3 in Bryant Family Indicted on Tax Evasion : Courts: Matriarch Florence Bryant, Sheriff’s Deputy Ely Bryant, and alleged leader Jeff Andrew Bryant Jr. are named.

As one member of the Pacoima-based Bryant crime family prepared Thursday to testify at his quadruple murder trial, three others--including a Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy--were being indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of conspiring to evade income taxes on suspected drug money.

Named in the two-count indictment were Florence Bryant, 73-year-old matriarch of the family; Deputy Ely Bryant, 42, who works in the sheriff’s Court Services Division, and Jeff Andrew Bryant Jr., 43, of Palmdale, who police describe as a leader of the alleged cocaine syndicate that bears the family name.

The three were accused of conspiring to violate federal tax laws, Assistant U.S. Atty. Monica Bachner said. Jeff Bryant also was charged with tax evasion.

According to the indictment, the three accumulated more than $630,000 in cash between 1986 and 1991, and “attempted to conceal the source, the ownership, the control, the taxable nature and the ultimate disposition” of the cash.

The money was used to purchase real estate and cars, buy business equipment, and pay other family members’ taxes and mortgages, according to the indictment.

Bill Gilligan, who heads the criminal division of the IRS’ Los Angeles office, said the investigation was launched in 1993, in conjunction with the Drug Enforcement Administration and the San Fernando Police Department.

Carl Jones, attorney for Stanley Bryant, called the timing of the indictment “unfortunate”--coming as it did during the defense phase of the murder trial. His client and three other defendants are currently on trial for the fatal shootings of four people--including a 2-year-old child--at a Bryant Family crack house in 1988.

Jones added that neither he nor his client were surprised because “there have been rumors of a pending investigation.”

He added that Stanley Bryant intends to testify in his own defense next week at the murder trial.

Jeff and Stanley Bryant have been described by police and in court testimony as leaders of the Bryant Family, a 200-member cartel that allegedly dominated cocaine distribution in the northeastern San Fernando Valley for more than a decade.

*

At one point in the mid-1980s, authorities said, records seized during police raids showed that the Bryant Family drug trade made about $1.5 million over three months. Authorities also have linked members of the Bryant organization to more than a dozen drug killings during the past two decades.

The most notorious was the Aug. 28, 1988, shooting at the crack house on Wheeler Avenue in Lake View Terrace. A woman and 2-year-old girl were shot to death, along with two rival drug dealers who had been ambushed in a cage-like security entrance, the killings that are the subject of the current murder trial.

At that time, Jeff Bryant was in prison and Stanley Bryant was in charge of the operation, state prosecutors have alleged.

Three alleged Family employees--LeRoy Wheeler, Donald Franklin Smith and Jon Preston Settle--are also on trial for the murders. A fourth, James Franklin Williams IV, was a key prosecution witness, testifying under a grant of immunity from prosecution for his role in the crimes.

A sheriff’s spokesman said Ely Bryant was on duty with the department Thursday, and he did not yet know how Bryant’s job would be affected by the indictment.

The document alleges that between August, 1986, and October, 1987, Ely Bryant deposited more than $250,000 in cash into three savings accounts, but sidestepped federal reporting requirements by making individual deposits of less than $10,000 each.

“On at least six occasions, defendant Ely Bryant deposited $5,000 in each of the three accounts on the same day,” the indictment stated. It also alleged that the deputy sheriff purchased cashier’s checks totaling more than $330,000 during the same time period.

The money, according to the indictment, was used to acquire real estate in Lake View Terrace and Pacoima--including the crack house where the shootings occurred.