Brownsville Operation Seizes Guns, Crack and ‘Sour Patch’ Cannabis

February 16, 2012 Brooklyn Eagle Staff
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BROWNSVILLE – Special prosecutors and cops conducted raids in Brooklyn this week and indicted nearly a dozen loosely affiliated drug dealers, official say. They found guns, crack-cocaine and marijuana individualized inside Sour Patch candy wrappers.

Yesterday, New York City’s Special Narcotics Prosecutor Bridget Brennan and NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly announced the indictment and arrests of 11 alleged drug traffickers who reportedly sold crack-cocaine in the vicinity of Pitkin Avenue in Brownsville, Brooklyn. An additional three individuals who have not been indicted were arrested during the execution of search warrants.

The new arrests are the culmination of a nine-month investigation, dubbed Operation “In the Ville,” in which undercover officers made 69 purchases of crack-cocaine for approximately $4,000. Many of the drug traffickers in this case were in their late teens and early 20s.

The arrests began early Valentine’s Day morning and continued throughout the day Tuesday. Arraignments for the indicted defendants were scheduled for yesterday before Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Michael Sonberg at 111 Centre St.

Members of the NYPD’s Narcotics Bureau Brooklyn North executed two search warrants inside apartments at 1800 Pitkin Ave. A search of Apt. 2F yielded three loaded handguns – a 9mm, a .380 caliber and a .40 caliber with a high capacity magazine – as well as approximately 200 zips of crack-cocaine and $300 cash. Police also recovered individual packages of marijuana that were sealed inside Sour Patch candy wrapping. These items were hidden in a safe inside the stove. Drug paraphernalia was also seized from Apt. 2J.

The residential building at 1800 Pitkin Ave. gained notoriety following a tragic murder in October 2011, when a 34-year-old woman was killed by a stray bullet as she picked up her child after school. In carrying out the shooting, the gunman, a resident of 1800 Pitkin Ave., ran into the building and retrieved a weapon from an apartment. He then went to roof, where he fired a hail of bullets into the street below. None of the defendants who were arrested yesterday are charged in the October homicide.

At the outset of the investigation, drug transactions took place at the Brownsville Houses, a New York City Housing Authority complex. The investigation expanded to 1800 Pitkin Ave., where drug traffickers made sales in the stairwells, and other locations in the vicinity, including a Chinese restaurant and a laundromat.

Charges, mostly for conspiracy and criminal sale of controlled substance, against the 11 indicted defendants are contained in 4 indictments. Two residents of 1800 Pitkin Ave., Sharron Wayne and Sharieff Jacobs, are charged in the same indictment, along with three other defendants who belonged to the same crew. Wayne was sleeping inside Apt. 2J when police arrived. Wayne’s brother, Rashad Wayne, one of the unindicted defendants arrested yesterday, was inside 2F when police seized the three firearms, the crack-cocaine and the marijuana.

A second indictment charges Jamol Donegan and two additional defendants he allegedly operated with were arrested yesterday. Donegan was also sleeping at 1800 Pitkin Ave., Apt. 2J, when police arrived.

A third indictment charges two defendants together, and the final indicted defendant is charged alone.

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