Gang Member Gets 30 Years For Racist Shootings
LOS ANGELES (AP) -- A so-called "shot caller" who was arrested in a crackdown on a Southern California Latino street gang that allegedly sought to eliminate African-Americans from their city was sentenced Monday to 30 years in prison.
George Manuel Flores, 43, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Dale Fischer after he pleaded guilty in March to five counts, including conspiracy to distribute crack cocaine.
Flores, also known as Boxer, was the lead defendant in 2009's "Operation Knock Out." About 170 members and associates of the Varrio Hawaiian Gardens were arrested; some have pleaded guilty and received sentences up to nearly 25 years in prison.
The gang waged a racist campaign to eliminate black residents in Hawaiian Gardens through attempted murders and other crimes, according to court documents.
An indictment said there had been a string of attacks on African-Americans, including a shooting into a home with eight people inside. In another instance, two gang members allegedly chased a black man, yelled a racist epithet at him and then beat him with a garden rake.
Flores was a longtime drug dealer who ran several "supermarkets" from houses in Hawaiian Gardens, a city of about 15,000 in southeastern Los Angeles County, federal prosecutors said. The supermarkets were open 24 hours a day and where customers could get their drug of choice, prosecutors said.
Flores also issued orders to other gang members to collect money from drug dealers, authorities said.
"Mr. Flores was a leader in a criminal enterprise that tormented the city of Hawaiian Gardens for decades," said U.S. Attorney Andre Birotte Jr. "The law-abiding residents of Hawaiian Gardens deserve safe neighborhoods, and this prosecution will go a long way toward restoring order to a community that was once under the thumb of criminal thugs and drug dealers."
The investigation of the gang began in June 2005 after the murder of Los Angeles County sheriff's Deputy Luis Gerardo "Jerry" Ortiz. Jose Luis Orozco, a member of the gang, was sentenced to death in 2007 for the killing.
Ortiz, 35, died as he searched for Orozco, who had shot and wounded a man while he did yard work. Orozco was later found guilty of attempted murder in that case.
(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
