Last winter, Boston police noticed a rise in shootings around Humboldt Avenue in Roxbury, a section of the city historically plagued by gang violence. A handful of officers was assigned to do undercover drug buys a couple of times a week, hoping to gather enough intelligence to take some violent offenders off the street.
I know it sounds horrible, but with all the liquor stores and cigarette shops around we gotta rethink this drug thing.
Then in January, Gabriel Clarke, a 13-year-old seventh-grader, was shot in the stomach on his way to church choir practice.
Suddenly, as many as 24 officers from the drug and gang units were on the street four times a week, approaching known drug dealers with a history of carrying guns. To build their cases, the officers bought bags of crack cocaine and heroin from dealers and conducted video surveillance of them.
“This would have been a much smaller operation, had it not been for that shooting,” Boston Police Commissioner Edward F. Davis said.
Operation H, as the four-month sting became known, culminated in more than 100 officers fanning out across the city at dawn Tuesday, pulling dozens of alleged dealers, some described as gang members, from their beds. By the end of the day, 58 people, including two women, were in custody; 10 remained at large.
Marathon false flag helped.
As much as the raids were a response to the Jan. 11 shooting that almost killed Clarke, police said the operation was also an attempt to prevent the swell of violence that often comes as the summer approaches. Though most of the arrests were on drug distribution charges, Suffolk District Attorney Daniel F. Conley said many of the offenders have violent criminal histories.
Oddly(?), his picture is literally right next to the turn-in because of the mayoral race. Guess the drug bust gives him a leg up in the primary.
“Let this morning's events set a tone for the months to come,” Conley said during a press conference at Boston police headquarters. “We’re not going to tolerate violent crimes and drug feuds in Boston. If you pick up a gun, if you sell dope, if you bring chaos into your community, Boston police and the Suffolk district attorney’s office are coming after you.”
You have been warned Boston.
But in the community, some were skeptical that the raids would make a lasting difference.
“In the long run, I don’t think it’s going to have the sustaining effect of rebuilding our neighborhoods,” said Rufus J. Faulk, a program director at the Boston TenPoint Coalition, which works to prevent gang violence.
Related: Two shot near Bowdoin Street in Dorchester
Maybe he has a point.
He praised police and prosecutors, thanking them for holding violent offenders accountable. “But we can’t arrest our way out of this issue,” Faulk said. “Until we put the same vigilance around full employment for youth, helping them prepare for college and trade schools and public schools, the cycle is going to keep recurring.”
Then you ought to be against the new immigration bill.
Faulk’s plea came as state lawmakers are considering deep funding cuts for a youth summer jobs program, even as teen unemployment remains near record levels. Conley said that officials would be reaching out to the young relatives of those arrested to see what kind of services they need.
Nice that the government will be there after hauling away your loved ones.
Davis said the raids also served another purpose: putting pressure on those arrested to provide information about more serious crimes....
So even if they didn't so anything.... sigh.
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As for lasting differences....
"Officials hope gang raid results in long prison terms" by Andrew Ryan | Globe Staff, January 18, 2013
After almost two years of surveillance and undercover work, an army of more than 300 law enforcement officers set out at dawn Thursday to crush two of Boston’s most violent street gangs, arresting 27 longtime criminals on federal narcotics and firearm charges that prosecutors hope will end what had become a revolving door of arrests and short prison terms.
The raid came as welcome relief to residents on Woodward Avenue in Roxbury and in the Bowdoin-Geneva section of Dorchester, where authorities said the two gangs have been the driving force behind more than 60 shootings and six homicides in the last six years....
The effort by more than a dozen local and federal agencies took tenacity and perseverance, law enforcement officials said, and they hope the number of arrests and charges that carry lifetime prison sentences will be a warning to other gangs and help stem the violence that surges each summer.
“This will make a difference,” Police Commissioner Edward F. Davis III said at a press conference at the US attorney’s office. “I’m anticipating a much quieter summer because of the work that occurred this winter.”
This was how long ago?
Many of the suspects have plagued the two neighborhoods for so long, officials said, that they collectively have faced arraignment on charges more than 850 times and repeatedly returned to the street, including one who was convicted of stabbing someone to death and later released on parole.
When you start thinking about it, the justice system wants there to be crime. It's good for business.
This time, officials said, law enforcement made a concerted effort to build a case that would lead to lengthy prison terms.
In 2011, Boston police and the Federal Bureau of Investigation determined that the gang from Woodward Avenue had formed a lucrative alliance with another gang from Hendry Street in Bowdoin-Geneva, law enforcement officials allege.
As a team, the two gangs operated a sophisticated drug pipeline that stretched to California, Maine, and Miami, flooding Boston’s streets with thousands of Oxycodone pills, kilos of crack cocaine, and hundreds of pounds of high-grade marijuana.
So which government intelligence agency turned on them?
Investigators described a meticulous operation that began when a cooperating witness agreed to work with authorities and buy drugs. From August 2011 through October 2012, the cooperating witness bought crack cocaine, high-grade marijuana, and Oxycodone on Woodward Avenue, Hendry Street, and other places in Boston, according to documents provided by prosecutors. The witness made a total of 30 buys, many of which were recorded on videotape.
The drug buys gave investigators enough evidence for electronic wiretaps on scores of cellphones, providing investigators a rare understanding of the flow of drugs into Massachusetts, according to the documents. They listened as Jonathan DaSilva, the alleged ringleader from Woodward Avenue, pooled his money with his counterpart from Hendry Street, Alexis Hidalgo, combining resources to repeatedly purchase kilos of cocaine, thousands of Oxycodone pills, and hundreds of pounds of marijuana, according to the documents.
Officers listened, according to the documents, as suspects made phone calls for gun deliveries, a task that seemed as effortless as ordering a pizza. Davis said the suspects ordered killings but that police intervened to prevent violence and protect residents.
Over the summer, police parked a patrol car in front of a big yellow house at 37 Hendry St. Davis said the suspects were so nonchalant about the police presence that they simply told buyers to go to the back door.
At the press conference, US Attorney Carmen M. Ortiz stood before three tables piled with evidence: three handguns, a slab of cocaine that looked like a large block of feta cheese, and plastic bags brimming with fragrant marijuana buds.
Ortiz described the raid as “the dismantling of two Boston street gangs whose members have terrorized the community, intimidated witnesses, and brought drugs and guns into our neighborhoods.”
On Woodward Avenue and in Bowdoin-Geneva, the overwhelming majority of residents are law-abiding citizens.
As are most gun-owners.
Those residents have hungered for lasting peace amid bursts of violence that claim lives and give the neighborhood a bad reputation....
We all have.
Related: The Boston Globe's Baggy Pants
Haven't you kids heard? It's the new austerity and you need to pull up those pants and tighten your belt.
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Time to head over to Chinatown:
"White leader in Chinatown gang facing prison" by Milton J. Valencia | Globe Staff, March 15, 2013
John Willis was a white man from Dorchester, yet, according to court records, he quietly emerged as a leader among Chinatown’s Asian gangs, historically known for insulating themselves from outsiders.
He had been introduced to the neighborhood’s underworld when he was about 12 years old, learned to speak Cantonese, and was essentially adopted by a Chinese family, according to federal prosecutors. From there, they say, he followed the leaders of the violent and once-powerful Ping On Gang, launching a career that spanned more than two decades.
On Thursday, he was facing a lengthy prison term for his activities....
Willis, 42, was in federal court in Boston, pleading guilty to an indictment that painted him as the nexus among low-level Asian gangs that ran rackets in Chinatown, including drug dealing, gambling, and prostitution.
“The defendant ran a vast conspiracy,” Assistant US Attorney Timothy E. Moran said during the federal court hearing in which Willis pleaded guilty to dealing oxycodone and money laundering....
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Also see:
15 arrested on drug and gun charges
Shooting in South Boston
Shining Light on Brockton Gangs
Obama Goes After Gangs
Must be working:
"Crime declines in Boston in beginning of 2013; Community policing, wintry weather credited" by Evan Allen | Globe Correspondent, March 24, 2013
Major crimes in Boston dropped 15 percent in the first three months of 2013....
Related: Globe's Quick Stop and Frisk
It's whatever works to advance the agenda at a given moment.
However, shootings and firearm-related arrests are on the rise....
Police are getting out of their cars and walking their beats, he said. Safe Street Teams composed of six officers and a sergeant are regularly deployed to monitor hot spots, and resident watch groups are springing up across the city.
“Community policing is the core of it — the police officers are out on the street,” Mayor Thomas M. Menino said of the reason for the drop in crime. “Same cops, same beat. That works out real well. You have neighborhood crime watches. I believe that’s the real heart of solving crimes in the neighborhood.”
In 2012, 103 crime watch groups were formed, bring the total in Boston to 288, city officials said.
“I can feel the change in Boston,” said Monalisa Smith, who founded the Boston antiviolence group Mothers for Justice and Equality after her nephew was shot to death in 2010. “More people are working together.”
But, Smith said, the city still has a long way to go.
“I think we’re still seeing our young people fall victim to crime, and also be the perpetrators,” she said, ticking off a list of recent violent events, including the Feb. 28 shooting death of a 26-year-old man at the Dudley MBTA stop in Roxbury. “Crime is down, that’s what the statistics say — but one is too many for us.”
And while major crimes are down, gun crime is up....
By ONE!
Still, the shootings have rattled some neighborhoods, including Roxbury, where 13-year-old Gabriel Clarke lives. Clarke was shot in the stomach in January as he walked to church on a Friday evening.
“We’re still battling gun crime in the inner city,” said the Rev. Nigel G. David, Clarke’s pastor at the Berea Seventh Day Adventist Church on Seaver Street.
“No matter what the percentage is that’s dropped, we still have that horrific crime that happened.”
Clarke is recovering, David said, but gets anxious when he’s out on the street.
Still, David has noticed a dramatic increase in police presence in the neighborhood since the shooting. Officers have even come to church with Clarke and sat through services on several occasions, he said.
“I believe they went beyond the call of duty trying to reassure the family,” David said of police. Having officers out and about, he said, keeps people in line.
Others caution against reading too much into the recent crime numbers.
“Ten weeks do not a trend make,” said Thomas Nolan, who was a Boston police officer for 27 years and now lectures at Tufts University and the Urban College of Boston. “I think that the mildest winter in recent memory followed by the harshest winter in recent memory probably has more to do with that 15 percent drop in crime than anything the police are doing.”
Menino said he believes the recent numbers are part of a larger trend.
“I don’t care if it’s one week, or two weeks, or six years,” he said. “If it’s a drop in crime, I’m gonna support it. I’m gonna say it’s a good thing for us.”
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"Boston Police targeting summertime crime" by Evan Allen | Globe Correspondent, April 04, 2013
Boston Police Commissioner Edward F. Davis said Thursday that he hopes to cut gun crimes in half this summer in preparation for a summertime assault on youth violence.
Assault on violence?
“We’re going to have a full court press on those months this year,” said Davis. “We’re going to do a lot of preventive work leading up to those months, there’s going to be a significant amount of attention paid to the impact players in the city. We want them to put their weapons down.”
It's going to be a hot summer in Boston even without the global warming.
Major crimes in the city have dropped 15 percent, he told the crowd assembled for the ceremony, held at the Shelburne Community Center in Roxbury; violent crime has dropped 14 percent, and arrests are down 11 percent.
“Prevention is alive and well in the city of Boston,” he said....
While major crimes are down in the city, gun violence has risen slightly in the first three months of the year....
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Also see: Serious crime in Cambridge drops to lowest mark in almost 50 years, police say
I'm sick of the mixed messages.
I'm sick of the mixed messages.
