Drug-Peddling Street Gang Holds Neighborhood in Fear

Only a few years ago, the Cadillac-Corning neighborhood was no different than other pleasant working-class enclaves within a stone’s throw south of Beverly Hills. But now, residents are more likely to describe the 26-block district as a graffiti-strewn prison where they are held hostage by the Playboy Gangster Crips, a drug-peddling street gang.

To avoid muggings, burglaries and intermittent gunfire, some residents have stopped walking their dogs or watering their lawns after nightfall. Security bars have been bolted over picture windows, marring the view from neatly appointed Spanish-style homes, and chain-link fences--sometimes topped with razor wire as an added deterrent--have been put up.

“I feel like I’m jailing my tenants to protect them from the kids outside,” said one apartment owner, who recently doubled the height of a fence to 12 feet.

Despite such precautions and a year-long police crackdown that resulted in a 50% increase in arrests during the first six months of 1987, members of the 200-strong Playboy Gangsters say the Westside neighborhood they have dubbed “PBGC Land” remains a comfortable place to hang out and conduct business.

In interviews last week, several gang members said they have no intentions of complying with the terms of a lawsuit recently filed by City Atty. James K. Hahn, which, if approved by a judge, would ban hard-core gang members from associating with each other or leaving their homes between 7 p.m. and 7 a.m.

“I can’t stop, I won’t stop, I refuse to stop and nobody can make me stop,” declared Wendell (Big Tuttt) Thompson, 20, a leader of the gang.

“I love the Playboy Gangsters,” said Thompson whose stomach bears a huge scar from a gunshot wound last year.

Although a Los Angeles Superior Court judge recently rejected Hahn’s request for a temporary restraining order as “too broad to grant,” further arguments on the city attorney’s lawsuit against the gang are scheduled for a court hearing now set for Wednesday but expected to be postponed to Dec. 10.

In taking the drastic action, prosecutors contend that the Playboy Gangsters employ an urban guerrilla-like network to sell rock cocaine. They say the gang posts lookouts who whistle when police approach and has cut holes in fences and bushes along escape routes.

However, gang members maintain that the proposed civil sanctions will not put an end to their drug business, which authorities say thrives on sales to affluent whites who prefer driving into Cadillac-Corning to venturing into seemingly rougher communities.

“It ain’t going to never stop,” said one Playboy Gangster, who wore a long gold earring and identified himself as L. T. “All they going to do is come and we going to run.”

A compatriot, Bam-Bam, 15, clothed in typical gang attire--a blue baseball cap and low-slung blue overalls--suggested the authorities should turn their attention elsewhere. “We (are) a small gang. They should mess with bigger ones.”

Gang experts concede that the streets of Cadillac-Corning are by no means as dangerous as those in many parts of South Los Angeles. But the situation has deteriorated to the degree that one veteran Los Angeles police officer stated in a recent court affidavit, “I hate to say it, but the Playboy Gangsters control this area--I mean that’s the only word for it.”

“I’ve rarely if ever seen a neighborhood where the gang operates with such openness and with such tight control over the territory,” added 12-year officer Mark Furhman.”Because the Playboy Gangsters’ turf is so small and they are so ruthless, they have literally no competition.”

At issue in the territorial battle between residents and the Playboy Gangsters is the future of a neighborhood of low-rise apartment buildings and single-story stucco houses bordered by La Cienega and Robertson boulevards, 18th Street and Cadillac Avenue. Cadillac-Corning’s 5,000 residents, a mixture of blacks, elderly Jewish people, Latinos, Asians and even a sprinkling of Sikhs, have been described as “a little United Nations” by Deputy City Atty. Robert A. Ferber.

Besides its proximity to Beverly Hills, the district is even closer to the pricey Beverlywood neighborhood, where, just one block west of Robertson, homes regularly sell for $500,000. Moreover, local real estate agents say the problem area is so concentrated in Cadillac-Corning that houses can go for an additional $100,000 just a block away to the north and south.

While some gang experts privately question why Hahn has singled out the Playboy Gangsters rather than more violent gangs operating in more impoverished districts, Hahn’s prosecutors retort that if the sanctions pass constitutional muster, they could serve as a model for city-wide action.

Cadillac-Corning was chosen because it is “one of the few areas where if you took the gang out of the neighborhood, it would return to normal,” said Ferber.

“In some neighborhoods, (residents) are so terrified, so hopeless about what is going on that they won’t say anything,” added Deputy City Atty. R. Bruce Coplen, coordinator of the office’s gang section. “People here are willing to take a stand.”

Neighborhood residents said last week that the situation has improved perceptibly since a police special problems unit beefed up patrols at the beginning of the year--enforcing curfew restrictions, breaking up drug sales and making arrests in an attempt to uproot gang members.

By mid-October, serious crimes including robbery, burglary and murder had dropped 16% compared to the same date last year.

Situation Remains Grim

But the situation remains grim, some residents said.

“All I want to be able to do is walk the streets at night,” wrote one resident in a letter to community officials last week. “My mother was mugged three times in broad daylight and my father had a gun held to his head for carrying only a quarter in his pocket.”

“I hope we can bring our area back,” said a 30-year resident, who asked for anonymity. “Now we’re scared of our own shadows.”

Police officers appear to agree that the fear is warranted.

“As it is, this area is getting more police protection than any other place in West Los Angeles, yet crime is still rampant,” said 14-year officer Frank Domino, in a court affidavit filed on behalf of Hahn’s lawsuit. “When we finally move out of the area, it’s hard to imagine how bad things could get.”

While some gang members, who typically range in age from 14 to 28, reside in single-parent households or on their own in a handful of rundown apartment buildings in the neighborhood, others come from surrounding communities.

At night, they take control of the streets, congregating in narrow roadways and alleys to hang out and ply their lucrative rock cocaine trade.

Thus far this year, more than 500 arrests have been made in Cadillac-Corning, the majority of them for drug-related offenses. Authorities say the Playboy Gangsters have been involved in six killings this year and 14 disappearances since mid-1985.

In August, two 14-year-old neighborhood boys--one a Playboy Gangster and the other a non-participating friend--were randomly gunned down by automatic rifle fire on a street in what police say was a retaliatory drive-by killing by members of a rival street gang.

“It could have been me or you or anyone walking down the street who got caught with the same bullet,” said Kenneth Sample, the older brother of the slain gang member, Paul Barnes Jr. “It’s part of life, but to get killed so young.”

Drug buyers have also been robbed, raped or gunned down, authorities say.

In late 1986, a 16-year-old involved in a business misunderstanding with a Playboy Gangster drug dealer was killed by a lookout who, upon receiving a signal, stepped out of an apartment building and fired a gun as the youth drove off on his motorcycle, police say.

Although the American Civil Liberties Union condemns gang violence, it also opposes Hahn’s proposed sanctions--saying the restrictions would infringe on constitutional rights. Some neighborhood residents also question whether police can adequately distinguish between gang members and youngsters who do not cause problems.

Blacks ‘Pulled Over’

“Basically you can be walking down the street and if you’re a black youth, you’ll be pulled over and questioned. . . . It’s degrading,” asserted a 20-year-old college co-ed, who asked to remain anonymous.

Sgt. Jim Wakefield of the special problems unit said his officers know most of the troublemakers by sight, but he added that, as part of their extensive patrols, they also question people on the streets whom they do not recognize.

“It’s like fishing--you never catch everything but you have to throw your hook out in the water,” Wakefield said.

As in fishing, the police express frustration also at the ones that get away.

“The brains of the operation are kids that are just 18 and 19 years old. These are the people we know run the gang but who we have difficulty catching,” Officer Charles Zunker said in a court affidavit. “The gang knows that an arrested juvenile will be treated far less harshly than an adult . . . Thus, they try to get the juveniles to do most of the work . . . They laugh at the courts, judges and probation officers.”