Alleged gang members indicted

Jace Radke and Will Oremus

Friday, Aug. 15, 2003 | 11:10 a.m.

Twenty-one alleged gang members have been named in a federal indictment. Nine of the men were already incarcerated on other charges, five were arrested on Wednesday and Thursday, and arrest warrants have been issued for seven others.

A two-year racketeering investigation by local and federal authorities has resulted in 21 indictments of alleged gang members on charges ranging from drug dealing to murder.

The 80-count federal indictment should greatly hamper the operations of one of Las Vegas' larger street gangs, the Rolling 60s, said Joe Forti, North Las Vegas Assistant Chief of Police.

"For a lot of years these gangs have run amok in our cities," Forti said. "They've become a cancer in our communities, and we have to act as surgeons to remove them."

Of the 21 men indicted, nine were already in custody on unrelated charges. Four were arrested Wednesday and another was arrested Thursday. Seven of the men facing charges are considered fugitives, FBI spokesman Todd Palmer said.

Charges against the alleged gang members date back to robberies of grocery stores in 1992, and also include operating "drug houses," dealing crack, transporting a minor across state lines to engage in prostitution, arson and murder. If convicted the accused could face years of prison time.

The Rolling 60s are affiliated with the Crips, a highly organized and violent West Coast gang.

Some of the criminal activities that members of the Rolling 60s are being charged with include:

There are 17 related cases that have already been adjudicated in federal court, or are pending, said Ellen Knowlton, special agent in charge of the Las Vegas FBI.

"The message (to gang members) is that Las Vegas is an extremely hostile environment for gang activity," Knowlton said. "We're not finished. We will continue to investigate gang activity and unsolved cases."

Although the racketeering indictment includes 80 separate counts, only the charges relating to the killings of Hawkins and Williams were a part of a gang war that saw dozens of shootings in the general area of Martin Luther King Boulevard and Carey Avenue in 2001.

The gang war between the Rolling 60s and the Gerson Park Kingsmen stretched from January of 2001 into the fall of that year with shootings peppering the border area between North Las Vegas Police and Metro jurisdiction.

Forti said that while many of those shootings remain unsolved, the new charges should have an effect on gang violence in the valley.

"We're confident that we will see a reduction in gang violence," Forti said. "The gang members don't recognize our jurisdictional boundaries, but by working together we can combat that."

Fear of retribution by gang members has gripped valley communities in the past when authorities asked for help in their investigations. On Thursday residents who live in the area west of Interstate 15 near Owens Avenue and Lake Mead Boulevard didn't want to talk about the indictment or gangs.

"I don't want to talk about any of that," said a woman who works at a child development center on F Street.

A man who lives near the Cadillac Arms apartments, another location where authorities say gang members sold drugs, said, "You're not going to get me talking about that stuff."

Another man who was sitting at a bus stop on the corner of Washington Avenue and H Street said that gangs have long been a serious problem in the neighborhood, but he added, "It's gotten a lot better just since a few months ago."

Still, he warned, "Be careful walking around here."

Despite a reluctance to talk about gangs by some, authorities did get help from residents while conducting the nearly two-year long racketeering investigation, Knowlton said.

"The people in the neighborhoods are the ones that are victimized the most, and I would say that we had good cooperation from the community in this investigation," Knowlton said.

Residents and business owners who live north of downtown Las Vegas to the area around Martin Luther King and Carey said they hope the indictment results in safer neighborhoods.

Phil Umeria, who owns the Knotty Pine motel on 1900 Las Vegas Blvd. North, was especially happy that some of the "drug houses" that the Rolling 60s ran have been shut down. He said he has been urging police for years to crack down on the drug dealers at the Cactus Hotel across the street from his motel, named in the indictment as a "drug house."

"I'm very happy about (the bust)," said Umeria, who has lived near the northern border of Las Vegas and North Las Vegas for 25 years. "That should have been done a long time ago."

Umeria said that he hopes the indictment will result in prison sentences, instead of the constant jailing and release that he says is usually what happens to gang members and prostitutes in the area.

"The police have been at it for so many years," Umeria said. "They catch them, they let them go. It's like a merry-go-round."