kind of business relationship with them.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/11/nyregion/bronx-assassination-mafia-arrest.html" target="_blank">New York Times</a> found that sworn testimony indicated that the case originated from the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=FBI" target="_blank">FBI</a>’s <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Balkan" target="_blank">Balkan</a> and Middle Eastern organized crime squad. In combination with the murder-for-hire charge brought against Shelton, this could mean that the individual(s) behind this murder plot fall under that umbrella. In New York, the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Albania" target="_blank">Albanian Mob</a> has a long and notorious presence, making its members prime suspects.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/an-introduction-to-the-new" target="_blank"><strong>An introduction to the New York Albanian Mob</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>With Shelton behind bars facing serious charges chances of uncovering a massive conspiracy involving the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/organized-crime-in" target="_blank">Italian Mafia</a>, the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Bloods" target="_blank">Bloods street gang</a>, and a mysterious third party have increased exponentially.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/the-bonanno-crime-family">Bonanno crime family 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>
<p> </p></div>
Murder at the Drive-Thru: Bonanno family mobster shot in the head while getting coffee at McDonald’s
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/murder-at-the-drive-thru-bonanno-family-mobster-shot-in-the-head
2018-10-05T09:30:00.000Z
2018-10-05T09:30:00.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
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<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/murder-at-the-drive-thru-bonanno-family-mobster-shot-in-the-head" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237105477,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237105477?profile=original" width="600" /></a>By David Amoruso</p>
<p>Sylvester Zottola had problems. The Bonanno family mobster was beefing with someone and that person was intent on murdering him over it. After surviving several attempts on his life, Zottola’s number was finally up on yesterday evening when an assassin shot him dead while he waited for his coffee at a McDonald’s drive-thru in the Bronx.</p>
<p>One medium coffee at a McDonald’s on Webster Avenue in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Bronx" target="_blank">the Bronx</a> was the last order 71-year-old <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Zottola" target="_blank">Sylvester Zottola</a> got to place in his life. He didn’t even get to enjoy it. While he waited in his SUV around 5 p.m., another car pulled up and blocked his escape. A man got out and fired five closely placed shots through the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Bonanno" target="_blank">Bonanno</a> gangster’s car window.</p>
<p>Zottola was hit in the head, chest and shoulder and was pronounced dead on the scene. The <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Hitman" target="_blank">hitman</a> escaped and police have not made any arrest thus far.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237106088,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237106088?profile=original" width="600" /></a><em>Closely placed bullet holes show gunman's precision</em></p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Like Father Like Son</strong></span></p>
<p>In July, Sylvester’s son was the target and victim of a gangland hit when a gunman fired several shots at him from close range in front of his family home. The whole murder attempt was <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/bonanno-family-mobster-shot-in-front-of-his-bronx-mansion-salvato" target="_blank">caught on video</a>. 41-year-old Salvatore Zottola was hit by multiple bullets but miraculously survived the assassination attempt.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>WATCH & READ:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/bonanno-family-mobster-shot-in-front-of-his-bronx-mansion-salvato" target="_blank"><strong>Video shows how Bonanno family gangster is shot in front of his Bronx mansion</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>As is custom for those involved with <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=LCN" target="_blank">La Cosa Nostra</a>, the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/organized-crime-in" target="_blank">American Mafia</a>, Salvatore refused to talk to police after the incident.</p>
<p>The attempt on Salvatore’s life was seen by investigators as a message to Sylvester, who himself survived three attacks in the past year. He was beaten over the head with a club outside his Bronx residence in September of 2017, threatened by a gunman who tried to get in his car a few months later, and stabbed in the neck by a burglar who had invaded his home.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237106289,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237106289?profile=original" width="600" /></a><em>Sylvester Zottola (left) with Bonanno crime family leader Vincent Basciano (right)</em></p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Murder Motive</strong></span></p>
<p>Though it remains unclear why someone wanted Sylvester Zottola dead, it is believed there is a link between these gangland-style attacks and his position as an associate of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-bonanno-crime-family" target="_blank">New York’s Bonanno crime family</a>. He had close ties to <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Basciano" target="_blank">Vincent Basciano</a>, who was the family’s boss in the 2000s and is currently imprisoned for life for murder and racketeering.</p>
<p>Court documents show father and son Zottola supplied and serviced <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Gambling" target="_blank">Joker Poker machines</a> to businesses controlled by the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Mafia" target="_blank">Mafia</a> during the 1990s and 2000s with their company D.A.Z. Amusements. Sylvester Zottola’s nickname was “Sally Daz”.</p>
<p><strong>UPDATE:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/high-ranking-bloods-gangster-arrested-for-organizing-murder-of-bo"><strong>Bloods gangster arrested for organizing murder of Bonanno mobster</strong></a></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/the-bonanno-crime-family">Bonanno crime family section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
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<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
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Prison bars couldn’t stop powerful Godfathers of United Blood Nation as they directed violent gang war
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/prison-bars-couldn-t-stop-powerful-godfathers-of-united-blood-nat
2018-09-06T15:30:00.000Z
2018-09-06T15:30:00.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/prison-bars-couldn-t-stop-powerful-godfathers-of-united-blood-nat" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237102292,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237102292?profile=original" width="575" /></a>By Gangsters Inc. Editors</p>
<p>Two high-ranking leaders of the Nine Trey Gangsters set of the United Blood Nation (UBN), including the Godfather, 45-year-old Pedro “Magoo” Gutierrez (left), who also served as Chairman, and 45-year-old James Baxton (right), also known as “Frank White”, who held the rank of Worldwide High, were each sentenced Tuesday to 20 years in prison for racketeering conspiracy.</p>
<p>According to <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/federal-jury-convicts-two-godfathers-of-united-blood-nation-of-ra" target="_blank">prosecutors</a>, Gutierrez was a Godfather of the Nine Trey Gangsters and had served since 2003 as the Chairman of the council that governs the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=UBN" target="_blank">UBN</a>. Gutierrez, together with James Baxton and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/united-blood-nation-godfather-says-he-is-part-of-the-last-ones-th" target="_blank">Omari Rosero</a>, considered themselves “<a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/united-blood-nation-godfather-says-he-is-part-of-the-last-ones-th" target="_blank">the last ones that God put in power</a>” over the UBN.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/united-blood-nation-godfather-says-he-is-part-of-the-last-ones-th" target="_blank"><strong>Profile of United Blood Nation Godfather Omari Rosero</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>As the Godfather of the set, Gutierrez, along with Baxton, conducted gang business and participated in the distribution of gang dues while incarcerated in the New York State Department of Corrections.</p>
<p>Trial evidence also established that Gutierrez ordered a <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=War" target="_blank">gang war</a> in North Carolina in 2011, directing that members of the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Bloods" target="_blank">Bloods gang</a> attack and kill members of a renegade gang called Pretty Tony. The war resulted in numerous injuries among inmates and the lockdown of five North Carolina prisons for six months.</p>
<p>As a Worldwide High of the Nine Trey Gangsters, Baxton, while incarcerated in the New York State Department of Corrections, trafficked <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Heroin" target="_blank">heroin</a> within the prison system and engaged in wire fraud by threatening the relatives of other incarcerated inmates.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: VIDEO:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/video-bloods-gangster-talks-about-doing-time-with-mafia-boss-john" target="_blank"><strong>Bloods gangster talks about doing time with mob boss John Gotti</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>“With today’s sentencings of two violent gang leaders, including the purported Godfather of the Nine Trey Gangsters, law enforcement has delivered yet another devastating blow to the Nine Trey Gangsters and the United Blood Nation,” said Assistant Attorney General Brian Benczkowski. “The defendants committed crimes that spanned the East Coast, including trafficking deadly narcotics in North Carolina and New York and ordering a gang war in North Carolina. As demonstrated by the 61 defendants now adjudicated guilty in this case, when federal, state, and local law enforcement work together in sustained efforts, we can disrupt and erode violent prison and street gangs.”</p>
<p>In all, 61 defendants have been found guilty in this case.</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>
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<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
<p> </p></div>
VIDEO: Bonanno family mobster shot in front of his Bronx mansion – Salvatore Zottola in critical condition
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/bonanno-family-mobster-shot-in-front-of-his-bronx-mansion-salvato
2018-07-14T07:30:00.000Z
2018-07-14T07:30:00.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
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<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/bonanno-family-mobster-shot-in-front-of-his-bronx-mansion-salvato" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237109082,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237109082?profile=original" width="539" /></a>By David Amoruso</p>
<p>An alleged associate of New York’s <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-bonanno-crime-family" target="_blank">Bonanno crime family</a> was shot by an unknown hitman in front of his mansion in the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Bronx" target="_blank">Bronx</a>. Bullets hit 41-year-old Salvatore Zottola in his torso and left hand. He also suffered graze wounds to his head.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: Murder at the Drive-Thru:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/murder-at-the-drive-thru-bonanno-family-mobster-shot-in-the-head" target="_blank"><strong>Sylvester Zottola shot in the head while getting coffee at McDonald's</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>The hit attempt occurred on Wednesday morning and was caught on camera. The video below shows how Zottola is about to get into his minivan when a dark-colored Nissan Sedan drives by. Inside, a man in the passenger seat fires several shots at the mob associate.</p>
<p>Trying to evade the gunfire, Zottola can be seen rolling away from the gunshots until he is behind his van. The car with his assailants then stops and the gunman - described as a black man wearing a light-colored cap, black hooded sweatshirt and white sneakers - gets out, running to where Zottola is crouched, firing several more shots from close range as Zottola makes another attempt at dodging bullets by rolling away.</p>
<p><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/9ugSjF7geMs?wmode=opaque" width="560" height="315" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""> </iframe></p>
<p>Though it may have seemed futile, Zottola’s desperate maneuvers helped him survive the professional, cold-blooded assassination. He was taken to Jacobi Medical Center where he currently is in critical but stable condition.</p>
<p>Zottola’s family is said to own three luxurious houses in the upper-class Bronx neighborhood, near a yacht club and a marina. The large mansion sports a large Z-logo atop of its façade. A sign with the quote: “Our walls are built thick our love for each is thicker” can be seen as well. Another home has a sign with the saying: “Our foundation is built from love our strength keeps us together.”</p>
<p>Zottola’s 71-year old father, Sylvester, is alleged to have ties to <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-bonanno-crime-family" target="_blank">Bonanno family</a> boss <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Basciano" target="_blank">Vincent Basciano</a>, who is serving a life sentence for racketeering and murder. Sylvester is no stranger to violence either. He reportedly survived a stabbing by burglars last December and was arrested last month for shooting at a man who pulled a gun on him outside his own Bronx home.</p>
<p>Staying true to his <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Mafia" target="_blank">Mafia</a> affiliation, Salvatore Zottola refuses to cooperate with authorities and will not give them any information about his attackers.</p>
<p><strong>UPDATE:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/high-ranking-bloods-gangster-arrested-for-organizing-murder-of-bo"><strong>Bloods gangster arrested for organizing murder of Bonanno mobster</strong></a></p>
<p><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/w9LJ0XfnnM8?wmode=opaque" width="560" height="315" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/the-bonanno-crime-family">Bonanno crime family section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
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Federal jury convicts two Godfathers of United Blood Nation of racketeering conspiracy
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/federal-jury-convicts-two-godfathers-of-united-blood-nation-of-ra
2018-05-19T07:36:08.000Z
2018-05-19T07:36:08.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/federal-jury-convicts-two-godfathers-of-united-blood-nation-of-ra" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237102292,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237102292?profile=original" width="575" /></a>By David Amoruso</p>
<p>Two men who hold the rank of Godfather in the Nine Trey Gangsters set of the United Blood Nation were convicted on Thursday of racketeering conspiracy charges. 44-year-old James Baxton (photo above, right), known on the streets as Frank White, and 45-year-old Pedro “Magoo” Gutierrez (photo above, left) were found guilty by a federal jury sitting in Charlotte following a two-week trial.</p>
<p>Prosecutors presented evidence in court showing that Gutierrez was a Godfather of the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Bloods" target="_blank">Nine Trey Gangsters</a> and had served since 2003 as the Chairman of the council that governs the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=UBN" target="_blank">United Blood Nation</a>, an organization with tens of thousands of members that spans the United States and has links to the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-lucchese-crime-family" target="_blank">Lucchese crime family</a>, one of New York’s five Mafia clans.</p>
<p>Gutierrez, together with James Baxton and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/united-blood-nation-godfather-says-he-is-part-of-the-last-ones-th" target="_blank">Omari Rosero</a>, were “<a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/united-blood-nation-godfather-says-he-is-part-of-the-last-ones-th" target="_blank">the last ones that God put in power</a>” over the United Blood Nation. Rosero had already pleaded guilty to racketeering conspiracy and admitted to holding the leadership rank of High, and to serving as an acting Godfather of the entire United Blood Nation gang.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/black-organized-crime" target="_blank">Black Organized Crime</a>: From <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/drug-boss-leroy-nicky-barnes" target="_blank">Nicky Barnes</a> and Frank Lucas to <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/supreme-gangster-giant-towers-over-queens-rap" target="_blank">"Supreme" McGriff</a> and the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Bloods" target="_blank">Bloods</a> and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Crips" target="_blank">Crips</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p>As the Godfather of the set, Gutierrez, along with Baxton, conducted gang business and participated in the distribution of gang dues while incarcerated in the New York State Department of Corrections.</p>
<p>Trial evidence also established that Gutierrez ordered a <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=War" target="_blank">gang war</a> in North Carolina in 2011 directing that members of the Bloods gang attack and kill members of a renegade gang called Pretty Tony. The war resulted in numerous injuries among inmates and the lockdown of five North Carolina prisons for six months.</p>
<p>Further, trial evidence established that 42-year-old Cynthia Gilmore, who trafficked cocaine, was a local high-ranking officer who routinely traveled from North Carolina to New York to meet with Gutierrez, acting as his “eyes” and “voice” in the South. The evidence also showed that Baxton was trafficking <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Heroin" target="_blank">heroin</a> within the New York State and prison system. He also was calling and threatening the family members of inmates incarcerated in New York State in an effort to obtain money.</p>
<p>“United Blood Nation uses violence and intimidation to assert power over our neighborhoods and vicious tactics to bolster the image of an indestructible gang,” said U.S. Attorney R. Andrew Murray. “Today’s convictions of three high-ranking leaders delivered a blow to that myth, proving that United Blood Nation gangsters are no different than other common criminals – they can and will be found and prosecuted for their crimes.”</p>
<p>35 defendants have previously pleaded guilty in this <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/83-bosses-and-members-of-united-blood-nation-indicted" target="_blank">investigation</a>, including nine defendants in high-ranking leadership positions.</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>
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83 bosses and members of United Blood Nation indicted
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/83-bosses-and-members-of-united-blood-nation-indicted
2017-05-20T03:00:00.000Z
2017-05-20T03:00:00.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/83-bosses-and-members-of-united-blood-nation-indicted" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237085456,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237085456?profile=original" width="483" /></a>By Gangsters Inc. Editors</p>
<p>The United Blood Nation gang has been hit by a massive indictment charging 83 of its alleged leaders and members with federal racketeering conspiracy and charges related to murder, attempted murder, violent assault, narcotics distribution, firearms possession and Hobbs Act robbery. Some are also charged with white-collar offenses like bank fraud, wire fraud and aggravated identity theft related to financial crimes, evidence that the group has become more sophisticated.</p>
<p>More than 600 federal, state and local law enforcement officers executed the arrest warrants early Thursday morning in Charlotte, Cleveland County, and eastern North Carolina. Arrests were also made in Florida, South Carolina, New York, and Virginia.</p>
<p>The operation was aimed at the Nine Trey Gangsters faction of the United Blood Nation. The <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Bloods" target="_blank">Bloods</a> were formed in the 1970s in Los Angeles, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=California" target="_blank">California</a>, when a group of seven individual street gangs united to form a larger unit. The <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/street-gangs" target="_blank">gang</a> quickly spread to surrounding areas, eventually expanding its influence across the United States. In 1993, a single Bloods entity, the United Blood Nation, was created on the east side of Rikers Island Prison.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237085856,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237085856?profile=original" width="426" /></a>Membership of the United Blood Nation is estimated to be between 7,000 to 15,000 members along the east coast, with ultimate authority for gang decisions still maintained in New York and members currently incarcerated in the New York prison system. The various <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Bloods" target="_blank">Bloods’ gangs</a> or “Hoods,” which unified under the United Blood Nation, kept their original names. The Nine Trey Gangsters is one of the original factions of the United Blood Nation, with a large gang presence in North Carolina.</p>
<p>It’s in North Carolina where authorities sought to put an end to the violence and crimes allegedly committed by the Nine Trey Gangsters. “This morning’s arrests are the result of a joint law enforcement investigation targeting alleged leaders and members of the Nine Trey Gangsters faction of the United Blood Nation,” Jill Westmoreland Rose, United States Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina, told the media. “These defendants participated in a racketeering conspiracy, committing multiple violent crimes, including at least six murders and five attempted murders in North Carolina.”</p>
<p>According to allegations contained in the 69-count indictment, the Nine Trey Gangsters engaged in a pattern of racketeering activity, including, but not limited to, murder, attempted murder, assault with a deadly weapon, robbery, narcotics distribution and firearms possession. Additionally, the indictment alleges that certain defendants engaged in the racketeering acts of bank fraud and wire fraud. As alleged in the indictment, the defendants committed these crimes to generate proceeds to pay gang dues, to maintain membership with the gang, to discipline other gang members, and to be promoted within the leadership structure of the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Gang" target="_blank">gang</a>.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237085874,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237085874?profile=original" width="490" /></a>The defendants communicated regularly with each other and other United Blood Nation members to discuss gang business, including the enforcement of gang rules; disciplinary action of members; the identities and punishment of individuals cooperating with law enforcement; the collection of gang dues; and to plan future crimes. The indictment further alleges that the defendants maintained and circulated a collection of firearms, including assault rifles, for the use in criminal activity by gang members.</p>
<p>Over the course of the investigation, agents and officers seized, among other evidence: 36 firearms and ammunition, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Cocaine" target="_blank">cocaine</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Crack" target="_blank">crack cocaine</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Heroin" target="_blank">heroin</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Marijuana" target="_blank">marijuana</a>, MDMA, prescription pills and other narcotics and drug paraphernalia, counterfeit checks, credit cards and gift cards, and credit card making devices.</p>
<p>Prosecutors allege that the gang is governed by 31 rules known as “The 31.” These rules were written by the United Blood Nation’s founders and are strictly enforced. In addition, the gang maintains a strict hierarchy or chain of command, with each gang member assigned to a specific rank with specific duties and responsibilities.</p>
<p>A typical structure for the Nine Trey Gangsters includes the leader of the hood, referred to as the “Godfather,” followed by ranked “Generals,” down through unranked members called “Soldiers” or “Scraps.” Additionally, within the United Blood Nation, some females hold unique positions of authority, including that of a “First Lady,” who is often responsible for record keeping, covert communications, and distribution of gang records.</p>
<p>According to the indictment United Blood Nation members represent their gang affiliation with common tattoos, graffiti markings, language, and communication codes, and are identified by wearing the color red. They are also expected to pay gang dues, which are used to support the enterprise, to finance the gang’s criminal activity, and as gifts of respect to incarcerated high-ranking members.</p>
<p>The 83 defendants charged with one count of Racketeering Influenced Corrupt Organization (RICO) conspiracy are:</p>
<ul>
<li> Sherman Devante Addison, a/k/a “Ace,” 22, of Shelby.</li>
<li> Aaron Demitri Alexander, a/k/a “A Dawg,” 24, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Montraya Antwain Atkinson, a/k/a “Hardbody,” 30, of Raleigh, N.C.</li>
<li> Freddrec Deandre Banks, a/k/a “Drec/Banga,” 21, of Shelby.</li>
<li> James Baxton, a/k/a “Frank White,” 43, incarcerated in New York.</li>
<li> Bradley Beauchamp, 29, of Fort Lauderdale, Florida.</li>
<li> Destinee Danyell Blakeney, a/k/a “Lady Rude,” 22, of Morven, N.C.</li>
<li> Antonio Dontre Brooks, a/k/a “Montana,” 24, of Shelby.</li>
<li> Antarious Qaushard Byers, a/k/a “Bang,” 23, of Shelby.</li>
<li> Renaldo Rodregus Camp, a/k/a “Rodeo/Drop,” 39, of Shelby.</li>
<li> Shakira Monique Campbell, a/k/a “Lady Rage,” 23, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Adrian Nayron Coker, a/k/a “Gotti,” 27, of Gastonia, N.C.</li>
<li> Brandon Khalil Covington, a/k/a “Blokka,” 24, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Alex Levi Cox, a/k/a “Quick,” 26, of Myrtle Beach, S.C.</li>
<li> Marquel Michael Cunningham, 20, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Richard Diaz, a/k/a “Damu,” 32, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> James Walter Dowdle, a/k/a “Staxx,” 24, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> John Paul Durant, a/k/a “JP/Glock/Gudda,” 28, of Shelby.</li>
<li> Cynthia Gilmore, a/k/a “Cynthia Young/Lady Bynt,” 41, of Raleigh.</li>
<li> Shamon Movair Goins, a/k/a “Rugie,” 26, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Pedro Gutierrez, a/k/a “Magoo/Light/Inferno,” 44, incarcerated in New York.</li>
<li> Jalen Raekwon Hackney, a/k/a “Menace,” 19, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Christopher Dentre Hamrick, a/k/a “Red Dot,” 27, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Lavaughn Antonio Hanton, a/k/a “Killem/Billy-D,” 33, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Anthony Oneil Harrison, a/k/a “Ant,” 20, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Bianca Kiashie Harrison, a/k/a “Lady Gunz,” 27, of Raleigh.</li>
<li> Quincy Delone Haynes, a/k/a “Black Montana,” 38, Shelby.</li>
<li> Delonte Maurice Hicks, a/k/a “BBB Shooter/Black,” 28, of Morven.</li>
<li> Jasmin Reikeem Hicks, a/k/a “Rude,” 26, of Morven.</li>
<li> Bobby Earl Hines, a/k/a “Swahili,” 34, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Raheam Shumar Hopper, a/k/a “Bone,” 23, of Shelby.</li>
<li> Wesley Javon Howze, a/k/a “Drama,” 21, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Donl Lequintin Hunsucker, a/k/a “Remy,” 31, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Dricko Dashon Huskey, a/k/a “Drizzy,” 25, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Muhammad John Jackson, a/k/a “Picasso,” 32, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Terrence Thomas Johnsom, a/k/a “Sypher,” 40, of Shelby.</li>
<li> Joe Tarpeh Johnson, a/k/a “JR/Big Pusha/Kutthroat,” 26, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Latif Nakia Antoine Johnson, a/k/a “Billy Solo,” 23, of Charlotte, N.C.</li>
<li> Tonney Horatio Kerbay, a/k/a “Rich Tonney,” 29, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Rashad Monte King, a/k/a “Billy Kilo Montana,” 25, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Barrington Audley Lattibeaudiere, a/k/a “Bandana/Bobby Seale,” 30, of North Lauderdale, Florida.</li>
<li> Juan Cruz Leon, a/k/a “Jefe,” 21, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Renaire Roshique Lewis, Jr., a/k/a “Banz/Esco,” 22, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Lamonte Kentrell Lloyd, a/k/a “Murda Mo/Moo,” 23, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> David Matthew Lowe, a/k/a “Gucci,” 26, of Shelby.</li>
<li> Charles Kenyon Lytle, a/k/a “Kam,” 39, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Terry Lavon Maddox, a/k/a “Turbo,” 26, of Shelby.</li>
<li> Bradon Theodore Manning, a/k/a “Billy B,” 28, of Columbia, S.C.</li>
<li> Travis Cordell McClain, a/k/a “Fridaay Daa Thuurteenth,” 25, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Robert Allen McClinton, a/k/a “Trigga,” 27, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Isaac Nabah MckIntosh, a/k/a “Mac,” 26, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> D’Angelo De’Mara McNeil, a/k/a “Dutch,” 26, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Christopher Lashon Miller, a/k/a “Dro,” 23, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Johnny Thomas Mitchell, a/k/a “Joker,” 37, of Shelby.</li>
<li> Christopher O’Brien Moore, a/k/a “Ratchet,” 22, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Myquan Lamar Nelson, a/k/a “Dripz,” 26, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Thomas Oliver, a/k/a “T.O., Recon,” 31, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Kolawole Olalekan Omotosho, a/k/a “Rugged Red,” 19, of Jacksonville, N.C.</li>
<li> James Bradin Pegues, 30, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Deshawn Deonta Peterkin, a/k/a “Proo,” 28, of Morven.</li>
<li> Laquida Shuntae Poston, a/k/a “Lady Recon,” 25, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Austin Demontry Potts, a/k/a “Big Tek, B-Tek,” 23, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Tyquan Ramont Powell, a/k/a “Savage,” 22, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Omar Lionel Reed, a/k/a “Omega,” 38, incarcerated in New Mexico.</li>
<li> Omari Rosero, a/k/a “Uno B,” 40, incarcerated in New York.</li>
<li> Porsha Talina Rosero, a/k/a “Porsha Talina Gowdy/Lady Uno B,” 34, of Syracuse, New York.</li>
<li> Kenneth Marquise Ruff, a/k/a “Red Hot,” 26, of Shelby.</li>
<li> Rashad Sattar, 20, of Fort Lauderdale.</li>
<li> Alandus Montrell Smith, a/k/a “Kadafia,” 27, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Anthony Bernard Smith, a/k/a “Redd Lion,” 24, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Denzel Lamont Spikes, a/k/a “Dinki/Dino,” 24, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Isaiah Devon Stallworth, a/k/a “Zay/Juice,” 25, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Cedric Lexander Surratt, a/k/a “Hollywood/5-Star,” 29, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Peatrez Lamar Teaste, a/k/a “P-Wheezy,” 24, of Myrtle Beach.</li>
<li> Jhad Elijah Thorbourne, a/k/a “Flight,” 23, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Lavon Christopher Turner, a/k/a “Hungry,” 27, Charlotte.</li>
<li> Jesse James Watkins, a/k/a “Showtime,” 33, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Quintez Lamar Watkins, a/k/a “Bandana,” 27, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> David Earl Watson, a/k/a “Gunz,” 31, of Jacksonville.</li>
<li> Twylain Stanley Wilson, a/k/a “5 Alive,” 24, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Ronald Anthony Wofford, 27, of Charlotte.</li>
<li> Jonathan Wray, a/k/a “Jon Jon/Yungin,” 26, incarcerated in North Carolina.</li>
<li> Patrick Devon Wray, a/k/a “Ike, Murda,” 28, of Shelby.</li>
</ul>
<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>
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</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
<p> </p></div>
Black P-Stones lieutenant gets 30 years in prison for racketeering and murder
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/black-p-stones-lieutenant-gets-30-years-in-prison-for-racketeerin
2017-04-22T14:10:20.000Z
2017-04-22T14:10:20.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/black-p-stones-lieutenant-gets-30-years-in-prison-for-racketeerin" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237094883,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237094883?profile=original" width="180" /></a>By Gangsters Inc. Editors</p>
<p>Desmond Finnell, a lieutenant in the Black P-Stones gang in Newport News, Virginia, was sentenced to 30 years in prison for racketeering conspiracy and murder on Thursday. 30-year-old Finnell had already pleaded guilty in November of 2016.</p>
<p>For several years, Finnell was one of several violent members of the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/black-organized-crime" target="_blank">Black P-Stones</a> crew led by Michael Hopson. The gang was into drug dealing, robberies, and various other violent schemes. Finnell was responsible for multiple shootings in Newport News and Hampton as part of his <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/street-gangs" target="_blank">Black P-Stones gang</a> activity.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Read: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/1-gang-boss-dead-2-agents-shot-as-fbi-busts-black-p-stone-nation" target="_blank">1 gang boss dead, 2 agents shot, as FBI busts Black P-Stone Nation</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p>As is customary in organized crime, things are never personal, just business. This was also the case for Finnell.</p>
<p>When he had a falling out with a friend about a missing batch of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Marijuana" target="_blank">marijuana</a>, Finnell decided there was no use in sitting down and having a drink and talk with his pal. Believing his friend, Ernest “Critter” Crudup, had robbed him of around 20 pounds of marijuana, on November 28, 2010, he lured him to a location in Newport News where he shot him to death.</p>
<p>Whoever said drug business was easy money, needs to check the numbers. While the price of bricks remains high and stable, the price of life is going down faster than the Titanic.</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>
Profile: Rockford’s Black Gangster Disciples boss Karl Fort
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/profile-rockford-s-black-gangster-disciples-boss-karl-fort
2017-01-16T20:07:56.000Z
2017-01-16T20:07:56.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/profile-rockford-s-black-gangster-disciples-boss-karl-fort"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237088062,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237088062?profile=original" width="399" /></a>By David Amoruso</p>
<p>A very big name on the streets of Rockford is coming home early. Matter of fact, few people expected Karl “Shortdog” Fort, leader of Rockford’s Black Gangster Disciples, to ever come home again at all, as he was sentenced to life in prison on drug charges in 1994. But Fort successfully petitioned the government for a sentence reduction and is now scheduled for release in 2019.</p>
<p>What started out as a life sentence, handed down on November 21, 1994, turned into a 30-year sentence. Thanks to his good behavior behind bars, Fort is shaving some years off that one too, ending up with 25 years in prison when he will be released on November 9, 2019.</p>
<p>It is an outcome no one would’ve predicted back in the early 1990s, when Fort and his crew were known as “The Mob” and ran the streets of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Rockford">Rockford</a>, wearing bulletproof vests and doing drive-by shootings. Authorities claimed Fort and his organization were the first large-scale distributors of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Crack">crack cocaine</a> in the city.</p>
<p>The crack cocaine trade was known as a violent and extremely lucrative one. Junkies would take one hit and couldn’t wait to come back for more. Everyone involved also tended to get a little bit crazy.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237087881,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237087881?profile=original" width="206" /></a>Running an organization that deals in this product, Fort needed to maintain strict discipline, using the threat of excessive violence whenever needed. Like when one of his workers couldn’t explain what happened to a certain amount of powder cocaine. While the worker was questioned, one of Fort’s henchmen pointed a gun at his face and cocked the trigger. It was crystal clear what the repercussions for stealing were.</p>
<p>When one of Fort’s drug runners was short on money from his crack cocaine business, he was hit in the head with a bottle of champagne by another crew leader. The drug runner ended up in the hospital and lived to tell of his digression as an example of what happened if you weren’t professional.</p>
<p>Of course, the term professional was open for interpretation. Fort himself had a fierce temper and displayed an amazing willingness to use violence. In 1991 he allegedly emptied his Uzi at a house on Chestnut Street. Miraculously no one was hurt, but prosecutors did charge Fort with attempted murder.</p>
<p>A year later, Fort was hit with gun charges again. But by then his reputation as gang leader preceded him and the eye witnesses against him suddenly didn’t remember what they had seen.</p>
<p>Still, with authorities hot on his tail, Fort didn’t tone down his violent actions. In the summer of 1993, he was arrested for his alleged involvement in an argument over a pool game that got out of hand and ended with a man getting shot.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Read: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/i-shook-up-the-world-how-muhammad-ali-took-the-heavyweight-boxing">How Muhammad Ali took the Heavyweight title from the Mafia</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p>Sitting in a cell, perhaps still angry about the argument over the game of pool, Fort missed out on a massive police crackdown on his organization. Thirty Black Gangster Disciples were arrested and charged with being part of a massive crack cocaine trafficking ring. Fort himself was charged with federal drug conspiracy.</p>
<p>Back then, the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/drug-cartels">war on drugs</a> was intensifying. The <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/pablo-escobars-war-on-colombia">hunt for Pablo Escobar</a> had proven successful and the tough stance on drugs was winning votes. United States politicians had instituted severe penalties for charges related to crack cocaine. One gram of crack was considered the same as 100 grams as powder cocaine. This resulted in mindboggling sentences for street dealers and distributors.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Read: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/top-5-drug-lords-killed-while-on-the-run">Top 5 drug lords killed while on the run</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p>For a boss like Fort, it resulted in life in prison. But as time passed, authorities realized their mistake regarding treating crack cocaine differently than powder cocaine and Fort saw an opening to reduce his sentence. A successful petition supported by the community and a few influential politicians did the trick and provided Fort with an early release. Light at the end of the tunnel, a tunnel that seemed cemented shut forever.</p>
<p>Now in his late forties, Fort can begin building a life for himself. Hopefully away from the criminal underworld he once ruled. It would be better for the community and for himself. Not many get a second chance like the one he will get in 2019.</p>
<p>Besides, what is this soon-to-be 50-year-old going to rule when he gets out? Most of the young gangsters don’t even know his name. Nor does he know theirs. Hell, he’s been out for so long, he’ll come back to a changed world filled with smartphones, Snapchat and online beefs with real world consequences. Who would want to get involved with that?</p>
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Atlantic City “Dirty Block” Gang enforcer gets life in prison for violent heroin trafficking conspiracy
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/atlantic-city-dirty-block-gang-enforcer-gets-life-in-prison-for-v
2016-08-23T13:35:09.000Z
2016-08-23T13:35:09.000Z
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<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/atlantic-city-dirty-block-gang-enforcer-gets-life-in-prison-for-v"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237078672,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237078672?profile=original" width="520" /></a>By David Amoruso</p>
<p>Malik “Lik” Derry, an alleged enforcer for the Atlantic City “Dirty Block” gang, was sentenced to life in prison on Friday. After a six-week trial, he was convicted of conspiracy to distribute one kilogram or more of heroin and various violent shootings.</p>
<p>The “Dirty Block” gang was led by Malik’s brother <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/atlantic-city-gang-boss-gets-life-in-prison-for-drug-conspiracy">Mykal “Koose” Derry</a>, who himself is serving life in prison as well after having been convicted of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/atlantic-city-gang-boss-gets-life-in-prison-for-drug-conspiracy">drug and gun crimes</a>. Malik Derry acted as the gang’s enforcer, but was also active as a street level dealer, selling dope to junkies in the lucrative drug trafficking area of the Stanley Holmes public housing complex, and Brown’s Park.</p>
<p>He switched roles from dealer to enforcer whenever the “<a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=DirtyBlock">Dirty Block</a>” gang’s power was questioned. Malik Derry, his brother Mykal, and other gang members routinely carried loaded handguns and engaged in at least eight drug related shootings between October 2010 and February 2013, including the shooting of a teenager on April 17, 2011, which left the victim paralyzed.</p>
<p>Additional testimony at Malik Derry’s trial established that he and his brother planned and carried out the shooting murder of a rival drug dealer in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=AtlanticCity">Atlantic City</a> on the evening of February 10, 2013. Mykal Derry told members of his gang that he wanted them to “put him down” (referring to an order to shoot the rival dealer) when they saw him.</p>
<p>Malik Derry heard his brother loud and clear and, in a scene reminiscent of television series Breaking Bad, shot the dealer in the head from close range while riding a bicycle past him as the victim stood in front of an Atlantic City restaurant.</p>
<p>The murder weapon, a stolen .380 caliber semi-automatic handgun, was later recovered from the drop ceiling in an apartment located on Green Street in Atlantic City, which, at the time, was shared by Mykal Derry and his girlfriend, Kimberly Spellman. Atlantic City police detectives also found 18 “bricks” of heroin (approximately 900 individual packets of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Heroin">heroin</a>) and drug packaging materials inside the apartment.</p>
<p>When the case hit the courtroom, there wasn’t much Malik Derry and his brother could do. The evidence presented by the government consisted of recordings of hundreds of telephone calls and text messages between Mykal Derry, Malik Derry, and over 19 other members of the gang, physical evidence including the recovery of twenty firearms, ballistics evidence from shooting scenes, crime scene evidence from eight different shooting scenes in Atlantic City, recovery of substantial quantities of heroin and drug packaging materials, approximately $40,000 in drug proceeds, the testimony of dozens of FBI agents and Atlantic City police detectives, ballistics experts, a narcotics expert, and two cooperating witnesses who had previously pleaded guilty to federal drug trafficking offenses.</p>
<p>They were street kings while it lasted, but now 25-year-old Malik and his 36-year-old brother Mykal will spend the rest of their lives behind bars for the criminal acts they committed.</p>
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Alleged Grape Street Crips leader charged with 4 murders, racketeering
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/alleged-grape-street-crips-leader-charged-with-4-murders-racketee
2016-02-11T20:30:00.000Z
2016-02-11T20:30:00.000Z
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<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/alleged-grape-street-crips-leader-charged-with-4-murders-racketee"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237059264,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237059264?profile=original" width="400" /></a>By Gangsters Inc. Editors</p>
<p>The alleged long-time leader of the Grape Street Crips has been charged with four murders, three attempted murders, and numerous other crimes as part of a racketeering conspiracy.</p>
<p>39-year-old Corey Hamlet (photo above), a/k/a “C-Blaze,” a/k/a “Blaze,” a/k/a “Blizzie,” a/k/a “Castor Troy,” of Belleville, New Jersey, was charged today in a fourth superseding indictment with RICO conspiracy, violent crimes in aid of racketeering, aiding and abetting the use of firearms in furtherance of crimes of violence, witness tampering, robbery, extortion, and drug trafficking.</p>
<p>Three other men, Sean L. Scott Sr., a/k/a “Ali Rock, 45; Keon Bethea, a/k/a “Fat Boy,” 33; and Jamil Harrison, a/k/a “L-Mel,” 32, all of Newark, were arrested today and charged by criminal complaint with distribution of heroin and crack-cocaine.</p>
<p>“Nine months ago we announced the arrests of more than 70 members – including the No. 2 and No. 3 highest ranking members – of the Grape Street Crips, a violent <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/street-gangs">street gang</a> we alleged controls much of the heroin trade in northern New Jersey,” U.S. Attorney Fishman said. “Today, we are announcing charges against Corey Hamlet, the leader of that organization, in an indictment that spells out his alleged role in at least four homicides and three attempted homicides in furtherance of his control of this drug trafficking organization. The people of Newark should not have to endure that kind of violence or the fear that it breeds. I am hopeful that these arrests will make the streets of this city safer.”</p>
<p>“The FBI’s mission at the beginning of this investigation was to significantly disrupt the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/black-organized-crime">Grape Street Crips criminal enterprise</a> operating in Newark,” Andrew Campi, FBI-Newark Acting Special Agent in Charge, said. “The federal indictment and arrest of its leader, Corey Hamlet, has brought us closer to our ultimate goal of dismantling one of the most violent street gangs in the city. This investigation is a tremendous example of the positive impact law enforcement has on the community and when federal, county, and local authorities join together with a common purpose.”</p>
<p>“Today we have taken a very dangerous and violent person off the street,” Carl J. Kotowski, Special Agent in Charge of the Drug Enforcement Administration’s New Jersey Division, said. “The people of Newark can be assured that the DEA will continue to pursue these violent predators.”</p>
<p>Hamlet’s indictment follows the coordinated takedown in May 2015 of 50 alleged members and associates of the Grape Street Crips, who were charged by criminal complaints with drug-trafficking, physical assaults, and witness intimidation. The charges – including today’s arrests – are the result of a long-running FBI and DEA investigation, in conjunction with the Essex County Prosecutor’s Office, the Newark Police Department and Essex County Sheriff’s Office Bureau of Narcotics.</p>
<p>According to documents filed in these cases and statements made in court:</p>
<p>Hamlet has allegedly served as the long-time leader of the New Jersey Grape Street Crips, even while serving prison sentences or being detained in federal or state correctional facilities. The New Jersey Grape Street Crips – a local set of a nationwide street gang founded in Los Angeles – engage in drug-trafficking and other criminal activities to enrich themselves and fellow gang members. In addition to these criminal activities, the gang’s rules provide that members must retaliate against individuals who cooperate with law enforcement. Gang members routinely engage in acts of intimidation and violence against witnesses, individuals who are believed to be cooperating with law enforcement, and law enforcement officers themselves. As the gang’s leader, Hamlet allegedly participated in and authorized acts of violence against rivals, suspected cooperating witnesses, and even fellow gang members who were perceived as being disloyal.</p>
<p>After completing a previous federal sentence, Hamlet and other gang members began to extort Victim One. After Victim One refused to pay the extortion demands, Hamlet targeted Victim One and associates of Victim One for violence. In early 2013, Hamlet authorized Corey Batts, 30, of Newark, and Tony Phillips, of Newark, to murder Victim Two, in part, because Hamlet believed that Victim Two, a member of the New Jersey Grape Street Crips, had grown too close to Victim One. On May 3, 2013, Batts and Phillips, acting on Hamlet’s orders, allegedly shot Victim Two repeatedly in the head and dumped the victim’s body on a Newark street.</p>
<p>In August 2013, Hamlet authorized Batts to murder Victim One. In October 2013, Hamlet met with Victim One at the Mall at Short Hills in Millburn, New Jersey, in a meeting that had been set-up by Victim Five, a member of the New Jersey Grape Street Crips who was a close associate of Victim One and who attempted to broker a truce between Hamlet and Victim One.</p>
<p>After the Short Hills meeting, Hamlet used a social media account to post a report from the Essex County Prosecutor’s Office purportedly indicating that Victim One had provided a statement to law enforcement. Just three days after Hamlet’s social media post, Batts and other gang members – acting on Hamlet’s orders – repeatedly shot and nearly killed Victim One and Victim Four, a bystander who was inside Victim One’s car.</p>
<p>Following the attempted murder of Victim One, Hamlet and other gang members perceived that Victim Five had been disloyal by attempting to put an end to the feud between Hamlet and Victim One. In November 2013, Aaron Terrell, 24, and Rashan Washington, 26, both of Newark, murdered Victim Five. Acting on Hamlet’s orders, Washington lured Victim Five into a Jeep Cherokee and then purposely left Victim Five alone, while Terrell shot Victim Five once in the head.</p>
<p>In November 2013, Hamlet allegedly told a conspirator that Victim Six, who was a relative of Victim One, had to be murdered. On March 3, 2014, Hamlet and another conspirator pulled up to a car being driven by Victim Six. Although Hamlet aimed a firearm at Victim Six and the car’s other occupants, Victim Six pulled off before any shots were fired. A short time later, however, Hamlet’s conspirator found Victim Six, and a car chase ensued. The chase concluded when Victim Six’s car crashed into other vehicles at Irvine Turner Boulevard and Spruce Street in Newark, and Hamlet’s conspirator fired numerous shots in the direction of Victim Six’s vehicle. Victim Six was shot and Victim Seven, a passenger in Victim Six’s car, was killed. Victim Eight, an innocent bystander who was a passenger in one of the vehicles crashed into at the intersection, was shot in the head and killed.</p>
<p>In addition to orchestrating these and other acts of violence, Hamlet conspired with other gang members to distribute 280 grams or more of crack-cocaine, conspired to distribute heroin, was involved in the extortion and robbery of other individuals, and threatened individuals whom he believed to be cooperating with law enforcement.</p>
<p>On each of the charges of RICO conspiracy, conspiracy to distribute crack-cocaine, and using firearms in furtherance of crimes of violence, Hamlet faces a maximum penalty of life in prison. The first count of using a firearm in furtherance of a crime of violence carries a mandatory minimum term of 10 years, while the second such count carries a mandatory minimum term of 25 years, which must be imposed consecutively to the first count. On the six counts of violent crimes in aid of racketeering, Hamlet faces terms of imprisonment ranging from three to 20 years.</p>
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Chicago Vice Lord Nation gang boss dead at 64
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/chicago-vice-lord-nation-gang-boss-dead-at-64
2015-07-23T12:00:00.000Z
2015-07-23T12:00:00.000Z
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<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/chicago-vice-lord-nation-gang-boss-dead-at-64"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237039665,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237039665?profile=original" width="452" /></a>By David Amoruso</p>
<p>Willie Lloyd, a former leader of the Vice Lord Nation gang in Chicago, died Monday, at age 64. During his lifetime, Lloyd evolved from a vicious crime boss waging war on his rivals to a fierce anti-violence advocate. An assassination attempt in 2003, however, proved that the violence was never far away.</p>
<p>Not much is known about the circumstances surrounding Lloyd’s death. According to the <a href="http://chicagodefender.com/2015/07/21/willie-lloyd-former-gang-leader-of-the-vice-lord-nation-dies-at-64/" target="_blank">Chicago Defender</a>, “[Lloyd] relocated with his family to Minnesota a few years ago and retreated to a quiet and solemn life. No further information was offered at press time.”</p>
<p>Lloyd joined the Vice Lord Nation gang in his early teens. In December of 1971, at the age of 20, he got himself into serious trouble after he and two other Vice Lords members were caught red-handed by police breaking into several motel rooms in Davenport, Iowa. As police surrounded the motel a shootout broke out between Lloyd and his pals and the cops in which a state trooper was killed.</p>
<p>Besides receiving a 25-year prison sentence for his crimes, Lloyd also earned the respect of his fellow gang members. He had transitioned from a boy gangster into a man and was known as cop killer despite not having been directly responsible for the trooper’s death.</p>
<p>When he was released from prison Lloyd was ready to take over the streets of Chicago.</p>
<p>According to <a href="http://www.biography.com/people/willie-lloyd-504960#attempts-to-change-his-life" target="_blank">Biography.com</a>, “As the self-proclaimed ‘King of the Vice Lord Nation,’ Lloyd helped generate new methods of income for the group, including drug dealing and street taxes for anyone who wanted to do business in Vice Lord territory. Anyone who didn't pay was extorted or murdered.”</p>
<p>Police were on to him, however, and were able to put him back behind bars after they found several firearms in his possession when they pulled him over for a traffic violation in 1988.</p>
<p>His time in prison loosened his grip on the Vice Lord Nation gang and the group splintered in his absence with a rival taking aim at Lloyd’s crown. In the ensuing war there were kidnappings, shootings, and murders. The violence only ceased when authorities arrested Lloyd’s rival and sent him to prison. When police raided Lloyd's house in 1994, they found a 9 mm handgun. Yet another violation, which earned Lloyd 8 years behind bars.</p>
<p>Apparently, all that fighting had changed Lloyd. Or maybe it was all that time in his cell. Either way, when he was released in 2002, he began working as an anti-violence advocate, teaching young kids to stay away from gangs and helping mediate disputes between hardened gangbangers to avoid needless bloodshed.</p>
<p>Others, however, claim Lloyd remained involved in gang life and that his anti-gang activities were merely a front. <a href="http://streetganglife.com/willie-lloyd-vice-lords-king-of-kings/" target="_blank">Street Gang Life</a> writes that, “Rumors persisted that Lloyd still wanted to collect a ‘tax’ from the Vice Lords as its leader, even though he had supposedly left gang life.”</p>
<p>Whether because of this alleged street tax or simply because of one of his many violent deeds in the past, Lloyd was shot down by gunmen while walking in Chicago’s Garfield Park in 2003. He barely survived the attack and as a result was paralyzed from the neck down.</p>
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Profile: Washington D.C. drug boss Rayful Edmond
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/profile-washington-d-c-drug-boss-rayful-edmond
2015-01-22T10:04:38.000Z
2015-01-22T10:04:38.000Z
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<p>By Seth Ferranti</p>
<p>To many in his hometown of Washington, D.C., during his 1980s reign as the city’s biggest cocaine and crack dealer, Rayful Edmond was public enemy number one. At the height of Dodge City’s brutal crack epidemic in 1987, this 22-year-old man was responsible for distributing 60 percent of the cocaine that flooded the city’s streets. In the Chocolate City, Rayful was the undisputed king of cocaine. He was street royalty with a certified gangster resume.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237029491,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237029491?profile=original" width="277" /></a>At his peak Rayful (right) sold 2,000 keys a week, reaped gross profits of $70 million a month and ran an operation with over 150 soldiers to support him. By his early twenties he had established himself as the city’s most notorious drug kingpin. In the high profile and glamorous life he led, champagne flowed like water, trips to Las Vegas, New York and Los Angeles were commonplace and $50,000 shopping sprees were the routine. Rayful personified the big city drug lord and his stature epitomized all the accolades that position demanded.</p>
<p>To the mainstream media, he encompassed all that was wrong with the city’s crack epidemic, but in the streets Rayful was a hero, an inner-city gangster who made it to the top echelons of the drug trade. A Lucky Luciano, Billy the Kid-type figure. But there were consequences to his reign. His volcanic rise coincided with an unprecedented explosion of street violence and drug addiction in the capital city. The era is remembered for murder, mayhem and bloodshed. Historians have blamed the crack storm that seized D.C. on Rayful, but Rayful maintained he was only trying to help his family live a better life and enjoy the finer materialistic trappings of capitalism that were often denied denizens of the ghetto.</p>
<p>To the block huggers, four corner hustlers and hood mainstays Rayful was beloved, even worshipped. His appeal crossed boundaries and he was adored by children and adults alike. But to others he was feared, a man who wreaked havoc on his community. Neighborhood people saw the effects of his crack enterprise outside their front doors and it wasn’t pretty. A community divided was in essence, a community destroyed. But regardless of what people thought of Rayful, he was an enigma, the president and CEO of what authorities called “the largest network for cocaine street sales in Washington D.C.” He was a gangster legend of epic proportions, until he tarnished his legacy by turning snitch.</p>
<p><span class="font-size-4"><strong>Excerpt from Rayful Edmond: Washington DC’s Most Notorious Drug Lord</strong></span></p>
<p><span class="font-size-5"><strong>Chapter: In Prison</strong></span></p>
<p>“Through history, all the bad things happened to the good guys,” Rayful said. “So I’m a good guy and just something bad happened to me and I’ll overcome it sooner or later.” But Rayful was in prison staring multiple life sentences in the face. His prospects were bleak, but he tried to make the best of a bad situation. “I will be home one day soon in a couple of years after my appeal,” Rayful said. “We will all be home in a couple of years. I’m not a violent person. You can ask 1,000 people. In high school I was only in two or three fights. I was tried for murdering one of my best friends. Ask his family. They got to see that I ain’t no murderer or nothing. Maybe I was a drug dealer, but I’m not all that bad of a person.”</p>
<p>Exactly who and what Rayful was caused a lot of disputes in the Chocolate City. One woman, quoted anonymously in The Washington Post said she was pleased by the conviction because Edmond was responsible for “a whole lot” of bad things that happened to children with drugs. But a man recalled that Edmond gave his family money for flowers when a brother died and occasionally gave extra money for medicine and bus fare. “He may have been guilty of knowing the wrong people,” the man said. “But Rayful wasn’t no dope pusher.” The director of a recreation center said the neighborhood children would miss Edmond. “They looked up to him. They respected him. If they ever had any problems, they could come and talk to him. They saw him as a big brother.” He said.</p>
<p>Despite his life sentence without parole, Edmond was making plans for when he got out. He dreamed of opening a nightclub. In one room he would have big movie screens. In another room there would be pool tables. And in a special room, people could watch “like nasty movies.” There would be a room for dancing and “a bar where they could buy all they want or whatever they want.” There would be a dress code, “casual shoes, slacks and a jacket.” Rayful knew it would be a success. “I could just put my name up there and people just come because they say ‘Oh, that’s Rayful’s club.’” Rayful was a little delusional to say the least.</p>
<p>Edmond’s long term home was a small cell at U.S.P. Marion. He described U.S.P. Marion as a place where prisoners wanted to take their frustrations out on each other. “I wish I was in another institution,” Rayful said. He explained that U.S.P. Marion was for the most dangerous criminals and that he wasn’t violent.</p>
<p>“I wouldn’t wish this place on anybody.” He said. When he wanted to hear the sound of another voice he had to call out carefully in a low voice, because he didn’t want to risk having another prisoner tell him to shut up, an act of disrespect he’d have to respond to.</p>
<p>“In Marion you just really don’t have too much communication,” he said. “And sometimes you feel lost and then the people, they not really functioning right. People tend to age a lot at Marion, they worry. They don’t wanna be here. People be loving their families and they can’t call them. It’s lonely here.” Rayful couldn’t call his family anyhow, because they had been spread far and wide, to prisons as distant as California.</p>
<p>“I’m going through the hardest,” Rayful said. “Probably harder than anybody else been through, but I don’t let it bother me. I just try to be me, just be Rayful. Like a lot of people come to jail and they get caught up into what’s happening in the institution, but that’s not what life is about. Life’s about being free and living in the streets. “If I ever went home, I would never come back. I’m just here until one day when I catch a break, get back in court and maybe get some of the time back and have a date to go home. I just be thinking of that. I’ll get out in a couple of years from now, probably two years.” But Ray was dreaming.</p>
<p>“Everybody is trying to make it seem like drugs is all that bad. I’m saying it is bad, when it gets to the kids that don’t know what it is. It’s bad. But when you of age, it’s not bad. When you of a certain age, it’s not bad. When you of age you make your own judgment.” Rayful said.</p>
<p>“People abuse anything in life. Like men have good women and they abuse them. People have nice kids and they abuse their kids. So that’s just part of life and a way of life. People be trying to survive, then you got a lot of money, so somebody might try to rob you and kill you. Drugs are all over now. That’s just life. They are everywhere.</p>
<p>“I would say white people are more conservative and tend to handle it a little better than black people. Maybe their system be a little stronger as far as with drugs. I don’t try to judge people. People just look for ways to survive. And if drug dealers do wrong, their intention is not to hurt anybody, not to hurt kids.</p>
<p>“People just say, ‘Drugs are bad.’ But it’s so many people that are out there talking about, ‘Drugs is bad,’ that are using drugs themselves. Just like Marion Barry. All this stuff he going around talking about drugs this, drugs that. I’ve been locked up for years and the streets are worse than ever. If I was the problem everything should have been cleared up by now.”</p>
<p>In 1990, after a short stint at U.S.P. Marion, Rayful was transferred to U.S.P. Lewisburg where he had more freedoms like walking the yard, using the phone and having the run of the compound. Not much, but better than 24 hour lockdown. U.S.P. Marion was the maximum security prison in the federal system while U.S.P. Lewisburg was only a high security institution. Rayful settled in nicely to the less restrictive environment.</p>
<p>“He came in with great accolades,” an old time mobster who was at the prison when Rayful came in says. Lewisburg is a very gothic style prison, like an old English castle. Hawks and other birds of prey inhabit the steeples built into the structure. Also there is a historical wall that can’t be altered. The wall is 50 feet high. The population at Lewisburg when Rayful arrived consisted of Italians, Asians, blacks and Irish. All the major ethnic groups were represented and Lewisburg was a hub of criminal activity as it is located between all the major East Coast cities and the most densely populated areas.</p>
<p>“All illicit activities are going on there because all the major cities are a stone’s throw away,” the old time mobster says. “The prison housed some of the most famous prisoners of the United States from <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-disappearance-of-jimmy">Jimmy Hoffa</a> to <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/gambino-boss-john-gotti-sr">John Gotti</a> to biker leaders from the Outlaws, Pagans and Hell’s Angels. Big drug dealers from all the major cities were there including Peanut King, Little Melvin, Big Melvin Stanford, Cadillac, the Nicky Santoro crew, Sam the Plummer’s crew, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/lucchese-associate-james-jimmy">Jimmy “The Gent” Burke</a>, members from all the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/organized-crime-in">five families</a>, the big Colombian dealers and a lot of guys from the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-new-england-crime-family">Raymond Patricia family</a>, Frank Valente, Angelo Leonardo and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/mafia-rebel-crazy-joey-gallo">Joe Gallo</a>. John LaRocca’s Pittsburgh family with Nick the Blade and the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-bruno-crime-family">Philly Nicky Scarfo crew</a> were there. The gangs weren’t popular then.”</p>
<p>Ray quickly took advantage of the situation. He learned that it was even easier to deal drugs from behind bars to people on the outside. He had access to phones on the B cellblock practically whenever he wanted. There was the mail and there was his full contact visits. All privileges he didn’t have at Marion. He got his visitors to smuggle small amounts of cocaine, heroin and marijuana in to him.</p>
<p>“Those were the basic four: cocaine, crack, heroin and marijuana,” he said. Rayful brought the drugs in through the visiting room. He hired other prisoners, whose girlfriends, during contact visits, would pass the drugs packed in small balloons. It was a simple routine. The oldest trick in the book.</p>
<p>“She might kiss him, and he put ‘em in his mouth. Got ‘em all inside. Then he get back inside the institution, he spit ‘em up. I’ve seen somebody bring in like 60 balloons before. It keeps the jail mellow. Keeps people patient. They be able to get high and chill.” Rayful said.</p>
<p>Lewisburg was the center of criminal activity on the East Coast. When you have a bunch of people of such a high magnitude from the criminal underworld in one place illicit activities are going to occur. “Drugs were so prevalent people developed bad drug habits to wash away the memory of their sentences,” the old time mobster says. “There were crap games, alcohol- homemade or smuggled in, every drug imaginable. They even had a Monte Carlo night, where you could play blackjack or dice like in a casino.”</p>
<p><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237030654,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237030654?profile=original" width="198" /></a>Making the most of his circumstances, Edmond reinvented himself, becoming a broker- bringing inmates with sources of cocaine together with his friends and associates back home who had the customers. “I wanted to make more money,” Edmond said. “At that time my mindset was I had to still have people look up to me and prove that I was still capable of making things happen.”</p>
<p>Ray wasn’t in Lewisburg two weeks before the FBI started getting reports that he was still dealing. The clever Edmond just moved his office to the penitentiary. He was doing the same thing from prison. And he found dealing drugs was even easier from prison.</p>
<p><strong><em><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/gangsters-inc-contributor-seth-ferranti">Seth Ferranti</a> is author of numerous true crime books, Rayful Edmond: Washington DC’s Most Notorious Drug Lord is one of his latest releases. You can order it online at all bookstores or visit Ferranti’s website <a href="http://www.gorillaconvict.com/" target="_blank">Gorilla Convict</a> to get your copy there. You can also follow Ferranti on Twitter <a href="https://twitter.com/SethFerranti" target="_blank">@SethFerranti</a></em></strong></p>
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Chester Wheeler Campbell: The 007 of the Detroit Drug Mob
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/chester-wheeler-campbell-the-007-of-the-detroit-drug-mob
2013-07-22T13:16:27.000Z
2013-07-22T13:16:27.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
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<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/chester-wheeler-campbell-the-007-of-the-detroit-drug-mob"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237028899,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237028899?profile=original" width="520" /></a>By Christian Cipollini</p>
<p>On February 6, 1975, a near collision between Chester Wheeler Campbell’s Oldsmobile and an on-duty Keego Harbor patrolman’s car would crack open the unbelievable tale of the era’s most dangerous enforcer to the drug lords and mob factions of Detroit. Murder, corruption, espionage and courtroom drama would ensue for two decades, with hit man for hire Chester Wheeler Campbell at the center of it all. Diary of a Motor City Hitman: The Chester Wheeler Campbell Story is the true, untold story of Detroit’s most dangerous enforcer – and the city in which he, and other gangland kingpins, controlled an underworld of narcotics and murder for hire.</p>
<p>Through narrative, never-before seen photographs, letters, evidence files and expert commentary, readers will enter :a time and place where organized crime was in transition, as was who would be in control of the biggest source of illicit cash – heroin and cocaine. Experience the people, places and things that create an environment where a man like Campbell could exist. Learn the strengths, weaknesses and mindset of Chester Wheeler Campbell. He was a master manipulator, a narcissist, a spy, a courier, a dealer, strong-arm, a ladies man, and of course… a hit man.</p>
<p><em><strong>From <a href="http://amzn.to/1beWdV6" target="_blank">Diary of a Motor City Hit Man</a>: The Chester Wheeler Campbell Story</strong></em></p>
<p><span class="font-size-4"><strong>Chapter 10 – Diary of a Hit Man</strong></span></p>
<p>What is more powerful than the intimidating collection of weapons Chester Campbell amassed? More fearsome than the steely-eyed look he gave? Of far more value than his expensive wardrobe or jewelry and property? Knowledge, that’s what. Nothing, not even an arsenal of guns or an unscrupulous attitude can produce the sort of fear in people that information can. From the dawn of time to modern day – knowledge makes oppressive governments paranoid, puts religious groups on edge, and assures corporations get jittery when business practices are called into question. All it takes is one pervasive individual to gather, contemplate and exercise greater senses of intelligence based on knowledge to either change something for the better, or for worse. Either way, the power of ‘knowing’ is worth more than gold. Acquiring intelligence, in more ways than one, was exactly how Chester Wheeler Campbell maintained an aura of power. His business was not corporate, religious, or governmental. Campbell’s was a direct result of, a necessity within the business of heroin.</p>
<p><a href="http://amzn.to/1beWdV6" target="_blank">Chester Wheeler Campbell</a> knew things. He had collected information so valuable, and potentially damning, that anyone and everyone from both sides of the law became fearful. That is the power of knowledge, and Campbell kept meticulous records of information, handwritten, fully exploited in notebooks. For Detroit’s organized criminals, the narcotics trade in particular; Chester Wheeler Campbell was indeed the most dangerous enforcer because he was armed with data, descriptions, and diagrams. He had been gathering data on everyone and anyone remotely involved in the underworld of Detroit and beyond. Years of intelligence gathering, really from the moment he exited the gate of Jackson Prison, Chester was not one to sit idle. His criminal acumen was second to none by the early 1970’s. Chester Wheeler Campbell scribbled, scrawled, drew, typed, and visually or audibly recorded every bit of information he could acquire on enemies and allies alike. It was like a diary of sorts.</p>
<p><a href="http://amzn.to/1beWdV6" target="_blank"><img class="align-left" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237029866,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237029866?profile=original" width="300" /></a>The <a href="http://amzn.to/1beWdV6" target="_blank">Motor City Hit Man</a> didn’t keep a diary of his everyday thoughts and feelings; he kept a journal of everything going on in the drug underworld of Detroit Michigan. His diary was not a memoir, but rather a collection of lists, addresses, properties, license plate numbers and phone numbers. Campbell’s notebooks were a reflection of just how corrupt, sinister and realistic the drug trade in Detroit’s underworld was.</p>
<p>The notes contained locations of witnesses, dealers, safe houses, and details for homes of law enforcement officials. Campbell kept track of unsolved murder and drug cases; he had access to cops on the kingpins’ payrolls. This is the sort of information that truly strikes fear into people. He gathered information in every conceivable manner. Surveillance, gossip, shadowing, payoffs, and keeping in the know by simply ‘talking’ to contacts, Campbell did it all. These were all easily applied methods of assembling intelligence. From mobsters to motorcycle clubs, hookers to hit men, pushers to pimps, Chester Wheeler Campbell made the rounds from Detroit to Cleveland, keeping tabs on everyone even remotely involved in underworld business. Everything was jotted down within the pages of his notebook collection.</p>
<p>When Orchard Lake police officers John Walsh and Edward Beyett removed the notebooks from Campbell’s rented Oldsmobile trunk – the true story began to emerge. Again, the police had no idea just how important the paperwork in Chester Wheeler Campbell’s possession really was at first glance. Over the coming weeks though, officials in neighboring Wayne County would jump on board the investigation and give insight they were already privy to on the Detroit strongarm.</p>
<p>One of the first items to draw law enforcement’s ire… a list of presumed future ‘hit’ targets, which included a well-known Assistant Prosecutor in Oakland County named L. Brooks Patterson. The initial review of Campbell’s notes led to the assumption that at least 300 names of individuals were recorded; presumably all potential targets of the assassin, yet in reality many were simply associates and contacts. Contrary to the often overly hyped press coverage at the time, Patterson’s name, as were many of the others, not explicitly noted in Campbell’s book as targets. In some cases, Patterson’s being one such example; names were simply scrawled on a page. Nevertheless, there were enough signs pointing to the danger of anyone having their name in any of Chester’s books. So, upon receiving the disturbing news that he was blatantly referenced in Campbell’s notes – Patterson was given around the clock extra security. This was unprecedented before <a href="http://amzn.to/1beWdV6" target="_blank">Chester Campbell</a> entered the picture. The standard way of law and order in both Oakland and Wayne counties was changing abruptly, thanks to the revelations gleaned from Chester’s collection of written materials.</p>
<p>Investigators were also very interested in what appeared to be a list of at least ten names recognized as belonging to unsolved-murder victim cases. All of the murders were considered drug-related, and Campbell was immediately presumed, in the minds of many who read and deciphered his notebooks, as somehow ‘involved’ in each case. There was no proof as such that Campbell had killed anyone on the list, of course, but the information was enough for cops to consider looking much deeper into each unexplained case.</p>
<p>Campbell had made notations of addresses where witnesses were being kept. He sometimes neatly – often times sloppily - wrote detailed, semi-detailed and a lot of ‘coded’ information, down to the license plates, of lawmen and dope peddlers alike. Many streets in and around the Pingree area were listed; safe houses, drug dens and protected witnesses. Nobody was off limits for the hit man. Everyone who heard the news or had been involved in examining the notebooks was, quite understandably, uneasy with the revelations of one Chester Wheeler Campbell. Though the man himself spoke very little to authorities, his possessions were loud proclamations of his dangerous presence in the Motor City and beyond.</p>
<p>Though the press sometimes alluded to Campbell possessing one, or a handful of notebooks – the fact was Chester Wheeler Campbell kept dozens of notebooks. They varied in size and content, many purchased for the bargain price of nineteen cents a piece. Within many of the pages were questions he’d asked himself. He used the pages in some for the purpose of accounting; payoffs, drug transactions and debts especially. He even maintained records of his own arrests… and associates who were implicated with him. Campbell also used some of the notebooks for record keeping in his ‘legitimate’ – legal assistant - work he performed for attorney Wilfrid Rice.</p>
<p><a href="http://amzn.to/1beWdV6" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237029888,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237029888?profile=original" /></a>Most unusual and disconcerting to authorities, however, was the realization that Campbell also had access to Michigan’s Law Enforcement Information Network system – LEIN. Yes, a hit man in Detroit’s underworld had the ability to access the official mechanism for “information sharing” – exclusive to the criminal justice system since its inception in 1967. This was both illegal and unprecedented. How did <a href="http://amzn.to/1beWdV6" target="_blank">Chester Wheeler Campbell</a> obtain LEIN records? The answer lay in a very sketchy, gray area that spanned across the lines of crime, law and politics. Somehow Campbell, or his drug lord employers, had ‘insiders’ working on their behalf. What he was using the LEIN for specifically – to identify the owners of every vehicle license plate he recorded.</p>
<p>Author <strong><span class="font-size-3">Christian Cipollini</span></strong> <span class="font-size-3"><span class="font-size-2">(right)</span></span>, is a freelance writer and journalist in the realms of entertainment, human interest and true crime history for over a decade. Cipollini has covered everything from community news to celebrities to organized crime through interview and narrative. Most recently, he has been added to the forum of ‘expert’ guest commentators for the Biography Channel documentary series “Gangsters: America’s Most Evil.” You can follow him on <a href="https://twitter.com/CipTheScallion" target="_blank">Twitter</a>. And you can buy his book <a href="http://amzn.to/1beWdV6" target="_blank">Diary of a Motor City Hit Man</a>: The Chester Wheeler Campbell Story at <a href="http://amzn.to/1beWdV6" target="_blank">Amazon</a>.</p>
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Black Caesar: The Rise of America’s Biggest Kingpin
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/black-caesar-the-rise-of-america-s-biggest-kingpin
2013-05-30T14:30:00.000Z
2013-05-30T14:30:00.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
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<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/black-caesar-the-rise-of-america-s-biggest-kingpin"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237014480,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237014480?profile=original" width="500" /></a>This is an excerpt from Ron Chepesiuk’s new biography on legendary gangster Frank Matthews. The book, titled Black Caesar: The Rise and Disappearance of America’s Biggest Kingpin, will uncover the true story of this international man of mystery who ran the American streets.</p>
<p>By Ron Chepesiuk</p>
<p><strong><span class="font-size-4">Who was Frank Matthews?</span></strong></p>
<p>Born in 1944 in Durham, North Carolina, Matthews left his hometown when he was a teenager, going first to Philadelphia and then to New York City. By the early 1970’s, Frank Matthews had become America's biggest drug kingpin. His organization, headquartered in Brooklyn, stretched across 21 states, and he became the only Black gangster to establish direct ties to the French Connection heroin pipeline. To quote William Callahan, a federal prosecutor assigned to the Matthews’ case, “Matthews was a pioneering giant of drug distribution.</p>
<p><a href="http://amzn.to/11MOIOU" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237014887,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237014887?profile=original" width="216" /></a>The $15 to 20 million Matthews (right) is believed to have disappeared with is roughly equivalent to the $90 to $100 in today's cash. The <a href="http://amzn.to/11MOIOU" target="_blank">book</a> explores various theories about the fate of Frank Matthews, and the author offers his own conclusion about the mystery.</p>
<p><strong><span class="font-size-4">The Excerpt:</span></strong></p>
<p>In jumping bail, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/drug-boss-frank-matthews">Matthews</a> left the people who had put up the money holding the bag, so to speak. To meet the $325,000 bond, a delegation of friends and family members led by Matthews’ Aunt Marzella had raised $100,000 and posted some of Matthews’ properties in New York City as collateral. On July 20, 1971, Federal judge Anthony J. Travia ordered theforfeiture of $325,000 bail that Matthews posted.</p>
<p>The bonding company, Public Service Mutual Inc. did not appear in court to protest the forfeiture. The press noted that the biggest signer of the bond was Julius Sterling Sales of Durham, who put up his business Jake’s Garage, estimated to be worth $100,000. To collect, thebonding company would have to obtain a foreclosure. In early July 1973, Barbara Hinton met with Edward Stanton, the representative of the insurance company that had posted Matthews’ bond.</p>
<p>Hinton told Stanton that there would be no need for his company to proceed legally against the properties her common-in-law husband had posted as collateral. If Frank is alive, he will re-pay your insurance company, Hinton assured Stanton. Sure enough, on July 19, 1973, two men delivered $225,100 in cash to Stanton’s insurance company. The bond was repaid.</p>
<p>The insurance company was not the only entity to which <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/drug-boss-frank-matthews">Black Caesar</a> owed money. The IRS was relentlessly pursuing the $7,009,165 in back taxes that Matthews owed the U.S. government. To recover some of the debt, the IRS auctioned Matthews’ Todt Hill mansion and its contents in mid-January 1974. The auctioneer was IRS agent Vincent DiPaolo, who oversaw an eight man staff that ran the liquidation sale for the IRS’s Manhattan office at 120 Church Street.</p>
<p>Undeterred by the abominable weather and the hazardous driving conditions, nearly a hundred prospective buyers, many of them requesting anonymity, crowded into the living room of the Matthews house at 7 Buttonwood Road. Nobody from the Matthews family attended the auction. “The auction realized just about what it should have,” said Claire Brown, a Staten Island auctioneer, who appraised the furnishings. That was Brown’s delicate way of saying that the IRS had to settle for a “pauper’s portion” of the true value of the contents it sold.</p>
<p><a href="http://amzn.to/11MOIOU" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237014901,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237014901?profile=original" width="368" /></a>For a mere $5,085, eleven people walked off with an assortment of furnishings, including everything from a commode chair to a 15-foot marble top end table valued at $400. A hefty young woman in skintight pants and expensive looking fur coat took home a huge credenza from the living room for $330. She declined to give her name to the press because she had called in sick to her boss in order to attend the auction.</p>
<p>`The single biggest chunk of cash, $1,500, was paid for the furnishings in the master bedroom: a mirror, night table, king-size bed, color TV with remote control, and a shoe chest with 25 compartments. The lowest bid of the evening was $55 for a collection of Christmas decorations, toys<br /> and a hobby horse.</p>
<p>Earlier, the IRS had tried to auction off the house, but the court gave priority to the lending institution for the mortgage. The Matthews house, valued at $250,000, sold for $128,000 at auction to Mrs. Ann Mae Cotogna of 925 Todt Hill Road. Paul Cotogna, Mrs. Cotogna’s husband, attended the auction, and he told the press that his wife’s purchase was a “business decision,” meaning the property could be re-sold.</p>
<p>After the IRS seized the Todt Hill property, Hinton and her three children moved to 3333 Henry Hudson Parkway. Eventually, the Matthews family settled into a house on 95th Street between Ditmas and Avenue B in a middle-class Brooklyn neighborhood. Bill Daley and Dexter Lezama, two kids not yet in their teens, befriended the Matthews children. Daley and Lezama, now in their 40s, remember Hinton and her children as “unpretentious, nice people” who “obviously had money but never flaunted it.” “Mrs. Hinton was beautiful and down-to-earth, and you would never know that she and the children were connected to Frank Matthews,” Lezama explained. “They were good neighbors.” Hinton owned a grocery store in the neighborhood.”</p>
<p>Of the three Matthews brothers, Daley and Lezama were the closest to Sean (nicknamed Man) because they were about the same age “Sean never talked about his father,” Daley explained. “I can only recall one time when the subject of our fathers came up. He asked me what my father did for a living. I explained that he was a police officer back in Jamaica. I asked him what his father did. Sean hesitated and then said, ‘My father is a gangster.’ I just looked at him and laughed, thinking he was joking. But<br /> now I know he was serious.”</p>
<p>The Hinton home was nicely furnished, but both Daley and Lezama thought it odd that it did not contain any photos of the father. “We never saw anything in the house that indicated who their father was,” Daley recalled. “Come to think of it, they never talked about him.” Eventually, the Matthews, Daley and Lezama families all moved out of the neighborhood, and they lost touch. “I heard through the grapevine that Sean later got into trouble with dogs… dog fighting, I think,” Lezama said. “He had a Doberman when he was living in our neighborhood. I would love to see him again, He was a good guy.”</p>
<p><strong>Go to <a href="http://www.frankmatthewsbook.com" target="_blank">www.frankmatthewsbook.com</a> for more on this book or straight to <a href="http://amzn.to/11MOIOU" target="_blank">Amazon.com</a> to order <a href="http://amzn.to/11MOIOU" target="_blank">it</a>.</strong></p>
<p><strong>Check out the Crime Beat radio show for a discussion on the Frank Matthews story on June 6, 2013. Go to <a href="http://www.artistfirst.com/crimebeat.htm" target="_blank">www.artistfirst.com/crimebeat.htm</a>. All shows are archived for 24-7 listening.</strong></p>
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Profile of Baltimore drug boss Maurice "Peanut" King
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/baltimore-drug-boss-maurice
2011-01-09T11:00:00.000Z
2011-01-09T11:00:00.000Z
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<p>By Seth Ferranti (<a href="http://gorillaconvict.com/" target="_blank">www.gorillaconvict.com</a>)<br /> <br /> In the late 1970s and early 1980s, if you were in the drug game in Baltimore, then you answered to one man, Peanut King. He was the man in more ways than one- trendsetter, drug dealer, high roller, ladies’ man- these were only a few of the titles Peanut King carried. His name has gone down in infamy in Charm City as one of the baddest, boldest, smoothest, and most blatant to ever do it. He dressed stylish like a pimp, pumped heroin like the French Connection, and played the game the way it was meant to be played, city wide and on multiple levels. Portraying himself as a big time gambler who frequented Atlantic City and won millions, Peanut King had the style, flash, class, and substance to set himself apart from other dealers of the era. He also had a vicious team behind him. One that would put in the necessary work to keep Peanut on the winning side. The Peanut King Mob was well known up and down the east coast as one of the most notorious crews in Baltimore. They were well respected and feared, led by one of the biggest names in the drug game, street legend Peanut King. An original gangster who rose out of B-More’s rough and rowdy streets to become lord of the heroin trade.<br /> <br /> In the streets of Charm City, Peanut was the recognized shot caller. “He was making $25 million a year,” says the dude from Holbrook, who was around during Nut’s reign. “Peanut King had Hoffman and Holbrook, that was the most lucrative area. He was putting seven to ten percent pure on the street. He had a better cut on the heroin. They’d be coming from D.C., Virginia, all over, to get that bang for their buck.” Most dealers put out three percent pure in that era, so the heroin that Nut’s people put out was of a higher quality, and with the better product, Nut quickly cornered the market. The Peanut King Mob sold a lot of heroin, and they broke it down into $60 and $70 bags. The feds estimated his mob made $5 million a year through their drug business. That was a nice sum. The money was too big to be ignored.<br /> <br /> Trafficking spread to dozens of operations around the city. Junkies walked dazed through the streets looking for something to put in their veins. Nut controlled the market from Cherry Hill way over on the other side of the Hanover Street Bridge, to Streeper Street in Southeast Baltimore, where the rowhouses were bunched tightly with marble steps. In the front stoop culture that existed on the fringes of civilization, Nut ruled. Everybody knew what was going down, but the city supported Nut. In ghettos like Cherry Hill his mob made the lions share of money. The junkies were committing all the crimes- needles in the gutter, automatic gunfire in the streets, news in the morning paper of another overnight killing but Nut was making all the money. Nothing mattered to Peanut, he was above it all, he transcended the streets. As the king of Baltimore he clocked mad paper and had the run of the city with its inhabitants at his beck and call.<br /> <br /> Peanut possessed an exoticness that was unique in the ghetto. The man drove a DeLorean which was unheard of in B-More. He brought that exotic-type shit into style. Many dudes bit his style, but Nut was the original. The innovator. He had a huge house in Silver Spring, Maryland. It’s said the house had no windows, just surveillance cameras on all angles of the house. Nut wasn’t taking any chances with security. He was a little paranoid due to his big name, and he wasn’t trying to get caught unaware. Make no mistake about Nut, he was a business man, but the five-foot-nine, 180 pound man would handle his business if and when necessary. But his M.O. was his extravagance. His demeanor wasn’t violent, it was all Charm City slickster. A pimp in the drug game that exuded true O.G. class.<br /> <br /> In the early 1980s Maurice “Peanut” King of East Baltimore took drug dealing down a sinister new alley. At his peak, King headed a $50 million-a-year heroin ring, running it from an executive boardroom with computers to keep track of all the money. At North Avenue and Chester Street, he installed a fully mirrored gymnasium, two universal workout systems, punching bags, a whirlpool, plus something the cops had never seen before- a room where Peanut could adjust the weather in his little universe. “Yeah,” said the city’s top narcotics cop, Captain Joe Newman. “They could make it rain inside the room. They could make the wind blow. There was something called jungle mist.” Little Wayne can make it rain, but can he make it jungle mist like Peanut King? The man truly was before his time. A P. Diddy of the drug game, merchandising and marketing his brand into all types of businesses.<br /> <br /> King and Meredith Market and Deli on East North Avenue was one of three stores owned by Joe Dancer, Magic Meredith, and Nut. He was one of the first drug dealers to try and go legit by investing in businesses in his community. He was reinvesting in the hood. Nut had a Robin Hood image in the ghetto, and the people loved him and worshiped the ground he walked on. He was a mythical type figure, an icon. He was looked up to and admired for his classy and extravagant ways. Dudes in the city emulated his style of dress and wore bedroom slippers that cost $150 just to be like Nut. That was his thing- being a trendsetter and hood star. He reveled in his celebrity. It’s said he used to step out of limo’s in front of the clubs wearing flawless diamond pinkie rings that Nut said cost 40 grand. All lights were on him as he shined brightly, a lord of B-More’s underworld. Because for real he wasn’t Robin Hood, he was in the hood.<br /> <br /> “By 81-82, he done took over Baltimore. He bought some shops and had some clubs on the strip,” the old head remembers. “He had some clothing stores he used for fronts. He laundered all his money through businesses. He bailed people out through his bail bonds to clean money.” Nut was a gangster, but he was so much more. He saw the big picture and took it all in, incorporating all aspects under his control. He knew where his niche was and he made an all out effort to get in where he fit in. “He had a good chunk of Baltimore. He owned it all. A real good chunk,” recalls the old head. In his book, Alfred Reed wrote of Peanut, “I used to see him get to his store on North Avenue, Grocery and Deli on the side. Peanut had a lot of class to be a drug dealer. He was very smart, and he could feel you. Once I brought my nephew to personally meet Peanut. Nut came down the steps to meet him, and my nephew said after he met Peanut, ‘He looks like a gangster.’” That’s because Peanut King was a gangster from the old school. He was well versed in gangster decorum and etiquette, and he knew how to carry it like a man. Back in the day there was honor among thieves, and Nut epitomized that ideal. To him the street code was paramount, but Nut also made his own rules<br /> <br /> Peanut King revolutionized the drug game by taking Nicky Barnes’ use of kids to another level. Nut used teenagers who, unlike the kids used by Barnes were wise to the drug game and were dedicated to their jobs. Furthermore, to make their jobs work more efficiently, Nut bought mopeds for all of his young workers to get back and forth from the stash spots to customers. The mopeds gave the youngsters mobility, agility, and speed in transporting the merchandise to the customers. With Nut it was all about good customer service. Teens in Russell brand sweat pants, Coach shorts, and bedroom slippers, the style Nut made popular, became a common sight on Baltimore’s inner-city streets. By forming the children’s brigade Nut took his big time narcotics trade where no one had gone before. He bought 18 Mopeds from an East Baltimore cycle shop and had his lieutenants give them to school kids, some as young as 11, and then paid the kids up to $500 a week to run heroin for him. Peanut thus insulated himself from easy arrest and the kids made a fortune. The city was also horribly afflicted by this adolescent army, swollen with unimagined money, numb to all sense of morality, disdainful of sitting through school or finding some chump job slinging hamburgers when their ship seemed to have come in. And Peanut King was the captain of that ship. A ghetto pirate with that Pirates of the Caribbean flavor.<br /> <br /> “He had kids between fifteen and eighteen, about 30 or 40 of them on Mopeds, selling heroin,” the Holbrook dude says. “This was one of his strategic moves because it sped up his deliveries with the transfer between money and drugs. The lure with the kids was that if you worked for Peanut King, you got a moped, so all the kids wanted to work for Peanut. He always had hundreds of kids who wanted to work for him. This was his stroke of genius.” The use of teenagers by Nut caused a new law to go on the books in Maryland though. It became a requirement for anyone driving a moped to have a valid driver’s license. That gave the beat police a reason to stop the kids on mopeds, taking a lot of Nut’s kids off their bikes.<br /> <br /> <a href="{{#staticFileLink}}9236990261,original{{/staticFileLink}}"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9236990261,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9236990261?profile=original" width="320" /></a>“Nut was big from the early to late 70s into the 80s. He was always present,” the young hustler comments. “In 1980 a kilo cost like $130,000. It was part of that French Connection/Nicky Barnes hookup.” If you weren’t hustling for Nut, it was dangerous to hustle. “You couldn’t sell nothing,” the young hustler remembers. “If you were a hopper, you knew where it ended up. Nut wasn’t having it. It was about them putting their hands on you. It was just Nut. You respected him.” Nut was instrumental in the youth basketball leagues as well sponsoring teams and tournaments. His grass roots efforts led to the development of players like Sam Cassell, Carmelo Anthony and Rudy Gay, who all made it to the NBA from inner-city Baltimore.<br /> <br /> “His crew were real avid basketball dudes. They ran the dope leagues,” the young hustler says, and locals remember playground legends like Skip Wise lighting up the games with his signature “honey dip.” Peanut’s crew used to style and profile over at O’Dell’s too. O’Dell’s was known as the baddest club on the strip where all the players, hustlers, ballers, dime pieces, and pimps congregated. “O’Dell’s was like Studio 54, the hood version. It was over on North Avenue between St. Paul and Charles Streets. The line would go around the block. It kicked like that from 1975 to 1985. They had a million dollar sound system. Thursday nights were the nights,” the young hustler says. It was rumored that Nut owned the club. The hustlers would be lined up in their furs and jewels, pimped out. It was a beautiful time in Charm City. Gangsters stunted in all their glory.<br /> <br /> Nut’s crew was different, sharp but professional; passersby would have thought they were businessmen. They were that fresh. Peanut always had a reserved table and women all around him. His crew was deep up in O’Dell’s. “The club had a radio commercial which said, ‘The underground is open. You’ll know if you belong,’” the young hustler says. “And Nut and his crew definitely belonged. They were like royalty up in that joint. Police would be up in there dancing and everything. It was crazy.” The photo booth captured the moments, even the moments with Nut. Him sitting in the wicker chair like it was a throne, his enforcers and colleagues surrounding him. Heavy was the head that wore the crown.<br /> <br /> “Nut was well protected. He always had like three or four dudes around him,” the old head says. “You had to go through these guys if you wanted to talk to Nut. He was the man for real. He had a piece of the action of every club on the strip. The clubs, strip joints, gambling. Nut had it all.” Baltimore Street at that time was the strip and Peanut allegedly had his hand in the inner workings of most establishments in the area. “He took over prostitution on Pratt and Monroe Streets and sold a lot of heroin down there. That’s when Lafayette was ringing. The big money was made at the projects. The money generated off his name was crazy. Twenty to thirty thousand a day coming off of one corner selling halves and wholes,” explains the young hustler. The heroin spots in B-More were bubbling, making the Peanut King Mob crazy cash.<br /> <br /> “Peanut King was bigger than the mayor because he took care of the ghetto,” the old head remembers. “He did things in different ways. He was a business man with morals. He showed love. He had big Christmas dinners in Lafayette, pulled up a U-Haul van and gave away presents for the kids, so how can you say something bad about a man like that? He was like the savior of the ghetto. He was one of the best con men in the business. If he could fool society and get them on his side while pushing dope and employing ruthless killers, his game was tight. He knew how to play every angle.” Peanut King was a man of many talents. He had the foresight to see a problem before it evolved. It’s said he made a lot of cases go away through his team of lawyers. “His lawyers were crooked as a two dollar bill,” the old head recalls. “They laundered his money and made all of his business dealings look legit. Anything big that was going down was going down because of Peanut. He was the king.” But like every king, Nut eventually fell.<br /> <br /> Peanut King was the lord of Baltimore’s heroin trade throughout the 1970s and into the 1980s. He has gone down as a certified street legend in Charm City and all up and down the east coast. There have been many dudes featured in street DVD’s, magazines, and on BET’s American Gangster whose legends don’t compare to Peanut King’s. Not to diminish who they were but Peanut King’s star shines brighter. His stature and reputation is recognized by the many respected men who have played this so called game. In the belly of the beast he is widely known and acknowledged as a true original gangster. The man was an innovator whose business techniques in the heroin trade revolutionized the game. His swagger, flamboyance, demeanor and style has often been copied but no one can really do it like Peanut did. He left an undeniable mark on the streets, and his legend has reverberated, elevating him to mythical proportions in gangster lore and in the prisons, the only place where it really counts. In the pantheon of gangsterdom, Peanut King’s legend looms large. Taking its place next to the giants of gangster history.<br /> <br /> <a href="{{#staticFileLink}}9236985670,original{{/staticFileLink}}"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9236985670,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9236985670?profile=original" /></a><strong>Check out the rest of this story and more in Street Legends Vol. 2.</strong></p>
<p><strong>Order it today.</strong><br /> <br /> "<em>Have you ever watched American Gangster on BET? Author Seth "Soul Man" Ferranti brings American Gangster from BET to the books in Street Legends. He chronicles the six most feared and respected gangsters who live by the creed death before dishonor.</em>" Rawsistaz Reviewers<br /> <br /> "<em>Street legends is aptly named as it details the lives of six of the most notorious black gangstas in American history. The stories will leave you in awe- this shit is so real it reads just like a timeless gangsta flick. The book was on point from cover to cover.</em>" DaRevew.com<br /> <br /> "<em>Incarcerated author Seth Ferranti has compiled a who's who of the late 20th Century's most infamous kingpins in Street Legends, a compendium series documenting crack-era America's criminal enterprises. Ferranti has fashioned a rogues' gallery of drug lords that is as compelling as it is concise. This is a must read for true-crime enthusiasts.</em>" Harold Rodriguez, Smooth Magazine<br /> <br /> "<em>Gorilla Convict is evolving into the most potent voice of the streets. Street Legends is the apple of a street soldier's eye.</em>" Walter "King Tut" Johnson, NYC Original Gangster<br /> <br /> <a href="{{#staticFileLink}}9236990852,original{{/staticFileLink}}"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9236990852,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9236990852?profile=original" /></a><strong>Check out what they are saying about Street Legends Vol. 1:</strong><br /> <br /> "<em>In this gripping gangstaography Seth Ferranti manages to once again take you somewhere you don't want to go.</em>" - Don Diva Magazine<br /> <br /> "<em>Seth Ferranti is a gifted author that brings the realness of the street to the pages of his books. Street Legends is a classic book that should be read twice by any young hustler that's thinking about joining the game of life and death.</em>" - Freeway Ricky Ross, (from BET's American Gangster)<br /> <br /> "<em>Street Legends is a classic book that will never leave my personal collection. It's definitely one of the realest books ever written about the rise and fall of some of the top kingpins in American history</em>." - Jimmy DaSaint, author of Money Desires Regrets and on Everything I Love.<br /> <br /> "<em>If you ever were a hustler or just thought you wanted to be good at it, you will need to read this first. The streets are rough. This author, Seth Ferranti, engages your mind like a skill saw.</em>" - Street Elements Magazine<br /> <br /> <strong>You can order the book at <a href="http://www.gorillaconvict.com/" target="_blank">gorillaconvict.com</a> or at <a href="http://astore.amazon.com/gangstersinc-20" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc. Amazon.com store</a> for $15.00 plus shipping & handling or request it at a bookstore near you.</strong><br /> <br /> <strong>ORDER PRISON STORIES TODAY</strong><br /> <br /> <a href="{{#staticFileLink}}9236990874,original{{/staticFileLink}}"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9236990874,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9236990874?profile=original" /></a>Prison Stories is the hottest prison book of Y2K10, taking over where "In the Belly of the Beast" and Hothouse took off. Check out what the book reviewers of the major magazine are saying:<br /> <br /> "<em>Plenty of blood is shed in this intense record of the harsh realities of the penal system.</em>" - Smooth Magazine<br /> <br /> "<em>Prison Stories outlaw rawness mixes well with hip-hop's street essence. Fans of Iceberg Slim's pimp tales or HBO's 'OZ' series will really dig this.</em>" - Elemental Magazine<br /> <br /> "<em>Prison Stories reveals a world of fearless convicts, inconspicuous snitches and deadly gang rivalry</em>." - The Ave Magazine<br /> <br /> "<em>An episode of 'OZ' couldn't capture prison drama the way Soul Man does in Prison Stories.</em>" - Don Diva Magazine<br /> <br /> Find out for yourself by ordering the seminal prison book of this decade. Take a journey behind the walls and experience convict life and culture through Soul Man's stories and insights. You can order the book at gorillaconvict.com or at the Gangsters Inc. Amazon.com store for $15.00 plus shipping & handling or request it at a bookstore near you.</p>
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Profile: Bonanno crime family soldier Benjamin Ruggiero
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/bonanno-soldier-benjamin
2010-11-26T21:23:28.000Z
2010-11-26T21:23:28.000Z
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<div><p style="text-align:center;"><img src="{{#staticFileLink}}9236992100,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="" /></p>
<p><br /> By David Amoruso<br /> Posted in 2001<br /> <br /> Benjamin 'Lefty Guns' Ruggiero was one of the true Cosa Nostra Mafioso, a guy who was old school and knew how Mafia politics worked. Lefty was a Bonanno soldier who was feared and respected by his fellow Mafioso and in the end Lefty showed them all, when he just wouldn't break Omerta. Most of you probably know Lefty from the movie "Donnie Brasco" in which Lefty was played by Al Pacino, it's a great movie but the truth gets tempered with for viewing pleasure. The following is the true story of Benjamin 'Lefty Guns' Ruggiero.<br /> <br /> <img style="float:right;" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9236992492,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="" />Lefty grew up just a few blocks from Little Italy and he never left. When he got older he moved into the apartment complex called knickerbocker village on monroe street a few blocks south of Little Italy. Lefty would soon be involved in criminal business and became connected to the Bonanno Crime Family. Lefty owned a social club at 43 Madison street where he would meet with other Mafioso and connected guys. One of those Mafioso who would drop by was Tony Mirra (picture on the right) a Bonanno Family soldier who would introduce Lefty to his friend Donnie Brasco. To Mirra and Lefty Donnie Brasco seemed an allright guy, something that would cuase them and their Family a lot of trouble later on.<br /> <br /> Lefty had not served time in prison, he had been arrested many times for extortion and theft but had always beaten the rap. Lefty's only real problem was that he was a degenerate gambler. He even had to pay of his gambling debts before he could become a made man, it was delayed untill he had fully paid. But in the summer of 1977, when Lefty was in his early 50s, Lefty became a 'made' man in the Bonanno Crime Family. Lefty became a soldier under Capo Mike Sabella and would run the bookmaking operation for Bonanno Family Underboss Nicky Marangello. In his pre 'made' man years, Lefty Ruggiero had allready made a reputation for himself being a stone killer, clipping between 25 and 30 people. Lefty was the epitome of the wiseguy. He was at it 24 hours a day, scheming, on the street in wiseguy situations he was sharp and tough and that's what earned him a lot of respect from the other wiseguy's.<br /> <br /> Lefty soon became close with Donnie Brasco, Lefty was old school and schooled Donnie Brasco in the ways of La Cosa Nostra. This created a problem between him and Tony Mirra, because technically Donnie belonged to Mirra. Donnie himself preferred being under Lefty and so the two themselves decided that they would say that Lefty was the first to 'claim' Donnie so that Mirra had no right to put Donnie under his wing. Offcourse Mirra wasn't having it and several sitdowns took place over the 'Donnie Brasco' situation. In the end Lefty won and Donnie Brasco was under him. Lefty liked Donnie a lot, seeing a good earner and potential 'made' guy. In the following years they would become very close and Donnie would pass up a certain percentage of money from all his schemes to Lefty.<br /> <br /> <img style="float:right;" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9236992870,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="" />After some good years the Bonanno Crime Family was on it's way to a new Family war. On July 1979 then Bonanno Family Boss Carmine Galante was whacked, this shook up the entire Family and changed things drasticly. When Galante got whacked, Rusty Rastelli was appointed new Boss, he would run the Family from prison. Lefty's Capo Mike Sabella was demoted to soldier and his crew was taken over by Capo Dominick "Sonny Black" Napolitano (picture on the right). Lefty was sent for by Sonny Black and got the choice if he wanted to be under Capo Sonny Black or Capo Joe Massino, Sonny Black said he would like to have Lefty under him and Lefty agreed and became a soldier in Sonny Black's crew. But all was not well. The hit on Galante had divided the Family in different factions, one faction supporting Rusty Rastelli as new boss the other opposing, a Family war was on it's way. Sonny Black's crew was supporting Rastelli along with Capo's: Joey Massino, Sally Farrugia and consigliere Steve Cannone. Opposing Rastelli as new boss were Capo's: Caesar Bonventre, Philip "Philip Lucky" Giaccone, Dominick "Big Trin" Trinchera and Alphonse "Sonny Red" Indelicato. Lefty was getting ready for the orders and do what he was supposed to do as a soldier: kill.<br /> <br /> Several times Lefty was ready to whack out a Capo from the other faction when he got orders to abort, they had a plan to whack out all the Capo's of the other faction in one clean hit. The three Capo's of the opposing faction were summoned to a peace meeting to patch up differences at a catering establishment. Inside the restaurant the three Capo's were whacked by Lefty, Jimmy Legs, Nicky Santora and Bobby Capazzio. No bodies were found. One of the Capo's of the other faction did not attend that 'meeting' because he was in jail, but Capo Caesar Bonventre had decided to come over to the Rastelli faction anyway. Later on one of the bodies was found by the police, it was a mistake by Joey Massino who was supposed to take care of making the body 'disappear', the bodies were supposed to be chopped up and thrown away. But eventough the body was found, there were no leads to whom might have killed him so the Rastelli faction did not worry.<br /> <br /> <img style="float:right;" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9236992692,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="" />All seemed well, finally, for Lefty and the Bonanno Family. The Family was at peace and business was back to normal. Untill one day when Lefty and Sonny Black were just hanging out in the social club and some F.B.I. agents came in. They brought pictures and a message: "Donnie Brasco (picture on the right) was an undercover F.B.I. agent". After a few moments the agents left leaving Lefty and Sonny Black stunned as they were trying to look for 'Candid Camera', at first they didn't believe it, they thought it was a trick to cause tension in a finally peacefull Family. But truth or not Sonny Black took measures and started making phonecalls. Every top Mafioso was briefed about the situation and at one point pictures of Brasco were sent to other Crime Family's so they could be on the look out. Being an old school Mafioso Lefty knew that this situation would end up getting him whacked, he had brought Donnie into the Family and he was close to him. Sonny Black also knew this would end in a negative way. And they were right.<br /> <br /> Soon after Sonny Black was missing, the F.B.I. knew that dead wiseguy's weren't of much use during a trial and so on August 30 1981, they snatched Lefty from the street and arrested him while he was coming out of his appartment. There allready was a contract out on Lefty's life. Lefty was offered to enter the Witness Protection program if he would testifie, Lefty declined and was tried and later convicted to 20 years in prison. A big difference with the movie "Donnie Brasco" where we are left to assume that Lefty was 'sent for' and whacked, which in reality didn't happen. In 1992 after serving 13 years in prison because he would not break omerta, Lefty was freed and out on parole, living his life untill he died of cancer on Thanksgiving Day, 1995. On his deathbed, according to one old friend, Lefty threatened to spit in the faces of movie people who offered him $1 million to interview him for the Donnie Brasco promos. A very different attitude if you compare it to someone like Salvatore 'Sammy The Bull' Gravano who not only snitched and joined the Witness Protection program but also wrote a best selling book about his life, while he was setting up his multi million extacy drugring.<br /> <br /> In his book about being undercover in the Mafia, Joseph D. Pistone a.k.a. Donnie Brasco quoted a conversation he and another undercover agent had with Lefty when they were undercover. In this conversation Lefty makes a great comment:<br /> <br /> Undercover agent: "Lefty, I understand how we all like to make money. But what is the actual advantage of being a wiseguy?"<br /> <br /> Lefty: "Are you kidding? What the....Donnie, don't you tell this guy nothing?<br /> Tony, as a wiseguy you can lie, you can cheat, you can steal, you can kill people: LEGITIMATELY.<br /> You can do any goddamn thing you want, and nobody can say anything about it. Who wouldn't want to be a wiseguy?".<br /> <br /> And I think that's about it, Benjamin "Lefty Guns" Ruggiero was one of the few Mafioso whose life was in danger and on it's way to prison who abided by the rules which he lived by most of his life, not breaking omerta and taking it like a 'made' man, someone who didn't look for excuses or an easy ride, he was Cosa Nostra and he didn't stop because he could get whacked or sent to prison, he knew that that was what being a Mafioso was all about.</p>
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Drug Boss: Roland
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/drug-boss-roland-pops-bartlett
2010-11-19T15:45:52.000Z
2010-11-19T15:45:52.000Z
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<div><p>By David Amoruso<br /> Posted March 20, 2007<br /> <br /> Roland Bartlett reputedly was the biggest drug boss of Philadelphia in the 1980s. His organization consisted of around 60 members, and had seperate crews which consisted of salesmen, cutting crew supervisors, and enforcers. Bartlett himself had started out as a streetdealer for the Philadelphia Black Mafia, and had worked his way up. Eventually he developed connections with the Gambino Crime Family from New York, from which he purchased heroin. Bartlett also had connections to the Genovese Crime Family. His drug organization ran Philly from 1980 till Bartlett’s arrest in 1987. Bartlett’s organization made close to $7 million per year during that time.<br /> <br /> Bartlett didn’t mind showing his wealth. He owned several residences in Philadelphia, a $750,000 home in New Jersey, two homes and property in a Susquehanna County resort development, the club Fleetwood in Philadelphia, twelve racehorses and thoroughbred breeding horses, two Mercedes Benz automobiles and other automobiles. Black youths from the neighborhood looked up to Bartlett because of his power and riches. Bartlett’s power was so huge that he did not pay the Philadelphia La Cosa Nostra Family, led by Nicky Scarfo, a street tax. Bartlett was a vicious man. When his neighbor filed a lawsuit against him for failing to clean up after his dog, Bartlett paid two underlings $5,000 to kill the man, they succeeded.<br /> <br /> On March 11, 1987 Bartlett’s organization was broken up, twenty-two men were arrested, including Bartlett himself. He was imprisoned for 35 years without the possibility of parole. On November 29, 1988 he was also convicted for ordering the murder of his neighbor, and sentenced to life in prison. Bartlett died in prison on January 15, 1990.<br /> </p>
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