coastal war between Norteños and Sureños

 

on Aug. 14, when a group of teenage Norteño gang members pulled out a gun and shot two rival Sureños on a quiet residential street in broad daylight. Fear prompted Luis' mother, Teresa Mendez, to bring him and his sister Noela to a community meeting Tuesday night, which was organized by the San Mateo County Sheriff's Office in the wake of the shooting. "I want to know how to prevent situations like this," said Mendez, who believes there are gang members on her son's youth soccer team. Luis has told her he knows kids in his class who have already become Norteños and Sureños like their older brothers or cousins. But she didn't know her son had been offered drugs until a reporter asked him about it. It was at the Pillar Ridge mobile home community, a known gang hotspot, Luis said. "They were, like, 15 or 16," he said. "They told me they had some extra if I wanted it." More than 300 Coastsiders packed into a meeting room Tuesday for a series of Advertisement presentations that amounted to a master class on gang warfare. Locals were shocked to learn that Half Moon Bay is immersed in an all-out coastal battle between Norteños and Sureños, who have been threatening each other for months with coded graffiti in plain sight. One recent tagger painted the number "187," a reference to the California Penal Code section on murder. Retaliation is now a major concern and the Sheriff's Office has beefed up patrols. "It's a war that's going to be going on for some time, but it's a war that's worth fighting," Sheriff Greg Munks said. Officers have arrested four suspects: 21-year-old Christian Serrano DeLeon, who police believe is the gunman; Mason Paul Wessel, 19; Marco Antonio Barajas, 18; and a 17-year-old resident of Moss Beach. But even arresting every gang member in town won't make the problem disappear, officials acknowledge. They need the community's help to address the deeper crisis that's taken root when young people grow up together, go to the same schools, and end up joining rival gangs. Older gang members reach out to younger kids in middle school and offer them acceptance and a seductive feeling of power and belonging in the most vulnerable period in their young lives, according to sheriff's Deputy Mike Smyser. "They don't have much money. You can take a kid into town and buy him a cheeseburger, and you've got a friend," Smyser said. Meanwhile, their parents (mostly first-generation farmworkers) are often too distracted catch the warning signs before it's too late. They work long hours and don't notice changes in their children, Mendez said. "Latinos, we have to work a lot, but we don't really pay attention to the kids. We leave them around too much," she said. Smyser has spent 10 years tracking gang activity and juvenile crime as a school resource officer on the San Mateo County coast. He said the shooting was a major wake-up call. "I've seen fights with fists and fights with sticks. But I've never seen fights with guns," he said. Smyser has counted about 50 Norteños and 40 Sureños on the coast, two rival Mexican-American gangs that originated in the California prison system. They go by local names like Media Luna Norteños, Coastside Locos, and neighborhood-specific gangs like Moonridge Outlaws. Those numbers are modest as compared with gang sets in East Palo Alto or Redwood City, according to the Sheriff's Office, which estimates 2,000 confirmed gang members in San Mateo County affiliated with more than 50 gangs. In a small town like Half Moon Bay, it's not a mystery who's in a gang or where they congregate, said Smyser. A quick search on YouTube for one local gang turns up a video filled with youthful Norteños flashing gang signs, drinking beer and showing off their Half Moon Bay gang tattoos. By the time they reach high school, kids are already sporting gang colors: red for Norteños, blue for Sureños. Drug dealers wear purple. Half Moon Bay High School counselor Kira Gangsei said she's worked with many gang members to turn their lives around -- but it's not easy. "They don't care about school as much. Getting involved with drugs, selling drugs -- once that happens, it's harder to get them back on track," she said. The high school uses a number of classes, workshops and nonprofit programs to teach students about the dangers of gang life, drinking and unhealthy relationships. Many are led by former gang members. Now it's the community's turn. The shooting has already prompted neighborhoods to come together and form Community Watch groups, and locals have volunteered to paint over graffiti and mentor youth with the Sheriff's Activities League. "I'm not going anywhere. If it has to be me standing my ground, then yes, I'll embrace it," said Brett Bowers, a father of two who lives in the neighborhood where the shooting occurred.

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Dave Courtney believes the killer of his murdered stepson attended his funeral.

After burying gunned-down Genson, 23, at a huge funeral in south-east London, the notorious underworld leader of 'The Firm' mob said he could not sleep in the knowledge that the killer remains at large.

Clad in white, the 53-year-old was surrounded by minders from the Outlaw gang as he paid his last respects with his devastated wife and mother of Genson, Jenny.

Mourning: Dave Courtney with Genson's mother Jenny at the funeral of the gunned-down cage fighter

Murdered: Genson Courtney, 23, was shot dead while he waited in his car outside of his girlfriend's home in Greenwich

Genson, nicknamed 'G-Man', was ambushed as he got into his VW Golf outside his girlfriend's home in Greenwich, south-east London in July.

The victim, whose stepfather has written books about gangland violence, was blasted by a lone gunman in the head and shoulder before his assailant fled on foot.

Police suspect a major drugs baron owed thousands of pounds by Genson ordered his execution just before 11pm on Sunday.

There is also a theory he could have been lured to the area after being caught up in an ongoing feud between gangs.

But the Daily Star on Sunday newspaper says some sources from Genson's gang claimed to them that the shooting had been ordered by the young man's own stepfather.

They claim Mr Courtney, from Plumstead, South London, had a grudge against his stepson after he was beaten by him in a fight following a family row.

But the former debt collector, who claims to have been shot, stabbed and had his nose bitten off, rubbished the accusations.

'this has nothing to do with me and I honestly don't think ,y past has had any influences on my kid.

'Whether I'm gonna get chastised for this or not, I was aware what he was and I just tried to make him do that as much as possible. I could not have stopped this and I definitely didn't make it happen.'

The Daily Star on Sunday said the gangster paid £2,500 for the coffin's plot in the send-off, which cost £4,00 and was held in Eltham.

Killer on the loose: 'Dodgy' Dave Courtney, with wife Jenny, says he cannot sleep knowing that the person responsible for Genson's death is still out there

Send-off: Hundreds turned out to pay their respects to the 23-year-old, whose execution police suspect was ordered by a drug baron

Courtney, who was jailed in the Eighties for attacking five men with a meat cleaver, also boasts that he has been involved in assault and murder.

He often focuses on his links with Reggie Kray and the infamous criminal Lenny McLean and is said to be a central figure in a loose collection of villains who refer to themselves as The Firm.

He refers to himself as Dave Courtney OBE – 'One Big Ego' - and has a painted depiction of himself as a knight on his house.

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THE stepson of celebrity gangster Dave Courtney was executed this morning in a suspected hit over drug debts.

Genson Courtney, 23, was ambushed as he got into his car outside his girlfriend's home.

A gunman blasted him in the head and shoulder before escaping on foot.

Genson was taken to hospital where he was pronounced dead at 3.43am.

Cops suspect a major drug baron owed thousands of pounds by Genson ordered his killing just before 11pm last night in Greenwich, South East London.

Villains

His stepdad "Dodgy" Dave Courtney, who brought him up as his own son, and his singer mum Jenny were said to be devastated.

Debt collector and former actor Courtney has written a number of books about his underworld exploits in which he claims to have been shot, stabbed and had his nose bitten off.

He organised the funerals of East End gang bosses Ronnie and Reggie Kray and boasts he was the inspiration for Vinnie Jones's debt-collecting hardman in movie Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels.

Courtney is a central figure in a loose collection of villains who refer to themselves as The Firm and revels in his image as a hardman.

The colourful self-proclaimed gangster lives in a house in Plumstead, South London, called Camelot. It is decorated with Union Jack flags and a large painted depiction of himself as a knight with a large knuckle duster.

Police are now braced for a wave of "tit-for-tat" shootings by Courtney's cronies hell-bent on revenge.


Gangster ... Dave Courtney
The Met's Operation Trident are investigating last night's shooting.

Detective Chief Inspector Mark Gower said : "At this early stage it is believed a male suspect may have run from the scene in the direction of Christchurch Way, SE10, shortly after the shooting.

"I am appealing to anyone who may have seen or heard anything suspicious to contact the police.

"I would like to reassure anyone concerned about contacting the police that Trident has great expertise in protecting witnesses and there are a huge variety of measures that can be put in place to protect you."

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Alleged Vancouver gangster named as fatal shooting victim

Mounties have named the man targeted and shot to death in North Surrey over the weekend as Christopher Jai Reddy.

Sgt. Peter Thiessen, an RCMP spokesman, said the Gang Task Force is assisting the Integrated Homicide Investigative Team on the case.

“We’re still actively trying to move forward,” said Thiessen.

“We’re not in a position to really comment directly on what we believe the motive may have been, other than it was clearly targeted and gang related,” he said.

Reddy, a 24-year-old from Vancouver, was well known to police in the Lower Mainland.

He was found guilty of carrying two loaded handguns, a Beretta .380 pistol in one pocket and a Colt .45 in the other, in a June 2005 incident. But that decision was overturned when the B.C. Court of Appeal found that police had violated his rights when they searched him after receiving reports that two suspicious men were sitting in a vehicle in the 2900-block Windsor Street in Vancouver and might be selling drugs.

Reddy was also charged in 2006 in connection with a home invasion in Chilliwack. The charges were forcible confinement, assault causing bodily harm, assault with a weapon, wearing a disguise to commit a crime, robbery, break and enter, uttering threats and pointing a firearm.

He was also arrested in 2010 after the gang-related shooting of Gurmit Singh Dhak in a Metrotown parking lot. Reddy was one of six people rounded up by police as they tried to defuse gang tensions after Dhak’s slaying.

Because he was under a 10-year prohibition against possessing weapons, he was arrested Oct. 29, 2010 near Mill Ross Avenue when he was found in possession of a firearm.

The RCMP received a 911 call Friday at 3:40 p.m. about multiple shots in the 13100-block 111 Avenue in the northwest part of Whalley in Surrey. Officers responded in minutes and found Reddy lying on the roadside suffering from multiple gunshot wounds.

They began CPR immediately but Reddy was confirmed deceased when the B.C. Ambulance Service arrived.

 

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­investigation into gangland “hits” on Adams family enforcer Gilbert Wynter, 37, and financial adviser Solly Nahome, 48.

gangster Terry ­Adams, 56, will be quizzed by Scotland Yard detectives following ­advances in DNA science.

They have reopened an ­investigation into gangland “hits” on Adams family enforcer Gilbert Wynter, 37, and financial adviser Solly Nahome, 48.

Detectives hope improvements in forensic science will provide the vital breakthrough in the cases that have remained unsolved for 13 years.

Items of clothing and the last car Wynter used have been ­recovered and will be retested for potential DNA clues.

Detectives also plan to speak to two other men who were also part of the notorious crime syndicate from London's Clerkenwell. In all, more than 20 associates of the family will be questioned again.

Detective Chief Inspector ­David Manning from Scotland Yard’s Homicide and Serious Crime ­Command, is leading the new probe. He said: “Having reviewed both investigations and with ­advances in DNA techniques, we decided to launch a last-ditch effort to bring them to a ­successful conclusion.”

The Adams Family gang – known as the A Team – is believed to have been behind 25 gangland murders. Detectives said they were so ­violent they made the Krays look like “lovable rogues”.

The murders include the ­mysterious disappearance of Wynter and the death of Nahome by a motorbike gunman.

Both are said to have double-crossed the family. DCI Manning added: “We are now convinced that the two cases are linked.”

Adams, from North London, was jailed for money- laundering in 2007 but detectives have so far been unable to pin anything else on him.

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NEWS of the brazen murders of sisters Tamara Reddy and Nadine Cassanova -- vendors at the Spanish Town Market in St Catherine — was heavy on the tongues of everyone who visited the shopping area on Friday

NEWS of the brazen murders of sisters Tamara Reddy and Nadine Cassanova -- vendors at the Spanish Town Market in St Catherine — was heavy on the tongues of everyone who visited the shopping area on Friday.
For the sisters' customers, their deaths came as a grim surprise; to other vendors, the killings highlighted the dark realities of life in the old capital; while for their relatives, it was an act they swore to avenge.

The two were gunned down and another man shot and injured inside the market Thursday evening. The man is still hospitalised.
Between them, the slain siblings left seven children motherless.
"Right here dem get shot. Right here where me sit down, me two friend dem lie down last night, dead," lamented a male CD vendor, pointing to the intersection of Adelaide and French streets where two gunmen pumped several bullets into the twitching bodies of Reddy and Cassanova as they lay sprawled out on the roadway.
"One lie down over there, while the other drop right here. Pure blood, everybody a run up and down," said the man, describing the scene the night before.
"Not even two minutes after me leave the corner dem murder me friend dem just like that," continued the man, his face crumpled in a grief-stricken grimace.
"As Nadine hear the gun select (being primed) and she turn around, dem shoot her in her eye, and then dem just start put it on on her sister after that," added an alleged eyewitness.
"Is the same time I run off, and when me look back up the road all I see was pure gunsmoke. I don't know how I didn't get shot," said the alleged witness, still visibly shaken by the ordeal.
Two of Cassanova's female customers stood speechless as they listened to the tales of her demise. As if the stories were not gruesome enough, the terrified women were offered pictures and videos of the women's corpses taken by cellular phone.
For one, the sight was too much to bear. She bolted from the market after viewing the gory images. The other, however, continued looking at the footage, covering her mouth in horror.
"I can't believe is she that, is just the other day I come buy food from her," she blurted out.
The disbelief was even more heart-rending at a nearby bar where the bartender said, "everybody that come in here from morning just a cry. Nobody can't believe that is dem two woman dere dem kill."
One of the male patrons lamented the shooting of the man, who he said was his friend.
"The man get four shot; two in one foot, one in the other, and one in him bottom, 'cause he was running from them. The worst part, him don't even do them nothing, the man just a go 'bout him business," he said.
Up to late yesterday afternoon, police said they were still investigating leads suggesting that members of the notorious Klansman gang may have been behind the attacks.
"I can't confirm anything, but everything is pointing in that direction," said Deputy Superintendent Victor Hamilton of the St Catherine North Police Division.
Hamilton said cops in the division are bracing for possible reprisals.
"All our energies are concerned with proactive operations. Our primary focus is creating buffer zones," he said. "We just have to clear up this particular crime because it has implications for many other crimes, and we have to prevent them (gunmen) from getting at each other."
Hamilton said additional personnel and resources have been deployed on the streets to maintain the peace. He encouraged persons to report any suspicious gatherings in their communities.
The intersection of Adelaide and French streets is a known stomping ground for members of the One Order criminal gang, the arch-enemies of the Klansman. Vendors inside the market speculated that the gunmen turned their wrath on Reddy and Cassanova when they did not see any of their male rivals.
"A kill man fi go back round there go kill back some of them bwoy dere you nuh. Is true you not even know," said one of the sisters' male relatives, who wept bitterly at the spot where they were killed.
"You are going to have nuff more stories to write, because this not going to just done so; people have to dead back," he told the Sunday Observer.
Up to late yesterday afternoon the market was still tense, although a vendor said that customers of the deceased are slowly returning to the area.

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Target killings claim 36 lives in 15 days

Unabated target killings with the law enforcement agencies much too reluctant to pay heed have claimed some 36 precious lives in the last fifteen days of current month. Political workers of various political parties remained the most targeted victims. Five workers of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), including former MPA Arshad Qureshi and MQM Karachi Tanzimi Committee Member Farooq Baig were gunned down. The death of Baig, a senior party member, sent a wave of violence rippling across the metropolis. All commercial and non-commercial activities remained suspended for two days while some 35 vehicles were torched. Four people were shot dead including a truck driver, cleaner and a passer-by in Pak Colony and another at Tariq Road. Three activists of Mohajir Qaumi Movement-Haqiqi were also targeted in separate incidents while two of them were kidnapped before being tortured and shot. The Pakistan People Party (PPP) also claimed that two of its activists were killed. Police although maintained that one of them was killed by his own gang members over some dispute. On the other side, some four people were gunned down in the incidents of sectarian killing. As many as three people of the Jaferia Alliance Pakistan were shot dead while defunct Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan and Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam claimed to have lost one activist each. It may be mentioned here that sectarian violence runs high in the metropolis while processions and rallies have also been organised against each other. Following the confrontation between rival sectarian groups, unknown miscreants threw hand grenades at the Saudi Consulate Karachi. Police suspect recent dispute between the rival sects over the involvement of Saudi Arabia in Bahrain civil war was the cause behind the incident. Another tragic incident was reported from Lyari where unknown miscreants hurled grenades at a gambling den, which left three people dead, and about a dozen others wounded. Despite tall claims of the authorities for the prevention of such incidents as well as warnings given by the political parties part of the coalition government many political workers have been continuously falling prey to the curse of target killing and law enforcement agencies should take concrete steps to wipe out the menace. atif raza

 

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20-year-old Bloods gang member was sentenced to 30 years in prison this morning for the brutal torture killing of a Burlington County couple

20-year-old Bloods gang member was sentenced to 30 years in prison this morning for the brutal torture killing of a Burlington County couple in Camden last year.

Darryl Pierre -- who will have to serve at least 25 years of the sentence before being eligible for parole -- said in court today that the killings were "unfortunate."

"I'm sorry and the whole situation was very unfortunate," said Pierre of Merchantville.

Pierre showed no emotion during the sentencing, even as Assistant Camden County Prosecutor Mary Alison Albright held up pictures and the graduation gown of the 18-year-old Cinnaminson teen he helped beat and kill.

Pierre earlier pleaded guilty to participating in the gruesome killings of Muriah Huff and Michael Hawkins, 23, of Mount Holly.

Pierre is one of 10 defendants charged in the killings, which took place Feb. 22, 2010, inside a Camden row home over a period of several hours.

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The decapitated bodies of 25 men and two women have been found near Guatemala's border with Mexico.

The decapitated bodies of 25 men and two women have been found near Guatemala's border with Mexico.

The bodies were discovered at a ranch in Peten province, 500km (310 miles) north of the capital.

The chief of police said the killings were probably linked to a battle between rival drug gangs fighting for control of the area.

Northern Guatemala is an important transit point for drugs smuggled from South America to the United States.

"This is the worst massacre we have seen in modern times," police spokesman Donald Gonzalez told Reuters.

Army spokesman Col Ron Urizar said dozens of soldiers had been sent to the Mexican border to prevent any suspects from fleeing the country, El Pais reported.

He said ground and aerial surveillance was being carried out in co-ordination with the Mexican authorities.

Officials said the victims appeared to have been ambushed by gunmen.

They are investigating whether the deaths were related to the Zetas drug gang, which has been expanding its operations into Guatemala from Mexico.

There are also suspicions the massacre was linked to the killing of Haroldo Waldemar Leon in the same area on Saturday.

He was the brother of alleged drugs trafficker Juan Jose "Juancho" Leon, who was shot dead by the Zetas in 2008.

Guatemalan law enforcement officials say the gang has increasingly moved its operations south since Mexican President Felipe Calderon stepped up his country's fight against the drugs trade.

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remains of several people who had been dismembered.

Around 03:00 hours on Sunday, members of the State Investigation Agency and the Mexican Army, were present at Km 2 on the highway that connects Montemorelos and General Terán, close to a business called Cranes Treviño, were the remains of several people who had been dismembered.Some parts of the bodies were in bags, others were on a blanket, all were naked.

It is not the first time in the town of Montemorelos findings like these occur, this time three people were butchered, and until their identities are unknown, it was announced that those executed were men.

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GARDAI believe a murdered 19-year-old was knifed in the back by local thugs and have ruled out a link to a long-running feud.

GARDAI believe a murdered 19-year-old was knifed in the back by local thugs and have ruled out a link to a long-running feud.

Officers investigating the fatal stabbing of David Byrne at a Dublin apartment complex say they do not think the incident is part of the notorious Crumlin-Drimnagh feud, which has claimed a dozen lives over the past decade.

Members of the garda underwater unit have searched a stretch of the Grand Canal near the scene of the murder and recovered a number of potential weapons, including knives.

A post-mortem examination at St James's Hospital yesterday confirmed that Mr Byrne died from stab wounds in the back.

Gardai said last night that they were examining a number of theories on the motive for the attack on the teen but were not following any definite line.

One officer said: "This was not connected with gangland and had nothing to do with the feud. It was pure thuggery involving local hoods".

He said there was no evidence linking the murder to a previous knife attack on Mr Byrne last year and gardai were gathering information on his recent movements to find a reason for Saturday night's incident.

Mr Byrne was known to associate with local criminals in the Drimnagh and Inchicore areas but was not involved in the major gangs and was not regarded as a big player. His attackers were apparently waiting for him when he left his home at Davitt House, where he lived with his mother, shortly

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Glasgow-born Michael McGurk was shot dead outside his waterside Sydney mansion in a gangland-style execution.

Glasgow-born Michael McGurk was shot dead outside his waterside Sydney mansion in a gangland-style execution.

Now the latest episode of “Sopranos on the Harbour”, as some have called it, is riveting Australians, following the arrest of McGurk’s former business associate, Ron Medich.

A multi-millionaire property developer who had been in dispute with McGurk, Medich has been charged with masterminding the murder. A Sydney court heard that shortly after McGurk was shot at close range in his driveway in front of his nine-year-old son, Luc, a text message stating “Job done” was received by a friend of Medich’s, Lucky Gattellari. Medich was allegedly with him.

The murder, in a well-heeled area, shone a light on a murky side of Sydney society. As well as being involved in property deals, McGurk, 57, had been a loan shark and debt collector with a violent reputation. The father of four had once been charged with firebombing a house. There were allegations of blackmail and corruption involving politicians.

At the time of his death, McGurk – who grew up in the Gorbals as Mick Rushford and changed his name when he emigrated to Australia in 1993 – had many enemies, accumulated during his rise from dirt-poor roots to apparent respectability. He sent his children to Sydney’s most exclusive Catholic school and was a pillar of his church, but those who knew his ruthlessness feared him. A week before his death, he told a journalist he believed a hitman was on his trail.

Medich seemed the most obvious suspect in the killing. McGurk reportedly owed him millions of dollars, and had been on the verge of having his house and his Mercedes S-class repossessed.

Although the finger was pointed at Medich, the 62-year-old denied any part in the killing – and still does. During a parliamentary inquiry into the corruption claims, which were later dismissed, one MP asked Medich: “Did you have any involvement in the murder of Michael McGurk?” He snapped: “You have got to be joking. You’re a shocker.”

Now Gattellari, a childhood friend of Medich’s, has turned police informant – and detectives say the former boxer, arrested a fortnight ago with three other men, claims Medich planned the whole thing. The price on McGurk’s head was $250,000 (£153,000), and later increased to $300,000, according to Gattellari.

Haissam Safetli, who – along with Christopher Estephan – has been charged with the murder itself, is also co-operating with police. Safetli claims Gattellari introduced him to Medich in a Sydney café last year. The court was told Medich asked Safetli: “Can you get this job done in four weeks? I want him [McGurk] gone. I want you do to it.”

Not true, say Medich’s lawyers, who insist Gattellari organised the murder behind Medich’s back. The motive? Gattellari owed Medich money too, and wanted him out of the way. He allegedly phoned Medich’s son, Peter, after his arrest, and told him: “I want $1m in bail, otherwise I will dump on your father.”

Medich was refused bail and is now in jail, a long way from his harbourside home in Australia’s most expensive street – Wolsey Road, in Point Piper.

His glamorous wife, Lithuanian-born Odetta, defended him in an interview with a Sydney tabloid, the Daily Telegraph. “What has happened is all based on rumour and gossip,” she said. “The media has been on a witchhunt.”

Police say Medich was “at the very top of the pyramid of this contract killing”, with Gattellari in charge of logistics. Estephan is accused of pulling the trigger, and the fifth man, Senad Kaminic, a former Bosnian soldier, is charged with being an accessory to murder.

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Rebels member sues council over speed hump | Herald Sun

Rebels member sues council over speed hump | Herald Sun: "ONE of South Australia's most notorious bikies is suing a suburban council for negligence after falling off his motorcycle while riding over a speed hump. Rebels member Christopher Paul Clemente, 32, wants unspecified damages from Charles Sturt Council for injuries he alleges he sustained in the incident at Woodville South in northwest Adelaide.
But the council is fighting the District Court claim, alleging instead that any residual injuries Clemente is suffering stem from gunshot wounds he suffered in 2002 or a previous car accident, not from the motorcycle accident.
Clemente, who has a lengthy history of firearms offences and recently started a chapter of the Rebels in Mildura, has been injured in two gang-related shootings in Adelaide over the past eight years."

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New World Order and Almighty Latin King Nation gangs Seventy-Four Michigan Gang Members, Associates Charged with Drug Violations

Seventy-Four Michigan Gang Members, Associates Charged with Drug Violations: "Seventy-four members of two local gangs operating in Pontiac, Michigan were charged in two separate complaints with conspiracy to distribute marijuana and cocaine, announced United States Attorney Barbara L McQuade. McQuade was joined in the announcement by Special Agent in Charge Andrew Arena, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Special Agent in Charge Robert Corso, Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), Special Agent in Charge Brian Moskowitz, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Office of Homeland Security Investigation (HSI), Special Agent in Charge Thomas E Brandon, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) and Sheriff Michael Bouchard, Oakland County Sheriff's Office. Also joining in the announcement are the Michigan State Police, Auburn Hills Police Department, Bloomfield Township Police Department, Pontiac Police Department and the Oakland County Prosecutor's Office. The complaints charge that various members and associates of the New World Order and Almighty Latin King Nation gangs conspired to distribute marijuana and cocaine in and around the Pontiac area, from 2009 through the present."

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Police sergeant led a secret double life | The Sun |News

Police sergeant led a secret double life | The Sun |News: "POLICE sergeant led a secret double life as boss of a ruthless underworld gang, a court heard yesterday.
Salim Razaq, 31, took over the family drugs and dirty money racket after his brother was jailed.
He was regarded as a 'copper's cop' by colleagues, who had no idea he had turned his home into a gangland HQ."

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Anthony D. Singh ties to the Rollin’ 60 Crips street gang

Anthony D. Singh, 21, fired a bullet through a man’s right shoe after a confrontation in a downtown parking lot that police said stemmed from a dangerous culture of retaliation and intimidation common in gang life.
A jury convicted Singh of several felonies after a trial in December that included unusual testimony about Singh’s ties to the Rollin’ 60 Crips street gang.
Gang affiliations generally are considered inadmissible in trials, but prosecutors argued that Singh’s membership in the violent gang provided motive for the seemingly random shooting, which occurred near a downtown night club in July 2008.
“He has chosen this way of life, and it finally caught up with him,” said Superior Court Judge Kathleen O’Connor on Wednesday.Singh’s father, Elvis Anthony Singh, urged O’Connor to show his son leniency in a letter mailed from a federal prison, where he’s been since 2002. He was sentenced to 10 years after federal drug agents busted a crack cocaine ring the quadriplegic was operating out of his Spokane home with his caregiver.“We missed those important teenage years,” Elvis Singh’s letter reads. “I regret that I was not there to be a positive influence on him.”O’Connor approved an exceptionally high sentence for Singh, ordering him to serve sentences for second-degree assault, drive-by shooting and unlawful possession of a firearm before serving sentences for witness tampering and conspiracy to commit assault, instead of serving the sentences at the same time.Singh’s court-appointed lawyer, Thomas Cooney, has said he’ll appeal the verdict, partly based on a Spokane police detective’s admission to jurors that Singh had previous convictions.Jurors were ordered to disregard Detective Michael Roberge’s statement, but Cooney said that made little difference.Singh, Cooney argued in court documents, “was convicted on his propensity to commit crime and for being a bad person who is a gang member, rather than on admissible character evidence.”Singh denies firing the bullet that hit Alex Tauala in his right shoe in a parking lot near Sprague Avenue and Stevens Street on July 26, 2008. Tauala didn’t identify Singh as the gunman during trial.
But police witnesses and Deputy Prosecutor Larry Haskell argued Singh shot at Tauala after Tauala confronted Singh and his brother, 25-year-old Jamal R. Singh, by saying “anyone else got any problems?”The brothers, prosecutors said, were driven to retaliate because of their ties to a gang where “respect is the center of the universe,” according to court documents.
Jamal Singh pleaded guilty to riot in August 2008 and was given a year probation and credit for 24 days served in jail.But police argued Anthony Singh was the shooter, and his extensive criminal history contributed to his lengthy prison sentence.That prison sentence was exactly what Singh’s imprisoned father hoped his son, a father of two, could avoid.“As he is now able to see, the greatest price for his mistakes will be paid by his children,” the letter says.

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Stephen ‘Aki’ Akinyemi, 44,‘King of the Hill’ found shot dead

‘King of the Hill’ found shot dead in the Cheshire mansion of a controversial businessman Arran Coghlan.Stephen ‘Aki’ Akinyemi, 44, was said to be a prominent member of the notorious Cheetham Hill gang, which is believed to be behind major crime and the supply of drugs in Manchester.He was known for enjoying champagne and cruising Manchester’s clubland in his silver Porsche, with the private registration AKI.He had a string of previous convictions and most recently had been jailed for 13 months in 2006 for violent disorder.At the time of his death, he was on bail for allegedly attacking someone with a baseball bat outside the Lounge 31 nightclub in the city centre in November.He was found with serious stab injuries at Mr Coghlan’s Alderley Edge home on Tuesday afternoon. He was wearing a stab vest.But a post-mortem examination revealed he had died of a gunshot wound, not knife injuries.Mr Coghlan was also discovered with stab injuries at the scene and he was taken to hospital under police guard. He was later discharged although he remains in police custody after being arrested on suspicion of murder.Last night a tribute page to Mr Akinyemi on social networking website Facebook, titled ‘RIP AKI’, had more than 600 members.
Mr Coghlan was cleared in 1996 of murdering Stockport ‘Mr Big’ Chris Little, who was shot dead at the wheel of his Mercedes.In 2003, Mr Coghlan stood trial for the murder of drug dealer David Barnshaw, who was kidnapped and forced to drink petrol before being burned alive in the back of a car in Stockport in 2001.But the case collapsed when it was revealed police had failed to pass on important information about another possible suspect.

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Julian Jose Garza, 28 reportedly a member of Caldwell’s East Side Locos gang

Julian Jose Garza, 28, of Notus was sentenced to 70 months in federal prison by U.S. District Judge Edward J. Lodge, the United States Attorney’s Office announced Wednesday.Garza pleaded guilty to the charge in September, admitting that he had a 9 mm semi-automatic handgun during a confrontation with two men in Caldwell on May 14, 2008. Because Garza had been previously convicted of firing a gun into an occupied dwelling, he was prohibited from possessing firearms under federal law.Garza is reportedly a member of Caldwell’s East Side Locos gang and was prosecuted by the special assistant U.S. attorney hired by the Treasure Valley Partnership and Idaho State Police to address gang crimes. His sentencing on Tuesday concluded a string of successful prosecutions of Garza’s family and girlfriend, the U.S. Attorney’s Office reports.His father, Gabriel Garza, pleaded guilty to unlawful possession of a firearm and was sentenced to 12 months of prison last March. His mother, Maria Garza, . was convicted as an accessory to a felony in April, charged with assisting Gabriel, in possession with intent to distribute marijuana. And his brother, Alex Garza, was sentenced to five years in state prison last month for aiding and abetting witness intimidation in Canyon County District Court on January 7, 2010.

Julian Garza’s girlfriend, Chelsea Robbins-Gonzalez was convicted of perjury and sentenced in June to two years of probation for lying to the federal grand jury about Julian’s possession of a firearm.

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Tacoma Hilltop Crips gang

gang sweep by local and federal agents in Tacoma.
Twenty-nine men, suspected members of the Tacoma Hilltop Crips gang, have been arrested in a series of raid since Tuesday morning.
One of the men arrested, Manuel Jose Hernandez, pleaded guilty to the Toews murder in 2000. Hernandez was 12 at the time. He was sentenced to state custody until he turned 21 in October of 2008.
Since then, prosecutors say, Hernandez has been an active gang member. He was arraigned Wednesday on charges including: conspiracy, robbery, auto theft and trafficking stolen property.
Cornell hopes Hernandez gets a longer sentence this time, but she said it won't do any good for her or Hernandez.
"I don't have any great hopes that prison's going to improve somebody's outlook on life," said Cornell.
Thirty-two men have been charged in connection with the investigation.
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Sweep against the Hilltop Crips

Sweep against the Hilltop Crips included serving a series of early-morning search warrants Tuesday. Officers arrested 11 suspected gang members without incident and confiscated guns, drugs and stolen property.
Investigators were still searching for five others. The remaining 16 were already in the Pierce County Jail on other criminal charges or serving time in state prison.
Prosecutors have filed 51 felony counts in the case. Charges include attempted murder, first-degree robbery and drive-by shooting. The 32 suspected gang members, ages 17 to 38, face various counts, but all are charged with one count of criminal conspiracy, according to court documents.
Among those charged are two third-strike candidates and Manuel Jose Hernandez, one of eight youths convicted of fatally beating Erik Toews, 30, as he walked down the street in 2000.
“We’ve got a big chunk of the group, and we’re not stopping,” said Steven Dean, assistant special agent in charge of the FBI’s Seattle office. “We are looking at this group of gang members directly correlating to an increase in violent crime in the area.”
Filing conspiracy charges is a new approach in tackling gang violence, which has plagued the city since the late 1980s and left many dead and or wounded in drive-by shootings.
County prosecutor Mark Lindquist said this case marks the first time in Washington that the conspiracy statute is being used to prosecute gang violence. It’s being modeled after successful gang prosecution elsewhere in the country.
The charge usually is used in drug and identify theft cases. It’s being used against the gang members because prosecutors allege they joined the gang for the sole purpose of committing crimes – including robberies, drug dealing, shootings and car thefts.
In general, prosecutors say, a conspiracy occurs when two or more people get together and agree to commit a crime, and then at least one of them takes a substantial step toward carrying out the crime.
The others “can be legally accountable for the one person’s follow-through,” Pierce County deputy prosecutor Greg Greer said.
Those arrested Tuesday and previously booked into jail will be arraigned on the conspiracy and other charges today. Those in prison will return to Pierce County to face the conspiracy charges.
INCREASED VIOLENCE
Investigators say that the Hilltop Crips have increasingly flexed their muscle throughout the city during the last 18 months, targeting people who showed outward signs of wealth – including gold jewelry and fancy wheel rims on their cars – and working together to threaten or harm the victims to get what they wanted.
“They were active on a daily basis,” Tacoma police homicide detective John Ringer said. “Nothing slowed them down.”
Investigators contacted the Pierce County Prosecutor’s Office. Prosecutors researched different state statutes and found that the conspiracy charge worked with the facts and cases Tacoma police detectives presented, Greer said.
“The law is appropriate for the facts that we have in this case,” he said. “We want to be a little more proactive in addressing the gang problem.”
Most members of this targeted group have previously been convicted of felonies.
Hernandez was 12 in 2000 when he and seven other youths attacked and killed Toews on North Fourth Street.
Hernandez, the second-youngest person charged, was convicted as a juvenile of first-degree murder and three robberies in the days before the Toews beating. He was sentenced to juvenile detention until his 21st birthday.
Now 22, Hernandez was charged in connection with the gang conspiracy case and was among those arrested Tuesday.
FORMED IN LATE 1980S
About 15 teenagers formed the Hilltop Crips in the late 1980s after gangsters from Los Angeles moved into Tacoma and started selling crack cocaine. The gang was the first local black street gang, claiming South 23rd Street as its turf and recruiting other local teens to join their ranks.
Membership swelled to nearly 300 in the mid-1990s. Some of the original gang members were convicted of killing rival gangsters, while others were killed in gang-motivated violence. Some of the surviving original gang members remain in prison.
“Over the course of the past 20 years, the HTCs have been a powerful criminal force on the streets of Tacoma,” Ringer wrote in a search warrant affidavit as part of the recent crackdown. “They have been the strongest black street gang in the area and have dominated the local cocaine sales.”
Throughout the years, local and federal task forces have targeted the city’s gangs, which now total nearly 50. They’ve charged members with federal drug and gun charges and with shootings, homicides and an array of other crimes.
Among the crimes allegedly committed by the Hilltop Crips recently were burglaries at two secure facilities, including a Lakewood police parking lot where a member’s impounded car was rifled through for evidence.
NEW OUTBREAK OF CRIME
In mid-2008, Tacoma police and members of the South Sound Gang Task Force began to notice a new wave of crimes involving the Hilltop Crips, Ringer said.
Police reports detailed incidents in which victims were targeted for their financial assets, especially gold necklaces. Gang members stalked and jumped their victims around popular Hilltop Crips hangouts, police said.
Among the spots were a South Tacoma gas station, a South Tacoma convenience store, a South End restaurant and nightclubs that featured hip-hop music, police said.
Victims had necklaces ripped off in the clubs, faced armed robbers or were beaten on the sidewalk while others stole their car keys and wallets, court documents state.
The documents detail three incidents in which victims were critically injured. All survived, but one was paralyzed and another suffered permanent injury.
The gang task force focused on gang members who were still committing crimes. Many of the crimes had not been investigated, or charges had not been filed.
“These guys were off the hook,” Ringer said.
During the investigation, homicides involving Hilltop Crips were investigated separately, Ringer said. Other gang members were arrested in other cases.
In addition to interviewed witnesses and victims, investigators used informants, watched surveillance video of attacks and set up a surveillance camera in a Hilltop alley that was a favorite gathering spot.
They also sent shell casings and guns to the Washington State Patrol crime lab for analysis.
The lab matched casings from shootings in December 2008 at Oakland Playfield and in February 2009 at South 56th and Tyler streets to one Jan. 26 at a nightclub in Bellevue. A matching shell casing had been discovered in the car of one of the accused gang members.
Of the 28 shell casings collected after a shootout Dec. 2, 2008, outside a South End restaurant, one was matched with a casing taken from another member’s car during a search warrant.
“We were able to establish the conspiracy,” Ringer said. “When they join the group, they join the conspiracy.”

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Valentino Sanchez, 33,allegedly high ranking member of the Latin King street gang

Valentino Sanchez, 33, whose last known address was 8105 White Ave. in west suburban Lyons, was placed into custody at 12:15 p.m. by Chicago Police in a secure area in a lower level terminal area at O’Hare, according to police.
Sanchez, an allegedly high ranking member of the Latin King street gang who also goes by the streets names of “Shorty” and “Devious” was found in Guadalajara, Mexico by an FBI gang task force and was transported by DEA and FBI officials to Chicago, police said.
A Feb. 2, 2009 U.S. Department of Justice and FBI release offered a $10,000 reward for the arrest of Sanchez, who has been the subject of nationwide manhunt since July 2005 when he was charged in a criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court in Chicago with violation of drug laws.
The release said Sanchez is allegedly a high ranking member of the Latin Kings and he is accused of overseeing the distribution of wholesale quantities of cocaine in the city and suburbs.
Sanchez remains in Chicago police custody early Wednesday but is scheduled to be turned over to federal authorities who will likely hold him in the Metropolitan Correctional Center pending an appearance in Federal Court, according to police.

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They didn’t get the moniker ‘Body Snatchers’ for no reason

Dominique Finley, 34, was the highest-ranking member among the defendants with the lofty title “5-Star Universal Elite.” Eric Ollison, 26, who goes by the nickname “Murder,” was his second-in-command, officials say.

“They didn’t get the moniker ‘Body Snatchers’ for no reason,” said Chicago Police Deputy Chief Nick Roti of the Organized Crime Section, adding that the faction is suspected of dozens of killings over the years.The charges unveiled Wednesday don’t accuse any of the defendants of murder, but said they were involved in a vast drug business.Since September, though, Ollison has been locked up after he was caught on the West Side with a loaded gun in a car, police said. He pleaded guilty to being a habitual offender and was sentenced to six years in prison, court records show.
According to FBI affidavits, the Body Snatchers were peddling large quantities of cocaine north of the Eisenhower Expy., south of North Avenue, west of Laramie and east of Austin. Two informants were paid a total of $20,000 to help investigators, the FBI said. Electronic surveillance also was used.
Most of the defendants lived in Chicago, but Finley has a Bellwood address and Andre Beard, 29, lives in Glendale Heights. Betts had lived in St. Charles.
“A lot of these guys, when they get higher up, move out to the suburbs and come to the city to work,” Roti said.Ironically, “they feel a little safer there,” he said.

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Suspected of being members or associates of the Four Corner Hustlers street gang

Suspected of being members or associates of the Four Corner Hustlers street gang. The men were arrested as part of Operation Snatched, a coordinated effort by federal, state and local law enforcement agencies to target street gangs running drug distribution networks in the Chicago area, Grant said.The men were charged with attempted possession or possession with intent to distribute crack cocaine, the FBI said. The charges are felonies and carry a minimum sentence of 10 years in prison if convicted, according to the FBI.Investigators electronically intercepted telephone conversations, used surveillance techniques and conducted undercover missions to investigate the network whose turf went from the Eisenhower Expressway to North Avenue, between Laramie Avenue and Austin Boulevard, officials said.The Chicago residents who were charged were Milton Bills, 32, of the 5800 block of West Ohio Street; Clarence Johnson, 45, of the 700 block of East 50th Street; Terrance C. Jones, 32, of the 1400 block of South Christiana Avenue; Damon Westbrook, 32, of the 100 block of East 49th Street; Frederick Taylor, 23, of the 1200 block of North Mason Avenue; and Eric Ollison, 26, whose address was not available but who is in state prison on an unrelated conviction.Also charged were Andre T. Beard, 29, of Glendale Heights, and Dominique Finley, 34, of Bellwood.The men appeared Wednesday before U.S. Magistrate Judge Jeffrey Cole in Chicago and were ordered held without bail in the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Chicago, according to the FBI.

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John Paul 'JP' Joyce, a vicious criminal and member of a heroin distribution gang, had been kidnapped in Coolock on Thursday, January 7, murdered

first gangland slaying of the year had originated in their district. John Paul 'JP' Joyce, a vicious criminal and member of a heroin distribution gang, had been kidnapped in Coolock on Thursday, January 7, murdered and his body dumped near the airport where it was found two days later.

Joyce, aged 30, was involved in a feud with a gang which has been establishing complete control over the drugs trade in an area stretching from the north inner city to north county Dublin and westwards to Ballymun, Finglas and Blanchardstown. It was responsible for murdering Joyce's brother, Thomas, in June last year and John Paul had vowed revenge. John Paul himself had already survived at least two attempts on his life.

The two murdered Joyce brothers, members of a settled Traveller family from Grove Lane, were notorious in north Dublin. John Paul was imprisoned for a terrible assault on an innocent man at a public house in Rush, Co Dublin on St Patrick's Day, 2006. The man's son had accidentally spilled a drink on someone in Joyce's company. He and another man dragged the man from the pub, beat him to the ground, jumped on him and slammed a door repeatedly on the man's head, causing severe injury. Joyce had only been released from prison last November.

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three people yelling "T Block" and "BTG," cliques in the Crips gang. Someone in Maynard's group mentioned the Tre-Tre gang.

Ryan Daniel Jones-Adams, 16, was charged with first-degree murder and first-degree murder committed in association with a gang.He is accused of fatally shooting Marvin Ray Maynard III, who was found Jan. 17 in the street on the 2600 block of James Avenue N. Maynard had his hands in the air when he was shot, according to the criminal complaint.A family member who declined to be named said Maynard was not a gang member and referred questions to his mother, who could not be immediately reached Monday.Police are not looking for anyone else in the case, said Sgt. Jesse Garcia, a spokesman.Garcia and the complaint gave this account:A witness who had been with Maynard and another male told police that they had been confronted by three people yelling "T Block" and "BTG," cliques in the Crips gang. Someone in Maynard's group mentioned the Tre-Tre gang.One male in the Crips group took off a skull cap and yelled a threat, the complaint said. The witness saw that the male, who ran past him, had a gun and that he fired twice at Maynard. The shooter and another male ran east between houses.A police dog tracking them went to a porch on the other side of the block, where police found a black hat with a loaded 9-mm handgun in it. On the gun were two latent fingerprints, one of which was identified as the right thumb of Jones-Adams, the complaint said.Police also found surveillance video of Jones-Adams and three others at a gas station six blocks from the shooting and taken about 90 minutes beforehand, the complaint said. Jones-Adams was wearing the same clothes in the video as the shooter was said to be wearing, Garcia said.

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arrested Dandre Davaune Parker, 20, on charges of possession, manufacture and delivery of heroin

Medford Area Drug and Gang Enforcement Team officers arrested Dandre Davaune Parker, 20, on charges of possession, manufacture and delivery of heroin, possession of ecstasy, and manufacture of heroin and delivery of ecstasy within 1,000 feet of a school. He was lodged in the Jackson County Jail, where he remained Thursday evening on $100,000 bail.

Acting on a tip that members of the Crips street gang were dealing drugs near Jackson Elementary School, Medford police arrested a man on numerous drug charges Thursday morning.The arrest comes on the heelsof an unrelated investigation that led to three arrests and theseizure of an estimated $40,000worth of heroin and methamphetamine, team supervisor Medfordpolice Lt. Tim Doney said."We suspect Parker is associated with a Crips gang out of Stockton (Calif.)," Doney said.Investigators searched Parker's apartment in the 800 block of Summit Avenue at about 7:30 a.m. Thursday, armed with a warrant based on allegations of gang and drug activity, Doney said. They found about half an ounce of heroin, 28 ecstasy pills and seized $3,000 in cash.
Police initially detained three men and a woman, who were in an apartment across from the school and the Jackson community pool. Only Parker was arrested and lodged in jail.California street gangs have made their way into Medford over the years, Doney said."We have had dealings with the Crips and Bloods before, but they are not prevalent in this area," Doney said. "But when you find out about them, you certainly want to act on that information."

The Crips gang is one of the largest and most violent street gangs in the United States, with an estimated 30,000 members in more than 200 cities. It was founded in the early 1970s in Southern California and is well known for committing violent crimes, drug dealing and for its bloody battles with a rival gang, the Bloods.

Medford police arrested Parker's younger brother, Dante Deon Parker, on Monday after he reportedly robbed a man of his wallet in the Minute Market parking lot on Crater Lake Avenue. The younger Parker was lodged in jail on a theft charge and has since been released and cited to appear in Jackson County Circuit Court.The arrest of Dandre Parker was the second incident involving heroin in two days. On Wednesday, drug and gang investigators searched an apartment in the 3100 block of Juniper Ridge Drive in northeast Medford at about 5:45 p.m., Doney said.
They found about three-quarters of a pound of heroin and an ounce of meth. Investigators estimated the street value of the seized drugs at about $40,000. They also seized $10,000 in cash.Four men at the apartment were detained and three of them were arrested.Ricardo Alonzo-Martinez, 24, and Armando Javier Avila, 30, who both live at the apartment, each were arrested on charges of possession, manufacture, delivery of heroin and meth. Both were lodged at the Jackson County Jail without bail on those charges and immigration holds.Mario Castellanos-Arango, 24, of the 3600 block of Antelope Road, White City, was charged with possession of meth. He also is held in jail without bail because of an immigration hold.

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Crips street gang shots were fired in a fight between a group of black and Hispanic males.

Officers did find three shots were fired in front of 1161 Mazatlan Cir., but were unable to locate a victim.Just after 11 p.m., officers were called to St. Francis Medical Center to investigate a shooting victim. A 20-year-old victim admitted being involved in the earlier disturbance and having an affiliation with the Crip street gang.The victim's injuries are not life threatening.

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Bulldogs are described by authorities as the nation's largest independent street gang.

Bulldogs are described by authorities as the nation's largest independent street gang. Police estimate there are about 12,000 members in this city of 500,000.
For most of their 20-year existence, the Bulldogs escaped serious law enforcement scrutiny, even as they taunted cops with barks and howls. Police looked upon them mainly as wayward youth. But the gang that grew out of fights at San Quentin prison over respect eventually showed itself to be a deadly criminal enterprise. The 2006 shooting of a cop became a tipping point.
Now police are trying to bulldoze the Bulldogs, before the next generation takes over.The Fresno police are engaged in year four of tactical warfare against the gang, sweeping through neighborhoods and making more than 12,000 arrests, including many juveniles, and even going after petty offenses such as loitering by seeking injunctions.It's called "Operation Bulldog."
In other cities, such police pressure might have killed the beast. But with the loosely organized Bulldogs, many are independent operators who will turn on one another over territory.
"When you have structure," Fresno Police Chief Jerry Dyer says, "you can cut the head off the snake and it dies. You can't do that with the Bulldogs."
Although gang activity declined across America between 2001 and 2006, gang membership in Fresno County grew by 33 percent, studies show.
"We found that 10 percent of the people in our city were committing 50 percent of the crime," Dyer said. "If you're talking about robbery, that increases to 80 percent."
In July 2006, a motorcycle officer was critically wounded during a traffic stop by a gun-toting Bulldog, Joaquin Maltos Figueroa, 25, who was shot to death days later by police.
In Maltos Figueroa's car, officers found a magazine of bullets and a scanner tuned to police frequencies. They realized gang members were more sophisticated than they previously had believed.
That same summer, 16-year-old Courtney Rice, a prostitute whom gang members feared was snitching, was raped, tortured and murdered by seven Bulldogs and associates.
In November 2006, Chief Dyer went on TV announcing a 10-person "Operation Bulldog" tactical unit to make gang members' lives miserable. This January, he added 100 more officers to focus on intelligence gathering on the 10 percent who are most active and promised to seek longer, federal sentences when possible.
"We know the war on gangs can never be won," the chief said, "but we also know it can be lost."
Today, easily half of those incarcerated in the county jail on any given day are Bulldogs.
"The chief's directive is to arrest as many Bulldogs as we can," said Sgt. Alex Robles. "He doesn't want us to let up the pressure."
Four days a week for 10-hour shifts, Robles and his team swarm Bulldog territory, the scruffy neighborhoods on the city's east side. Armed with lists of names supplied by parole agents, they make unannounced visits.
Parolees have no right to privacy, and the officers take advantage, searching homes for drugs and alcohol — even inspecting cell phones for gang photos or insignias.
If life is made unpleasant, police figure they will either leave gang life or move away.
"I don't know if we'll ever get rid of them" says Robles. "I know the goal is to get rid of them."
In the first three years of Operation Bulldog records show that violent crime has decreased in Fresno by 14.3 percent, ahead of the 9 percent state average, and police attribute the statistic to pressure on gangs. Rape is down 43.5 percent, and there were 26.3 percent fewer vehicles stolen.
After recording 314 shootings in 2006; in 2008 there were 226 and 231 in 2009.
"Still, it is too many, but it's a far cry from 314," Dyer says. "At least we don't have them standing on the corners barking anymore. Our goal is to take away their neighborhoods."
The figures do not capture the uptick in shootings since July 2009, when the History Channel's Gangland series featured the Bulldogs and egos swelled, prompting a summer police sweep that netted 200 arrests and dozens of confiscated weapons.
On one sweep officers arrested Naomi Copple, 27, on parole from Chowchilla State Prison for Women, because her parole agent said she tested dirty for drugs. As they searched her house, she sat on the curb, hands cuffed behind her back. With a shaved head, she could not hide the two dog paw tattoos over her right eyebrow, or the 5150 — police code for crazy person — inked on the back of her neck.
About the tats on her forehead: "It's just some stupid s--- I did a long time ago. I was a kid."
Police see it differently. "It's like a billboard on their face saying 'Hey, stop me,'" Robles said.
On Thanksgiving Eve, a year-long police investigation netted Christopher Chavez, 26, the suspect in the 1999 murder of a transvestite, his two brothers and a 16-year-old. Awaiting trial, Chavez is accused of being the shot-caller of a small Bulldog "cell." He wore a bulletproof vest and carried automatic weapons, police said.
At the arrest scene, police reported finding 50 marijuana plants in a toddler's bedroom.
"You always feel bad for the kids," said Detective Tony Gates. "We always say they have no chance."
Investigators eavesdropping on conversations learned that Chavez, who joined the Bulldogs as a young teen, sold methamphetamine to his own mother, a street dealer, and used juveniles to move drugs and guns. The electronic surveillance reaffirmed the importance of tattoos.
"One of the juveniles had a gang tattoo on his body, and it subjected him to being involved in more crime," said Gates. "Chris Chavez told him, 'You have to back that up.' As investigators, we knew it, but it was surprising to hear it."
Children in Bulldog neighborhoods live amid prostitutes and parolees, surrounded by crime and violence, unemployment and poverty. The gang offers security, a sense of identity and, for many, a livelihood. In the worst Bulldog neighborhoods, drug dealers wear the nicest clothes and drive the newest cars.
"The middle class and upper class think about and do things to plan for the future," says C. Ronald Huff, a University of California-Irvine criminologist who studies gangs. "People who don't have those things are more fatalistic because they don't believe they have a future. Parents don't imagine anything will be different for their children."
The police gang unit has confiscated photographs of infants posed in Fresno State Bulldog onesies, cuddling semiautomatic handguns instead of bottles.
A survey of Fresno County school officials in 2007 found gang affiliations begin as early as kindergarten. And a school survey this fall showed the Bulldog gang with a steady source of new recruits: Fresno County 8th graders were almost twice as likely to join gangs if their fathers were involved.
"We're seeing third generation Bulldogs now, and it's not stopping," said Robles. "It's sad that these parents don't want something better for their children."
Whether Enrique Gonzalez is the kind of parent Robles describes will be decided in court; a hearing is set for Feb. 11. The Fresno County district attorney has charged Gonzalez and his friend, Travis Gorman, with mayhem — plus gang enhancements — for tattooing Gonzalez' 7-year-old son's hip with a dog's paw. If convicted, they could serve two decades or more behind bars.
Police say the boy was an unwilling participant, held down and marked against his will. Gonzalez' estranged wife discovered the tattoo and took her son to police.
Defense attorney Douglas Foster said the tattooing was only a case of poor judgment, not a crime. He denied it was forced, saying the boy made that claim only because he was intimidated by police and upset by his angry mother.
According to the lawyer, friends who were there said the child begged for a tattoo. They quoted him as saying, "Daddy, I want to be like you."

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Six Florencia 13 gang members life in prison sentence

six Florencia 13 gang members life in prison sentence appears to bring to a close a prolonged and terrifying spate of violence in the Florence-Firestone district allegedly brought on by orders from a prison gang member in solitary confinement 700 miles away.Beginning in 2004, the unincorporated Los Angeles County area north of Watts was the site of one of the region's worst gang sieges since the early 1990s, evolving into what some residents felt was a race war.The violence left dozens of people dead, including many with no gang affiliation, and required enormous county resources to combat."Things have gotten a lot better," said Chris Le Grande, pastor of Great Hope Missionary Baptist Church on Compton Avenue in Florence-Firestone.
U.S. District Judge David Carter sentenced Florencia member Francisco Flores, 24, to life in prison on Wednesday, saying that he "preyed on victims because they were black and for no other reason," according to a U.S. attorney's office news release.
Earlier this year, Carter had handed out life sentences to Florencia members Jesse Vasquez, 36; Alberto Hernandez, 28; Gilberto Oliva, 41; Manuel Hernandez, 27; and Noe Gonzalez, 28. Arturo Cruz, 34, was sentenced to 60 years in prison. Jose Gonzalez, 36, received a 20-year sentence. Two more gang members are scheduled to be sentenced later this month. An 11th defendant, Alejandro Rincon, will be retried in April.
Their trial, which took place in federal court in Santa Ana in 2008, grew from an indictment of 104 Florencia gang members on charges that included racketeering, conspiracy to sell drugs and murder.Of those indicted, 94 have pleaded guilty or have been convicted. Four more await trial; two have died and four are fugitives.The case showed the remarkable power the Mexican Mafia prison gang holds over Southern California Latino street gangs. Prosecutors alleged that Mexican Mafia member Arturo "Tablas" Castellanos essentially created a crime wave in the Florence-Firestone district.Castellanos was not indicted because he is already serving a life prison term in a maximum security cell in Pelican Bay State Prison. He hasn't been on the streets since 1979.Yet he wrote letters, introduced as evidence at the trial, that presumed to control a street gang, most of whose members had never seen him.Castellanos ordered gang members to stop rampant infighting; to tax drug dealers in their neighborhoods, as well as prostitutes, fruit vendors and vendors of phony ID cards in nearby Huntington Park; and to funnel the proceeds to him and other mafia members. He also ordered the gang to attack the local Crips gang, whose members are black."The Mexican Mafia has a powerful grasp on these [Latino] gangs," said Peter Hernandez, the assistant U.S. attorney who prosecuted the case.
"The prison system is a segregated place. Those rules and letters from Castellanos attempted to adhere those prison rules to the street," he said.
As Castellanos' letters appeared on the street in the fall and winter of 2004, Florencia 13 erupted in a spate of violence against African Americans.
"They just went out and started shooting" at black people, Hernandez said.
East Coast Crips responded with shootings of their own, often targeting Latinos who were not gang members.Few actual gang members died. Instead, residents said, they lived amid a race war.

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four accused - Nicola Ciconte, 54, of Rowville, Michael Calleja, 51, of Kew, Vincenzo Medici, 45, of Mildura, and Carmelo Loprete, 41, of Adelaide

four accused - Nicola Ciconte, 54, of Rowville, Michael Calleja, 51, of Kew, Vincenzo Medici, 45, of Mildura, and Carmelo Loprete, 41, of Adelaide - will be tried in absentia in the town of Vibo Valentia in Calabria after a failed attempt by the Italian government to extradite them from Australia.Anti-mafia prosecutor Salvatore Curcio has told The Age the prosecution will use testimony from a Mafia turncoat, whose name has been suppressed, to corroborate phone taps, photographic and video evidence allegedly linking the four to a multimillion-dollar drug smuggling network that stretched from Colombia through Spain and Italy to Australia.According to court documents, the turncoat has confirmed the alleged link between the Calabrian Mafia and what prosecutors have termed ''leading crime figures operating in Australia''.
He has told prosecutors the four Australians made several trips to Italy to arrange the shipment of large quantities of cocaine while members of the elite Carabinieri special operations group filmed their alleged meetings in Calabria.
''The essential nucleus of the investigation with which we are dealing can, without any doubt, be confirmed in the statements and accusations made by [unnamed turncoat]; through the taps of telephones and public places; in international documents; and as a result of searches and seizures carried out in identifying assets,'' prosecutors said in one document.Security is expected to be tight at the trial after a bomb attack outside a court building in nearby Reggio Calabria and the discovery of explosives during a visit by Italian President Giorgio Napolitano in January.
Court documents allege the four Australians conspired with the Calabrian Mafia in the ''transportation and importation'' of 500 kilograms of cocaine with an estimated street value of $35-$50 million from South America via Italy to Melbourne between 2002 and 2004.
The trial is the latest in a series of cases that arose from an investigation into a vast Mafia drug-smuggling network that sought to ship enormous quantities of cocaine inside slabs of marble, plastic tubes and canned tuna across four continents.
Italian court documents obtained by The Age allege that Nicola Ciconte played the lead role in negotiating with the Italians in setting up the operation.
Prosecutors are expected to present detailed transcripts of long-distance telephone conversations allegedly between Ciconte and Vincenzo Barbieri, a senior Mafia figure who was sentenced to 18 years in prison in 2005.The four Australians are charged with criminal association aimed at international cocaine trafficking and attempted importation of cocaine. If convicted, they would face lengthy prison terms if they set foot on Italian soil.Arrest warrants for them were issued by anti-Mafia prosecutors and Italian police in January 2004.While the Australians are not expected to appear at the trial, a court lawyer will be appointed to represent them.When approached by The Age, the Italian Ministry of Justice declined to comment on the status of the extradition request or whether it had ever been formally put to the Australian Attorney-General's department or the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions.

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James Bucheger told deputies -- he's a Juggalo. The Juggalos claim they're just extreme fans of the band "Insane Clown Posse".

James Bucheger of Oakhurst, is in jail -- accused of breaking into two cabins near Bass Lake. Bucheger told deputies -- he's a Juggalo. The Juggalos claim they're just extreme fans of the band "Insane Clown Posse". But many law enforcement agencies consider them -- a violent street gang. Deputies found the suspect covered in blood at a third home where a party was taking place. The two burglarized homes had smashed windows and blood splattered throughout them.

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seven Latin King members were arrested

seven Latin King members were arrested, the FBI said: Rene Ramirez, 27, of Orlando; Ricky Montesino, 26, of Orlando; Frederic Salizan, 28, of Orlando; Kevin Sullivan, 29, of Orlando; Derrick Hester, 21, of Davenport; Rafael Rodriguez, 35, of Davenport; Emilio Rosa, 37, of Davenport.Four others were already in state custody: Jose Santana, 28; Jason Rohena, 22; Jose Garcia, 23; and Vic Melendez, 22.Authorities are still looking for Luis Gelpi, 20, of Park Manor Drive, Orlando. Gelpi is considered armed and dangerous.The Latin Kings are one of the largest gangs nationwide, said Orlando police Sgt. Jose Velez. They’re very well organized, and each city or geographic area has a leader who reports to a nationwide leader.

“They are dangerous. They are criminals. They sell drugs. They fight for territories. They threaten people. They shoot people if necessary,” Velez said. “Anytime you can put people like this away, it makes the community a lot safer

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Ricardo McKendrick Sr., once a member of the notorious Black Mafia, pleaded guilty to a drug conspiracy charge

Ricardo McKendrick Jr., a Salem County, N.J., resident who has been in jail since his arrest in April 2008, was described as a "dealer's dealer" by U.S. District Judge Gene E. K. Pratter before she imposed a 108-month prison sentence.The term was substantially below recommended sentencing guidelines, and came in response to a government motion that detailed the extent of McKendrick's cooperation.Pratter also had a private, 15-minute sidebar session in the midst of the hearing in which she heard more details about why the prosecution felt a lesser sentence was appropriate.
The motion seeking a sentence reduction was filed under seal and is not available to the public.Neither the prosecutor, Assistant U.S. Attorney Leo Tsao, nor McKendrick's lawyer, Brian McMonagle, would comment about the motion or the sidebar session after the hearing.Pratter called the motion "very compelling," but provided no details.Under guideline recommendations, McKendrick, 38, faced a sentence of 188 to 235 months.The soft-spoken, admitted kingpin apologized to family members and friends who had packed the eighth-floor courtroom for the hearing.He said he was motivated by a desire to "get ahead" and had seen the money he made from drug dealing as a measure of success."It was the greatest mistake I ever made," he said. "I hurt so many people."
Police and the FBI seized nearly 600 pounds of cocaine, valued at about $28 million, and more than $1 million in cash when McKendrick was arrested in April 2008.
The stash included $982,000 hidden in the trunk of a Mercedes parked in the garage of a home in Woodstown, N.J., where McKendrick lived with his wife, who is a lawyer, and their 4-year-old daughter.Authorities said McKendrick used his father's Grays Ferry rowhouse in South Philadelphia to store his drugs.Ricardo McKendrick Sr., once a member of the notorious Black Mafia, pleaded guilty to a drug conspiracy charge in December 2008 and was sentenced to 10 years in prison.
Authorities raided his house in the 2600 block of Federal Street after receiving a tip that the younger McKendrick had received a shipment of cocaine.
During that raid authorities found 274 kilograms of cocaine (about 600 pounds).
"In terms of the sheer amount of cocaine seized in the offense, the scope of the defendant's crime is unmatched in recent Philadelphia history," Tsao wrote in a sentencing memo filed prior to Tuesday's hearing.McKendrick's decision to cooperate is not a secret.He testified for the government in the trial of rogue Philadelphia cop Malik Snell last year.Snell was charged with using his badge and his gun to rob drug dealers. McKendrick testified about a bogus police stop in which Snell stole $40,000 from the backseat of his car.But McKendrick's decision to cooperate could extend well beyond the case of a corrupt police officer.Described by Tsao as a "major player in the Philadelphia cocaine market," McKendrick could offer authorities inside details about the Philadelphia drug underworld.
McKendrick, according to law enforcement sources, bought and sold in bulk, and his information could help make cases against both the drug suppliers from whom he was buying and the dealers to whom he was selling.

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Police found 26-year-old Lester Thompson and 17-year-old Mileak Richardson sprawled face down on the sidewalk

fatal shooting of a man and his teenage cousin on a Jersey City street corner may have been a gang-related execution.Police found 26-year-old Lester Thompson and 17-year-old Mileak Richardson sprawled face down on the sidewalk at around 4 a.m. Tuesday. Both had been shot in the head.A neighbor reported hearing five shots and a car racing away.Hudson County Prosecutor Edward DeFazio said the attack was "clearly premeditated'' and money may have been taken from at least one of the victims.
Authorities are still searching for the shooter

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Adrian Ramírez, known as "El Rama" or "12" was killed in a shootout with Mexican soldiers

Adrian Ramírez, known as "El Rama" or "12" was killed in a shootout with Mexican soldiers the day after two squads of gunmen massacred 15 students who were celebrating a birthday party. The killings has shocked Mexico, and called into question President Felipe Calderón's war on the violent drug cartels who are fighting for control of profitable routes to the U.S.Police interrogated José Dolores Arroyo, who is accused of being a lookout for the gunmen. Mr. Arroyo told police the gunmen, who worked for the Juárez Cartel, also known as La Linea, believed the students belonged to a rival gang known as the Artistic Assassins who work for Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán, Mexico's most powerful drug lord. Mr. Guzmán has been battling to take over Ciudad Juárez from the hometown Juárez Cartel for the past two years. During that period, violence has spiraled out of control. Last year, more than 2,600 people were killed in drug related violence in Ciudad Juárez, up from 1,600 in 2008.

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Daniel “Rush” Potepa fugitive Bloods gangster with roots in Liberia was captured and charged yesterday with shooting a local man

fugitive Bloods gangster with roots in Liberia was captured and charged yesterday with shooting a local man at a homecoming party for a U.S. Marine on upscale Palton Road.Police said Daniel “Rush” Potepa, 20, shot 23-year-old Anshul Rastogi in the arm, hip and pelvis, wounding him gravely. Rastogi was reported in critical condition on a respirator at Aria Health’s Torresdale hospital.According to a probable cause affadavit, the party was held on Jan. 23 for Iraq War returnee Michael Shannon, a Marine who saw Potepa’s gun jam when the suspect pointed it at him and tried to fire.The legal papers also said the shots were fired at the party at the same time Potepa’s ally in the Sex Money Murder wing of the Bloods was smashing liquor bottles and threatening to cut people with the jagged edges.Four Bensalem detectives cracked the case by checking the social networking Internet site Facebook to compile a list of party attendees and see some of their pictures. (Also on Facebook, Shannon recounted the incident and ID'd Rastogi as his best friend.)
Promoted on the Internet as the “The Party at the Mansion,” the celebration at the $600,000 home stopped minutes before 3:30 a.m. when, police said, the host said someone had stolen a cell phone from the kitchen.When the party “bouncers” tried to stop anyone from leaving before they were frisked, “Rush” Potepa allegedly balked and in crude language said what he thought of the phone and its owner.That’s when, police said, the Liberian national pulled out a gun and started shooting. With Rastogi down on the floor bleeding heavily, Potepa allegedly stood over him and fired another shot at the victim just seconds after the misfire at lucky Marine Shannon.
Shannon was cited in the probable cause papers as saying he thought Potepa had shot Rastogi in the head.The papers also said Potepa’s fellow gangster, 24-year-old Augustine “Lyrico” Kiawu, allegedly smashed the liquor bottles, cut Shannon’s brother and threatened others.
With help from the Web site and videos taken at the party, cops were able to arrest Kiawu last week. He was charged with aggravated assault and other offenses, as was Bristol Township resident Potepa when cops caught up to him.
A judge ordered Potepa held on $3 million bail as Rastogi was fighting for his life in the intensive care unit. Police said Rostogi needs a ventilator to keep breathing and that he was twice taken off the device and quickly put back on both times.
The hospital would not release information on the condition of the victim, a Bensalem High graduate and college student whose family was said to be with him in the intensive care unit.But Rastogi’s sister, Monica, told friends on Facebook that he was able to talk when a tube was taken out of his mouth and that the family is hopeful.

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Juan Palo Lopez Ruiz, 35, of Watsonville was pronounced dead at the scene of the 9:11 p.m. shooting

Juan Palo Lopez Ruiz, 35, of Watsonville was pronounced dead at the scene of the 9:11 p.m. shooting at a residence in the 8800 block of Vista de Tierra Circle, deputies said. A second victim, Fernando Ramirez Ruiz, 35, of Castroville was taken by air to a San Jose hospital, deputies said. Sheriff's units swarmed to the scene to find one of the wounded men lying in the roadway and the second near the entrance of a housing unit, deputies said. Witnesses told deputies that the two men were at a birthday party when "unknown individuals" came up and asked if they belonged to any gangs. The interlopers were told to leave, and they started shooting, deputies said.
The shooters were seen leaving the area on foot, deputies said. They shot at a third man but missed, deputies said. Several of the rounds entered residences in the housing complex but no one else was injured, deputies said. The fatal shooting is being investigated as gang-related, deputies said.

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Robert Schultz shot Carlton Ewing with a .40 caliber semi-automatic gun on the evening of Aug. 17, which was a Latin King organized "Hood Day,"

Robert Schultz shot Carlton Ewing with a .40 caliber semi-automatic gun on the evening of Aug. 17, which was a Latin King organized "Hood Day," Assistant Cook County State's Attorney Antara Nath said. "Hood Days" are designated days when gang members look for for rival members so "shorties" — or those hoping to join the gang — can target enemies. Ewing did not belong to a gang, Nath said. Ewing, who was wearing a red baseball cap, was traveling in a car with three others in the 9800 block of South Ewing when Schultz's co-defendant Juan Macias yelled out, "GD killers" and motioned for Schultz to fire, Nath said. Schultz, then 17, sprung from the gangway he was hiding in and allegedly shot eight times at the car. One of the bullets went through the truck and hit Ewing in the back, Nath said.
The now 18-year-old Schultz, of the 9500 bock of South Avenue L, was arrested on Sunday in Crown Point, Ind. The 5-foot-5 alleged shooter, who goes by the nick name "Lucky Charms," looked nervous and gripped on to the table as Judge Donald Panarese told him he was charged with first-degree murder.
"Do you speak?" Panarese asked the part-time carpenter and roofer.
"Yes," Schultz replied. Schultz has no prior convictions.

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Julian Escobar, 24, was arrested Saturday to face murder, attempted murder, gang and gun charges

Julian Escobar, 24, was arrested Saturday as he drove away from his Pajaro Circle house and will be in court Tuesday to face murder, attempted murder, gang and gun charges, authorities reported.Escobar and another, still unidentified man went to the Apple Hill neighborhood in Watsonville the afternoon of March 21, confronted a group of young men playing basketball on public court and asked what gang they claimed, according to police.Angel Escobedo, 19, and his friends said they weren't involved in gangs. He and the other basketball players fled when gang members pulled a handgun, but Escobedo was shot several times and died.Although police suspect Escobar came to Watsonville to retaliate for a prior incident - which officers are tight-lipped about - Watsonville Police Chief Manny Solano said the gang member was not seeking out Escobedo in particular."This young man was an innocent victim of the terrible, terrible gang crimes we see," District Attorney Bob Lee said.
Escobedo had grown up in Watsonville but lived in Hollister. He was planning to go into law enforcement or join the military before he was killed, according to Solano.
His death was one of four homicides in the city in 2009. Of those, three were gang-related murders. Police have made arrests in two of the gang killings as well as the fourth homicide.Investigators identified Escobar, an ex-con, as the suspect based on "a new little bit of information" they received last week, according to Watsonville police detective Jarrod Pisturino."It was something that we followed up on and it just snowballed," Pisturino said. "It was very exciting and almost unbelievable."Before Escobar surfaced as a suspect, detectives had chased hundreds of leads in the 10 months since the killing and shown photo lineups to dozens of people, including many Apple Hill residents who cooperated with the investigation.
"We went into the neighborhood immediately afterward," said Solano, highlighting the department's community outreach efforts, including the Post-Incident Team and chaplain program. "I do believe that's why it fostered trust."
In addition to witness accounts, detectives relied on video surveillance from a nearby apartment complex. A police sketch artist made two renderings of the suspect, one of which included a teardrop tattoo below the assailant's left eye.
Escobar has the same tattoo and Pisturino said seeing that marking when detectives pulled up Escobar's mug shot last week helped things click.A judge signed a $1 million arrest warrant Thursday for charges that include the personal use of a firearm, likely meaning he is suspected of firing the deadly shots.Police declined to discuss the evidence in the case or where the tip leading them to Escobar came from. They also did not say if the gun was recovered or confirm that Escobedo was the shooter.Escobar was arrested Saturday morning after Watsonville gang investigators, agents from the county's Anti-Crime Team and Salinas police officers staked out his house and other hangouts for two days.Monday, he was transferred from the Monterey County Jail to the Santa Cruz County Jail.Solano said Escobar doesn't have a history with Watsonville police, but he was arrested by Salinas police in 2005 after he brandished a gun at officers and ran when he was pulled over. Escobar served three years in prison for the incident.

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Stephen Marshall, 38, sensationally confessed to the other atrocities

Stephen Marshall, 38, sensationally confessed to the other atrocities He admitted through his barrister that he sliced up and dismembered the victims a decade before he slaughtered his landlord Jeffrey Howe - whose flat he wanted for himself and his hooker girlfriend. At the time the four died he said he was working for North London's most vicious crime family - the notorious Adamses.
The cleaver-loving ex-gangster, whose confession stunned detectives, was taken away to begin a life sentence after REFUSING to identify the other corpses. Murder cop Michael Hanlon, who nailed Marshall after kitchen salesman Mr Howe's body parts were found, planned to visit the beast in jail. The Detective Chief Supt, who admitted the confession was a "surprise", confirmed: "Clearly we will seek to interview him further." Police suspect they know who two of the victims were.
The FIRST is gangster Gilbert Wynter - an enforcer for the Adams gang. He vanished in 1998 after the family accused him of double crossing them by skimming off drug profits. His remains are believed to be under the Millennium Dome - now known as the 02 arena. The SECOND is a hoodlum known only as Manchester John.
His body parts are thought to be somewhere in the North of England after he stole £100,000 from the mob family. Marshall's QC Peter Doyle told how for four years in the late 1990s his client was a bouncer at nightclubs in London and the Home Counties run by the mobsters. The QC said murder victims would be brought to the clubs late at night for the hulking bodybuilder to cut to pieces.
His client thought it "sensible" to get on with the grisly job no questions asked. Remains were disposed of by other gangsters.The gruesome routine was long suspected by Scotland Yard. Det Chief Supt Hanlon said: "We've now got for the first time from Marshall that he has been involved in those types of crime. That gives us areas to investigate." Man mountain Marshall, who boasts a 52in chest, became adept at using a meat cleaver, knives and sometimes a chainsaw. But his inexperience at HIDING remains came back to haunt him when he stabbed Mr Howe, 49, to death last March.
He simply dumped the cut-up body around the countryside in Hertfordshire and Leicestershire - the limbs wrapped in plastic and the torso in an old suitcase.
Within days passers-by began stumbling across body parts, including a head with eyes, ears and tongue cut away.The victim became known as Jigsaw Man as horrific discoveries continued for three weeks. When cops identified him they found Marshall and his lover still living in Mr Howe's flat in Southgate, North London - and spending his money. The lodger admitted cutting up the body in an ensuite bathroom and disposing of it. But bizarrely he denied murder - and a jury was sworn in at St Albans Crown Court, Herts. They heard three weeks of evidence before Marshall suddenly changed his plea to guilty last Friday. He had to wait until yesterday - when the trial of his prostitute girlfriend ended - before being sentenced to life with a minimum of 36 years. Lover Sarah Bush, 21, was also charged with murder, which she denied. Yesterday the prosecution accepted guilty pleas on two charges of perverting justice - involving covering up the killing and helping to dispose of the body. She got three years and nine months. CCTV caught the pair driving near where some of the body parts were dumped. The mum of two was working for an escort agency when Marshall started paying her for sex. He had a job with Kitchens Direct - a long way from the days when he used to call gang bosses Terry and Tommy Adams "uncle".
Police spent 25 years trying to nail Terry Adams - whose mob is suspected of 25 gangland murders. Vice girl Bush quit charging Marshall for sex when she fell for the twice-wed charmer who is dad to four kids. When her mum kicked the pair out, salesman colleague Mr Howe let them stay at his flat. The heavy smoker, who had lung disease, was yesterday described by his family as "a charming character who had a heart of gold." Bush told a pal Marshall would let him join them for three-in-a-bed sex.

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McCarthy-Dundon gang dealt a major blow after gardai seized €300,000 worth of heroin and arrested a leading member of the outfit.

ONE of the country's main criminal gangs has been dealt a major blow after gardai seized €300,000 worth of heroin and arrested a leading member of the outfit.
The crime figure was arrested in Limerick by gardai investigating the latest feud-related shooting in the city over the weekend. Officers also recovered a shotgun that was used in the attack.On Saturday evening, during a major search, gardai recovered a major cache of heroin on the Ballysimon road -- four miles from the city. Two men were arrested as part of the investigation, and heroin with an estimated street value of €300,000 was recovered. It is understood the narcotics belonged to the Collopy criminal gang.A 22-year-old man, considered to be a leading member of the gang, was arrested by gardai. He is a well-known criminal in the city and served a prison sentence for drug dealing. The other individual being detained is from Dublin.Meanwhile, detectives from Roxboro garda station were last night questioning a 25-year-old man suspected of being involved in the shooting of another man in the city on Saturday evening. The victim, aged in his 20s and from Bruff, Co Limerick, was shot on Carey's Road at around 5pm. An assailant armed with a shotgun fired at least one shot at the intended target. He suffered pellet wounds to the legs and was brought to the Mid-Western Regional Hospital.The man suspected to have carried out the shooting was arrested a short time later on Hyde Road. He can be held for up seven days. It is believed that the incident is drug-related and that the victim was targeted after he fell into debt with one of the city's criminal gangs.Separately, gardai recovered a shotgun they believe was used in the shooting of a 27-year-old criminal in the city on January 22. The victim, who is also a member of the Collopy gang, was shot twice in the Ballynanty area of the city as thousands of rugby fans left nearby Thomond Park. He was targeted by members of the McCarthy-Dundon criminal gang after his release from prison for drugs offences.
A 17-year-old who was arrested in connection with the incident was released without charge over the weekend.

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