These dealers are finally getting benched.
The feds cracked down on lawless Washington Square Park, busting up a round-the-clock, open-air drug market that operated for half a decade in the heart of Greenwich Village, authorities said.
Nearly 20 dealers whose coordinated peddling of dangerous narcotics in and around the famed greenspace caused a rash of overdoses, two of them fatal, since 2020, were hit with charges in a federal indictment unsealed in Manhattan Thursday.
The accused “prolific” narcotics traffickers had racked up a combined 80 drug arrests over the past five years — but time and again, New York’s soft-on-crime laws allowed them back out to peddle fentanyl, heroin and crack-cocaine in the park, prosecutors said.
“New York families want us to use all available resources to get deadly fentanyl off our streets,” Manhattan US Attorney Jay Clayton said in a statement.
“Together with the NYPD and the DEA, our office made a commitment to find and bring to justice those who target our children and our parks,” Clayton said. “My message should be clear: If you’re a drug trafficker operating in Washington Square, any of our other parks, or anywhere our kids walk or ride to school, we’re going to bring you to justice.”
The drugs dealt by the crew, which calls itself WSP Enterprise, led to two deaths in a six-month stretch just last year — including an 18-year-old from Colorado who had only just graduated high school and a 43-year-old homeless person who’d been living in the park, prosecutors said.
The operation was largely made up of “two primary, but closely interrelated groups of drug dealers,” some members of the Mac Ballers subset of the Bloods gang and the others working under John Livigni, a prolific dealer in the park for at least two decades, court papers state.
As part of the network, the two sects and other dealers working with them allegedly had an agreement not to sell in each other’s territory – and each had different colored bags to differentiate their deadly drug cocktails, the indictment states.
The organized criminal group was estimated to have distributed millions of doses of opioids, including fentanyl and heroin, as well as crack cocaine, tied to at least 65 overdoses in the popular park since 2020, Clayton said.
The 10-acre park, home to its iconic chess tables, three playgrounds, two dog runs, a fountain and the historic Washington Square Arch — as well as the West 4th Street subway station — has been a nexus of drug activity dating back well over 50 years.
But as the opioid crisis gripping the nation went into overdrive after the COVID pandemic, the park got out of control, with scattered hypodermic needles, brazen public drug consumption and drooling, strung-out addicts shooting up on benches all becoming common sights.
Earlier this year, Mayor Eric Adams announced a joint “community coalition” with the NYPD specifically targeting rampant drug use and vagrancy at Washington Square Park and Greenwich Village.
But a few months later, Manhattan’s District Attorney Alvin Bragg was spotted by The Post happily painting a watercolor sketch in the park — part of his “art of healing” workshop series in July — as nodding off drug addicts meandered all around.
Residents decried the tone-deaf painting session as “a farce” and accused soft-on-crime Bragg of “gaslighting the entire neighborhood” pretending the park’s deep-seated drug problem on display right in front of his face didn’t exist.
Bragg is “committed to public safety in Washington Square Park,” his spokesperson said in a Thursday statement that referenced the district attorney’s painting event.
The DA “has focused on both criminal prosecutions and preventative efforts like community engagement,” at the greenspace, Bragg’s spokesperson said.
“Public safety cannot be solved by one agency alone – it takes all of our government and law enforcement partners including the NYPD, SDNY, and Special Narcotics Prosecutors,” the statement continued. --->READ MORE HERE
It’s the ‘finest’ Washington Square Park has looked in a long time.
The NYPD flooded the Greenwich Village landmark with 68 additional cops Friday — in a 24/7 crackdown aimed at vanquishing junkies from the beleaguered space, which dealers and addicts alike turned into a veritable narcotics supercenter.
“My goal is to kick them out of the Sixth Precinct entirely,” the new commanding officer, Capt. Nicholas D. Minor, told a cheering crowd of Village residents. “Let’s get them out of there.”
Thirty police officers will now be patrolling the park on foot by day, during a first shift from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., with another 30 coming in for an evening shift from 4pm to midnight. An additional eight cover a night shift from midnight to 8 a.m. — all drawn from other precincts.
Officers from at least eight different precincts were seen Friday in the park, with some from as far as the 84th precinct in Brooklyn Heights. The officers were told they would be assigned to Washington Square Park for the next month – for now.
A NYPD mobile command center was set up by the park’s iconic arch on Washington Square North, and officers were posted at every park corner, entrance and fountain.
In addition to the 68 rank and file officers, nine commanders have been assigned to the operation — a lieutenant and three sergeants for each of the morning and afternoon shifts, and a sergeant for the night shift, Minor said.
The scene in the famously liberal park went off the rails, even by its standards, during the pandemic, when the combined effect of criminal-friendly legislation and the worsening opioid crisis gripping the nation descended the space into a depraved drug den, with addicts openly shooting up and dealers brazenly plying their trade in broad daylight.
Residents rejoiced at Friday’s sea of blue, which follows years of community outcry and reporting on the issue by The Post.
“It’s about damn time!” said Washington Square Association President Trevor Sumner. “For the first time in years, I’ve seen optimism among the residents.”
“I think it’s wonderful news,” Lilian Migliorini, a Village resident, told The Post. “It’s a great, right step. But I think people need to be tempered with ‘okay, so how long do we have them for before they get pulled for something else.'” --->READ MORE HERE
If you like what you see, please "Like" and/or Follow us on FACEBOOK here, GETTR here, and TWITTER here.
No comments:
Post a Comment