Crackberry Bust at Washington Market

• 

Details

Category: Crime Reports

Published on Sunday, 26 June 2011 15:41

Written by Dianne Lawrence

 

May 19, 2011 After a year long investigation highlighting increasing assistance from Federal authorities to beleaguered local law enforcement, “Operation Red Dawn” went into full swing as FBI agents along with LAPD, swept through several locations and arrested 17 Federal suspects and 28 others on local charges related to drug dealing and illegal weapons. They came down hard on a local electronics and cell phone store operating out of the Washington Square Market Plaza on Washington Blvd. east of Crenshaw where members of the Black P Stone Bloods had been selling pot and crack, giving new meaning to the popular term for Blackberries, Crackberries. Property owners have been faced with abatement actions forcing them to remove anyone responsible for gang and narcotics activities. "It's the top priority of [the] U.S. attorney to protect the public, and protecting the public in L.A. means going after gangs," said Assistant U.S. Atty. Bruce Riordan of the Los Angeles office. Riordan explained that members were looking at mandatory five year sentences, no parole and being placed separately in far-flung federal prisons helping to erode unified gangs.