177 Seized in Drug Raids Near Schools and Parks

In an effort to roust drug dealers from areas where children congregate in Los Angeles, 225 undercover narcotics officers and federal agents have swooped down on urban drug “hot spots,” making 177 arrests and confiscating two cars, 23 guns, $25,000 in cash and 1,139 grams of a variety of controlled substances, authorities said Monday.

The suspects were rounded up in a series of weekend raids, between 6 a.m. Friday and 3 a.m. Sunday, at scores of outdoor sites and rock houses near schools and park playgrounds, said Cmdr. Lorne Kramer of the Los Angeles Police Department. Police also made single arrests at two downtown video parlors, he said.

But several minutes after the end of an afternoon press conference announcing the sweeps, a reporter observing one of the arrest sites--at Alvarado and 7th Street in MacArthur Park--watched what appeared to be at least 15 drug transactions made in less than an hour.

The reporter watched some men and women exchange money with others who handed them packages covered by newspapers. Some of those who were given the newspaper packages were later seen withdrawing cigarettes from the packages and smoking them.

One of the smokers described the cigarettes as “Super Cools,” cigarettes that are dipped into PCP--phencyclidine--an anesthetic known to cause hallucinations and disoriented behavior.

“If you ain’t part of the scene you must be police,” said another man who approached the reporter and a photographer.

At the press conference, Kramer said that the problem of drug sales in MacArthur Park had “improved some” recently as a result of police activity there. But Susan Bryant-Deason, a special assistant in the U.S. attorney’s office who coordinated the weekend operation and another like it last fall, readily acknowledged that officers were barely finished booking suspects picked up in the park when it was again “crawling” with drug sellers.

“We’re not so naive as to think we are going to stop drug dealing in the city” or even at the targeted sites, Bryant-Deason said.

“Our intent is to increase the upcoming generation’s chance of being able to walk to school, video arcades or parks without being barraged and accosted by drug dealers or being caught in drive-by shootings,” she said.

Most of those arrested during the weekend--147 adults and six minors--were expected to be arraigned Monday and today on a range of state misdemeanor and felony charges, including making previous sales to plainclothes police officers.

The drugs seized included 407 grams of crack cocaine, 160 grams of powder cocaine, 50 grams of heroin, 36 grams of methamphetamine and 486 grams of marijuana. No official at the press conference was able to say whether drugs had actually been sold to a child.

Warrants were served at 26 sites, including 19 rock houses. About 20 sweeps were conducted near schools.

Twenty-four adults were to have been arraigned Monday under a federal law that provides stiff sentences for people convicted of drug sales near schools, video parlors, recreation centers and playgrounds.

The law allows judges to impose sentences up to 40 years in prison. By contrast, California law allows judges to tack on a few years--or “enhance”--the sentences of people who deal solely in crack--and only near schools.

The joint operation was described by authorities as part of a one-of-a-kind program that links the efforts of local and federal officials, utilizing the federal statute for cases that would normally be handled in state courts.

Bryant-Deason said that the broader, tougher federal law was used for the first time last October when a force of 250 Los Angeles officers and federal agents conducted sweeps at 15 city schools. Of the 83 people arrested then, 21 were charged under the law. Bryant-Deason, who coordinates the joint operation, said that all 21 pleaded guilty or were convicted during trials.

In the latest sweeps, Bryant-Deason said, the spots that had the most drug activity were in MacArthur Park and around the neighboring Alvarado Garden Elementary School.

Bryant-Deason said that undercover officers who had never made previous drug buys in the area were able to walk up to dealers selling narcotics near the school and purchase 17 grams of crack for $200--no questions asked. It is unusual, Bryant-Deason said, for such a large amount of crack to be sold on the street.

Officials are hoping that word of mouth and news reports about the sweeps will eventually decrease or eradicate drug dealing at the sites that were raided.