LOS ANGELES
A member of the Five Deuce Broadway Gangster Crips – who was found guilty by a jury last year of conspiring to engage in racketeering activities, which included him selling crack cocaine on Skid Row – has been sentenced to 30 years in federal prison.
Tony Gordon, also known as “Wo
di,” 36, of Freeport, Illinois, who has a lengthy criminal history that includes three prior felony narcotics convictions, was sentenced Monday in federal court.
Gordon was convicted late last year of conspiring to violate the federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations.
Members of the conspiracy engaged in murders, robberies, witness and informant intimidation, and narcotics sales.
The jury further convicted Gordon of agreeing to distribute approximately 10 ounces of crack cocaine, as well as marijuana.
Gordon “was also a long time crack cocaine seller who preyed on the most vulnerable of the most vulnerable,” prosecutors wrote in sentencing papers filed with the court.
Gordon “purposely traveled from his own neighborhood to infiltrate the Skid Row area of downtown, despite its own dangers, where, as established at trial, defendant sold directly adjacent to substance abuse recovery centers and mental health centers.
Defendant purposefully and thoughtfully capitalized on these individuals’ most debilitating vice.”
During the trial, prosecutors presented evidence of Gordon’s membership in BGC and in the “Gremlin Riderz,” the gang’s violent “hit squad.”
The jury saw videos of Gordon at gang meetings providing guidance on how the gang should operate, at one point bragging that he solved problems “the best way I can” – through “violence.”
Other videos showed Gordon describing shooting at gang rivals, recounting a home invasion robbery, and discussing how to discipline gang “snitches.”
During yesterday’s sentencing hearing, Judge James Otero noted that Gordon continued to come to court in a wheelchair despite no evidence of a disability and a jail video showing Gordon engaging in a fistfight with another inmate.
Judge Otero concluded that Gordon committed perjury when he testified about his fabricated medical condition.
Gordon’s sentencing follows a hearing last month when Crips’ leader – Tyrine Martinez, 36, of Vernon – was sentenced to nearly 22 years in federal prison.
Other Crips members have recently received substantial prison sentences.
Gordon, Martinez and other key defendants in the case who have been sentenced agreed to be banned from living in the BGC territory and subject to expansive search conditions after their release from prison.
Martinez was the lead defendant named in a 213-page RICO indictment that charged 72 members and associates of the BGC, a street gang that claims territory in South Los Angeles and controls drug sales in an area just west of Skid Row.
The indictment outlined two decades of criminal conduct, including murders, robberies, extortion, illegal firearms possession, witness intimidation and narcotics trafficking.
Fifty-seven of the defendants in the case have been convicted by guilty plea or at trial. The remaining 15 defendants are scheduled to go on trial in November.