NEW YORK
A federal indictment charged 20 defendants with allegedly participating in a conspiracy to distribute crack cocaine in the Bronx and charging six of those defendants with carrying guns as part of the conspiracy, officials said.
Nineteen defendants are now in federal custody – five after having initially fled apprehension. One defendant remains at large, according to authorities.
Since at least 2013 officials allege that the defendants conspired to distribute massive amounts of crack cocaine, as well as other drugs, in an area of the Bronx.
The defendants often sold to children as young as middle school age, and controlled the area by the threat of violence, officials said.
Many carried guns to make that threat real.
Through covert surveillance, dozens of undercover purchases of narcotics, and court-authorized wiretaps of the conspirators’ phones, among other methods, law enforcement agents learned the structure and membership of the conspiracy, and amassed evidence of its crimes, according to authorities.
U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara stated: “Until these arrests, the flood of poisonous drugs that allegedly accompanied this conspiracy were a plague on the neighborhood these defendants dominated through intimidation and threats of violence.”
Commissioner William J. Bratton said: “The resolve of the NYPD and its law enforcement partners to stamp out illegal narcotic sales and its accompanying violence remains unfettered.”
Acting Special Agent in Charge Glenn Sorge said: “The individuals arrested today wreaked havoc on the neighborhoods of the Bronx by selling crack cocaine to anyone who had the money, including young children.”