Pubdate: Mon, 15 May 2006
Source: Chicago Sun-Times (IL)
Copyright: 2006 The Sun-Times Co.
Contact:  http://www.suntimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/81
Author:  Frank Main

TROOPS DO DOUBLE DUTY IN GANGS

Army soldiers who belong to the Gangster Disciples have robbed people 
to raise money for the gang, orchestrated drug and gun deals, and 
even killed two people after gang members were kicked out of a bar.

About a dozen soldiers at bases in Texas and Colorado have been 
sentenced to prison over the last decade as a result of federal 
investigations into criminal activity they carried out for the 
Chicago-based gang.

They highlight the danger of soldiers maintaining gang affiliations.

"It is a continuing problem, sure. It's ongoing," said Scot Thomasson 
, a supervisor with the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and 
Explosives who investigated dope dealing and gun trafficking 
involving Fort Carson, Colo., soldiers.

Earlier this month, a Wisconsin National Guard sergeant serving in 
Iraq provided the Chicago Sun-Times with photos he recently took of 
gang graffiti on military equipment and buildings throughout Iraq.

Assault Rifles Seized

Other civilian and military investigators warned that gang membership 
in the Army appears to be rising as more recruiters ignore 
applicants' criminal backgrounds and gang tattoos. One investigator 
at Fort Lewis, Wash., said he has identified about 320 soldiers as 
gang members in interviews with them since 2002.

The Army Criminal Investigation Command has downplayed the problem, 
saying gang activity in the Army is insignificant. Whatever the scope 
of the problem -- both overseas and on the home front -- the cases in 
Texas and Colorado show it's not new and it's not harmless.

The Colorado investigation focused on a retired Army sergeant, Arnie 
Porter, a Chicago native who moved to Colorado Springs and ran a 
faction of the Gangster Disciples, Thomasson said.

Porter maintained his gang contacts in the Chicago area and his ties 
to noncommissioned officers at Fort Carson, near Colorado Springs.

In 1996, the feds targeted a gun-and-drug operation involving Porter 
and 25 other Gangster Disciples, including Gerald Ivey -- an 
active-duty sergeant at Fort Carson -- as well as other soldiers and 
civilians, officials said.

Ivey was a medic who served in Operation Desert Storm, said 
Thomasson, who is now assistant special agent in charge of ATF's 
Seattle field division.

"By all accounts, these guys grew up in bad neighborhoods," Thomasson 
said. "They got into the military and overcame their situations. They 
were successful, yet they maintained their ties and gang activity. I 
cannot understand why Ivey did what he did. He was a decorated 
soldier. He was not financially strapped. He did not have a drug 
habit. He just wanted to get back into the [gang] lifestyle."

The crew bought cocaine and marijuana in El Paso, Texas, exploiting 
Ivey's past contacts at nearby Fort Bliss, Thomasson said. They'd 
purchase marijuana for about $300 a pound in Texas and sell it for 
$1,200 a pound in Gary, Ind., which was Ivey's hometown.

Ivey also shipped guns back to Gary. He acted as an illegal "straw 
purchaser," using his military ID to buy weapons at a Colorado gun 
store called Dragon Arms, prosecutors said.

ATF agents seized five sawed-off shotguns, three assault rifles and 
other guns from the gang. Ivey bought other guns that were later used 
in crimes in Chicago and Gary and were found in crack houses, 
Thomasson said. Ivey was sentenced to 15 years of military confinement.

ATF foiled a plan by Ivey to send fully automatic machine guns back 
to the Chicago area, Thomasson said.

'Like A Social Club'

Sgt. Jim Rodgers of the Colorado Springs Police Department said 
officers continue to arrest Fort Carson soldiers affiliated with the 
Gangster Disciples. "We bust them for slinging dope or for having a 
pistol off base," he said.

No major gang conspiracy cases involving Fort Carson soldiers have 
been launched since Ivey was busted, Rodgers said. Still, he said his 
department is preparing for the Army to relocate members of the 4th 
Infantry Division from Fort Hood to Fort Carson, and he has been told 
that Gangster Disciples are prevalent among soldiers in that unit.

An FBI agent in El Paso has told the Sun-Times that law enforcement 
agencies there are preparing for a rise in soldiers affiliated with 
the Gangster Disciples and other "Folk Nation" gangs when they are 
relocated from Fort Hood to Fort Bliss. The FBI is concerned that 
Folk Nation-affiliated soldiers and their dependents could conflict 
with a Latino gang entrenched in El Paso.

It's not a new problem for Fort Hood. In 1999, a Fort Hood soldier, 
Spec. Jacqueline Billings of Milwaukee, was identified by military 
prosecutors as the "governor" of a 40-member faction of the Gangster 
Disciples -- many of whom were soldiers.

Chicago Police Lt. Robert Stasch was invited to Fort Hood to testify 
as an expert witness in the trial against Billings. She was sentenced 
to 27 years of confinement.

Hired through his private consulting firm, Law Enforcement Training 
Consultants, Stasch identified Billings' tattoos of a pitchfork and a 
six-pointed star as GD symbols. He led Army investigators to GD 
graffiti in a culvert near the entrance to the base. And he explained 
gang literature found in Billings' home.

"She claimed it was like a social club, like the Elks or Moose Lodge, 
and she called it 'Growth & Development,'" Stasch said. "I told them 
they were Gangster Disciples."

Convicted Of Battery

In July 1997, Billings allegedly ordered a hit on a club owner after 
she and other gang members were thrown out. She felt the club was the 
gang's "turf," prosecutors said. Two Fort Hood soldiers in the 
Gangster Disciples bungled the job, killing two of the club's 
employees but not the owner.

Those soldiers admitted to being the gunmen and testified against 
Billings. But Billings claimed she simply ordered the men to rough up 
the owner. She was acquitted of murder but found guilty of battery.

She also was convicted for her role in the robbery of a $15,000 
Cartier watch and $2,500 in cash in August 1997.

"No member was to act on behalf of the gang without her approval," 
according to one government filing. Billings "led and recruited 
active-duty soldiers and local civilians, including teenagers, into 
an organization that settled disputes through murder and assault and 
raised money through robbery."

Stasch, now a lieutenant in the Chicago Police tactical unit in the 
Town Hall District, said the Billings case raises serious questions 
about gang involvement in the military.

"Large gangs like the GDs have the ability to negotiate with Mexican 
cartels to bring drugs over the border," he said. "What's to say GD 
members in Iraq aren't over there for the sole purpose of making 
friendships with large drug organizations?"
- ---
MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman