Indictment Targets 18th Street Gang in Racketeering Case

Federal prosecutors Tuesday unsealed a racketeering indictment against 26 suspected members of an 18th Street gang clique who are accused of controlling drug trafficking in the MacArthur Park area near downtown Los Angeles.

The Columbia Li’l Cycos were described by law enforcement officials as one of the most violent and financially successful gang contingents in the city.

By wholesaling drugs to street dealers and then charging them for the right to operate, the group generated hundreds of thousands of dollars in profits, which it plowed into homes in Burbank and El Monte, a restaurant in South Gate and an auto business in Los Angeles, officials said.

Stephen Wiley, a senior FBI official in Los Angeles, said Columbia Li’l Cycos, also known as CLCs, “were held up in the gang community as examples of how to do business.”

The gang reigns through intimidation and violence, he said.

The indictment accuses various gang members of carrying out three executions, several attempted murders and many beatings.

Eight suspects were arrested in predawn raids Tuesday. Ten others were already in custody from previous arrests, three are expected to surrender and five are fugitives.

Investigators said they seized about $500,000 in cash from gang members’ hangouts.

“This wealth was accumulated one [cocaine] rock at a time,” U.S. Atty. Alejandro N. Mayorkas told reporters.

He said the arrests will cripple the gang’s grip on the MacArthur Park area, which has been a hotbed of drug dealing for many years.

“We think it will be very difficult for them to bounce back,” Mayorkas said, “but if they do, we will cripple them again.”

The indictment grew out of a 2 1/2-year probe by a task force of investigators from the FBI, the Los Angeles Police Department and the state Department of Justice.

It is the first use of the federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) statute against members of the 18th Street gang, which has about 15,000 members, according to FBI estimates.

The 18th Street gang was a major target of LAPD’s discredited and now-disbanded Rampart Division CRASH unit.

Some of the nearly 100 people whose criminal convictions have been overturned because of evidence-planting and other alleged misconduct by Rampart CRASH officers were 18th Street gang members.

One victim of Rampart police abuse was among the 26 defendants named in the federal indictment Tuesday.

Ismael Jimenez, 34, also known as “Loner,” is accused of racketeering, drug trafficking and conspiring to commit two murders in 1999.

Earlier this year, the City Council agreed to pay him a $231,000 settlement for a beating he received in 1998 inside the Rampart Division station house.

He said in his civil rights lawsuit that he was standing outside a tattoo parlor when Rampart Officer Brian Hewitt approached him with a drawn gun, slapped handcuffs on him and drove him to the station.

Inside an interrogation room, he said, Hewitt grabbed him by the neck, shoved him into a wall and punched him repeatedly in the chest and stomach until he began to vomit blood.

Hewitt was fired because of the incident.

Jimenez’s lawyer in the civil rights case did not return a call seeking comment Tuesday.

While the gang exacted “taxes” or “rent” from independent drug dealers in the MacArthur Park area, it, too, was obliged to pay a “tax” on its profits--to the prison-based Mexican Mafia, according to the indictment.

The Columbia Li’l Cycos’ indicted leader, Francisco Ruiz Martinez, 36, is a Mexican Mafia member, prosecutors said. Martinez, also known as “Puppet” or “Pancho,” allegedly controlled nearly all aspects of the group’s business. He has been in federal custody since last year.

Also indicted was Martinez’s wife, Janie Maria Garcia, 49, of Monterey Park. Prosecutors said she acted as his proxy on the street, issuing orders on his behalf and collecting money for the organization.

The indictment cited three homicides allegedly carried out by members of the gang: the Sept. 4, 1994, slayings of Carlos “Truco” Lopez and Donatilla Contreras, and the July 14, 1995, killing of Javier “Lefty” Cazales.