Multiple law enforcement agencies and partners including the FBI, DEA, and IRS Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI) have hit the jackpot after a three-year investigation resulted in the arrests of 12 members and associates of the Mexican Mafia-linked 18th Street Gang in Los Angeles.
The US Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California (USAO-CDC) said Thursday’s arrests came with federal charges of murder, extortion, drug trafficking, and running illegal gambling venues known as casitas.
The DEA’s LA Field Division took to X with footage of the drugs, $80,000 cash, and guns seized in Operation Dead Horse after raids on the gang’s “open air” narcotics market in LA’s MacArthur Park area:
According to a USAO-CDC news release, the gang ran their alfresco criminal marketplace out of the downtown LA park, where they operated out of tents to blend into the park’s large homeless community.
The DEA LA Field Division’s Special Agent in Charge Anthony Chrysanthis said the Mexican-American gang had been “moving product” at will and preying on the MacArthur Park population for “far too long.”
IRS-CI LA Field Office Special Agent in Charge Tyler Hatcher said the federal agency was “helping dismantle the network that allowed it to operate and profit at the expense of our communities.”
First Assistant US Attorney Bill Essayli said the arrests bring an end to 18th Street turning “one of the city’s most beautiful public spaces into a crime-infested pit.” He added:
That ends today.”
Essayli said the multiple enforcement agencies were “committed to eliminating violent organized crime and open-air drug markets from Los Angeles.”
In December, the multi-agency Operation Coast to Coast saw 130 people detained at illegal casitas across LA with the arrests of alleged members of the Florencia-13, Tortilla Flags, East Side Longos street gangs.
