5th and Hill Taken Down, Downtown

Los Angeles: The Los Angeles Police Department announced the culmination last February of a major narcotics investigation, which netted 31 arrests, nearly a dozen guns, and narcotics by the pound, including heroin, valued at over $1 million on the street.

"Our target was the 5th and Hill criminal street gang," said LAPD Captain Andrew Smith.  "With these arrests, we have cut off the gang's head.  Local heroin addicts are finding it much harder to find someone to sell them a balloon."

Local narcotics and gang officers worked for 10 months, focusing on the gang and its leadership.  They identified Pedro Sanchez-Limon as the gang's presumptive leader and major supplier; Alberto Blanco, "El Morro," as its transporter; Jamie Chacon Diaz, "Archie," as the gang's accountant; and Abel Flores, "Barbas," as the gang's enforcer.  In addition, detectives arrested two women, Lourdes Valdez and Ruth Segura, who processed and packaged heroin for the gang.

Sanchez-Limon and Diaz had been deported previously but reentered the US illegally.  Blanco had been twice deported.  All four gang leaders have long criminal histories dating back to the 1980s.

The 5th and Hill gang formed in the 1970s from a group of day laborers and transients who began robbing pedestrians near 5th and Hill Streets in downtown Los Angeles.  The gang transitioned to heroin sales in the 1980s and has been the major suppliers of heroin in Skid Row and the surrounding blocks since then.

In addition to arresting the major leadership, detectives arrested 25 more members and associates for a variety of narcotics and weapons-related charges.  Police seized six handguns, 2 shotguns, and 2 rifles.  They also booked $250,000 in cash, 85 pounds of tar heroin, most of it packaged into 45,000 balloons ready for sale.  Detectives also nabbed 3 pounds of methamphetamine and 5 pounds of cocaine.  The heroin alone was valued at $1.5 million on the street.

Comments

[Jennie]

Great police work! An effort like this must have taken long hours and lots of teamwork. Hopefully this will silence some of your critics who claim that you folks are only going after the little guys when in reality the little guy leads to the big guys.

Even if your critics still don't understand, what really matters is that all of you have made a dent on the drug trade on skid row and the surrounding areas. Really great job.

[LOVES LA LEOs]

My joy is only tempered by the sobering thought of the light sentences they will get, if any. Please post the ultimate outcome. Let us know how long before they will have contracts out on the Narcotics squad from jail. I say, send em to Guantanamo for three years of interrogation without benefit of a good Jewish lawyer. That way, you can clean up your cold cases, too.

[Gabe]

The comment about "a good Jewish lawyer" is really not appropriate for this blog, don't you think?