Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department Division Chief Neal Tyler announced the arrest today of 43 Pasadena-area gang members and the rescue of four children in a press release sent at 8:36 p.m. tonight. The identity of the gang, which had extended its operation to Antelope Valley, was not announced.
The arrests were the result of a multi-agency operation that took place this morning in the Antelope Valley. More than 400 law enforcement officers from the following agencies participated in the bust.
- Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department-Operation Safe Streets Bureau
- Antelope Valley Crime Fighting Initiative
- United States Drug Enforcement Administration High-Intensity Drug Trafficking Area Task Force
- United States Drug Enforcement Administration Mobile Enforcement Team
- Immigration and Customs Enforcement
- Internal Revenue Service-Criminal Investigation
- California State Parole
- Los Angeles County Probation Department
The suspects were sought for trafficking cocaine and weapons charges. Thirty-two search warrants were served and 48 parole and probation searches took place at 80 locations in the Antelope Valley.
The Multi-Agency Response Team for the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services rescued four children under the age of six who were taken into protective custody due to the unsafe living conditions.
Cocaine and firearms seized in bust
Law enforcement officers seized approximately three pounds of crack cocaine and 114 grams of powder cocaine. Ten firearms, including handguns and rifles, had been previously seized during the ongoing investigation, and today an additional five handguns and one assault weapon were seized.
Information used to commit identity theft including credit cards and phone service information was recovered. The suspects had been using this information to facilitate their sales of narcotics.
The arrests are the result of 23 indictments by a federal grand jury in Los Angeles on August 4. Sixteen of the defendants were arrested this morning and authorities continue to search for six other suspects named in the indictment. Twenty-six additional gang members and associates were arrested on various criminal charges and parole violations.
The investigation began last year after a Pasadena area gang member shot and wounded Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Deputy Giovanni Lampignano during a July 12, 2009 incident in Palmdale. Dejon Ray King, the gang member who shot Deputy Lampignano, was convicted in June in California state court of attempted murder on a peace officer. King was subsequently sentenced to 38 years to life.
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Comments
I feel that 38 years is an unfair sentence. It should be rounded to 50.
Sounds like Pasadena Denver Lane Bloods gang...
I get tired of reading the same thing why don't the sheriffs spend some real time being a role model???? I don't like the AV Sheriff's, any encounters I have had with them they have acted like Cowboy's out to deal justice their own way. They are abusive toward people they arrest, what happened to being innocent until proven guilty. I believe in the AV it is the other way around. We pay taxes for them I can't understand why people do not speak up more, or is everybody afraid of them???
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