Joel Labossiere and his wife Magdalena were found in their home Sunday by a family member who called police.Owner of a local home construction company and his pregnant wife were found shot to death in their home Sunday afternoon Police and paramedics received a call around 1:30 p.m., that a man was seen lying on the floor in a puddle of blood. He didn't appear to be moving, according to the caller. Paramedics were told to wait before entering the home until police could arrive to ensure the situation was safe. Paramedics were finally cleared to enter at about 1:55 p.m. and both victims were found dead inside.Neighbours said police canvassing the neighbourhood asked them if they had heard gunshots anytime overnight."It's unbelievable," a neighbour said breaking down in tears. "He was a great guy and the lady was as friendly as he was. I'm just stunned." Labossiere, the owner of JDL Construction, is the grandson of Fernand and Rita Labossiere, who along with their son Remi, were shot to death in their home on Nov. 26, 2005, before it was set on fire.No one has ever been charged. Mounties believe more than one person was involved in the slayings.Joel Labossiere is also the nephew of Denis Jerome Labossiere, who is currently on parole for a 2006 conviction for selling cocaine on behalf of the Hells Angels.A neighbour said Joel and his wife had a one-year-old daughter who was home during the slayings. She was unharmed and taken from the house soon after police arrived."This little girl is all alone now," he said. "She's got no parents now." City police released no details about the case other than to say the deaths were suspicious. More information was be released Monday.Joel Labossiere, a tall, muscular man, was the family spokesman in an ongoing court case over Fernand and Rita's farm estate.An August 2000 will left proceeds from the estate, valued at about $1.3 million, to six grandchildren, including Joel Labossiere. A second will, dated July 2005, left all of the property to Fernand and Rita's son Jerome Labossiere and his wife, Claudette Grenier, a school teacher.Jerome Labossiere served just 18 months of a six-year sentence for trafficking cocaine for the Hells Angels before he was granted day parole just before Christmas.However, within days he was arrested and charged with breaching a court order prohibiting him from contacting them at their homes and workplaces. Labossiere's relatives had obtained a no-contact order.

''They may have been into drugs but they didn't do anything to harm anybody,'' said their aunt, Cheryl Watkins. ``It was cold-blooded murder to lay them out like that.''Miami-Dade County's 80th and 81st homicides of 2008: Rashawn and Deon Beneby, brothers and suspects in a string of violent robberies, shot dead Thursday afternoon next to the Liberty City middle school they once attended.
''It's cold-blooded, outright killing out there -- and we're not even in the summer yet,'' said the Rev. Richard Dunn, a community activist who lives three blocks away.
Witnesses said a group of men were gathered outside an apartment at the Annie Coleman Gardens housing project when the shooting started.Someone mowed down the brothers, some 15 yards apart, on a grassy strip next to the chain-link fence that separates the community from the baseball field at Charles R. Drew Middle School, 1801 NW 60th St. Rashawn was executed -- shot in the head and torso -- under a clothesline. Tank tops, pink blankets, black jerseys, swayed in the breeze above his corpse. Blood spattered the line's metal pole.Deon, some witnesses said, was killed as he ran away.As Charles Drew students were locked inside their classrooms, assault-rifle toting officers searched the housing project, commonly known as PSU, 6051 NW 19th Ave. A police helicopter scoured from above.
Investigators were not sure how many gunmen were involved; none was immediately found, Miami-Dade police said. Rattled students at Charles Drew Middle and nearby Charles R. Drew Elementary were released to parents hours later.
''There was no threat to any of the students at the school,'' said Miami-Dade Detective Robert Williams, a spokesman.The brothers' deaths underscore what has been an intense year for homicide detectives across Miami-Dade. Before the Benebys' deaths, 79 homicides since Jan. 1 had been recorded with the six police departments in Miami-Dade that investigate unnatural deaths. There have also been a string of multiple-death shootings.
• On March 28, two brothers, Dion Coppet, 21, and Danzel Coppet, 17, were shot and killed during a botched robbery at a gas station near the Miami-Dade County Fair & Exposition near Sweetwater.
• On March 15, three men leaving the Take One Lounge strip club were killed in a drive-by shooting on Northwest 79th Street and 22nd Avenue.
• On Feb. 24, two men sitting in a blue Monte Carlo were shot dead in Miami Gardens in another drive-by shooting. Two other men were wounded.
Of the 81 homicides, including the Benebys, 37 of those were black men ages 35 or younger, according to county records.''It lies in the lap of the black community,'' Dunn said. ``We've got to stop glamorizing the hip-hop gangster rap, the bling-bling atmosphere of drugs sales and distribution and usage.''The Benebys had certainly come to the attention of police for their involvement in drugs and violence.
They grew up with their six brothers and sisters in the PSU projects. Deon Beneby played little league baseball.In 1997, as a fourth-grade Little League shortstop, he attended a town hall meeting on the poor condition of parks. ''It makes me ashamed -- sad,'' he told then-Miami Mayor Joe Carollo.
Their mother had died of AIDS, family members said. Their father later died, too.
By adulthood, they had run up arrest after arrest: marijuana possession, selling cocaine, possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.In December 2006, Rashawn Beneby, sister Tiffany Beneby, and her 3-year-old son were shot in the same housing project. Tiffany and her son received wounds to the ankles; Rashawn was shot in the left arm.On April 4, Anthony Morris Beaubrun, 21, and Lusteveus Dessaint, 18, friends of the two brothers, were fatally shot in a parking lot across the street from where the Benebys died. Stuffed teddy bears, placed as memorials, still decorated the pavement and grass.Another pal, Darnell Parker, 22, was shot and killed at the Studio A nightclub Monday morning in downtown Miami.Meanwhile, Miami and Miami-Dade police had already begun looking at the Benebys as suspects in several recent killings.Detectives say they think Rashawn, 22, Deon, 21, and brother Demetrius Beneby, 18, with handguns, had been robbing people of jewelry and money in drive-through lanes at fast-food eateries in North Miami-Dade.They were, police say, in a gray Pontiac Grand Prix driven by Rodney McDuffie, 24, who is currently in jail on an armed robbery charge. They had been pawning jewelry at the USA Flea Market on Northwest 79th Street and 32nd Avenue, Miami-Dade detectives believe.Demetrius Beneby, 18, was being questioned by Miami-Dade homicide detectives on Thursday evening.He and Deon Beneby had been free from jail on bond after March arrests on charges of grand theft and drug possession.

According to a lawsuit filed yesterday in federal court in Los Angeles by famed Hells Angels founder Sonny Barger, the script, concept and elements in the show were developed with his collaboration. However, the complaint contends that HBO, the White Mountain Company, and writer/producer Michael Tolkin cut him out of the project and violated many of his publicity rights when he demanded changes so as not to dilute his own brand.HBO announced the pilot, set in the world of biker gangs, back in October (the "1%" title is a reference to a tattoo used by biker gang members to symbolize life on the fringe of American society). Barger now says he first optioned his bestselling autobiography to 20th Century Fox for movie development. Fox then hired Tolkin (Robert Altman's "The Player") to write the script. Barger claims he shared with Tolkin some of the other fiction projects he had been working on. Together, the two pitched HBO on a new series, and eventually HBO turned to Tolkin to create it.However, after Barger objected to some of the elements in the pilot, HBO "refused to acknowledge the contributions or authorship" of Berger nor sought permission to "use or publish the name, trademark, persona or likeness of Sonny Barger for any purpose," according to the suit. Barger wants the court to declare the "1% Script" as a joint work of Sonny Barger Prods and Tolkin, enjoin Tolkin and HBO from selling or exhibiting the program, and award compensatory damages for exploiting Barger's publicity rights.Barger is repped by attorney Fritz Clapp.

Nevada brothel owner David Burgess guilty of possessing and transporting child pornography.Jurors deliberated less than four hours after Friday's closing arguments in the federal trial of Burgess, 55, a member of a northern Nevada chapter of the Hells Angels.Burgess had pleaded not guilty to the two charges. When the verdict was read, he looked solemnly back at his friends and family members in the courtroom, some of them weeping uncontrollably.Prosecutors say investigators found images of child pornography on two computer hard drives seized from Burgess' motor home during a traffic stop last July along Interstate 80 in western Wyoming

Undercover police agent David (Shaky Dave) Atwell was repeatedly scolded by his police handlers and Hells Angels friends to stop his cocaine use, court heard today.
“I was feeling very stressed,” Atwell said during the Superior Court trial of Thomas Bogiatzis, who was charged with trafficking cocaine and conspiracy to traffic. Bogiatzis is not a member of the Hells Angels.
“I was feeling very alone as an agent,” Atwell said. “I felt I had no friends. I let my guard down.”
Court heard that Atwell snorted a line of cocaine in Vienna with a Hells Angel member while discussing the possibility of a drug shipment into Toronto.
He also snorted the drug off a CD case in the washroom of a biker clubhouse near London, Ont.
Atwell said senior Toronto Hells Angel Donnie Petersen and downtown Toronto Hells Angel president John Neale chided him over his cocaine use at the same time he was working with police in his undercover operation.
Atwell said his reputation in the Hells Angels was that of a frequent cocaine user and if he halted use of the drug suddenly, it would have blown his cover.
“It’s all over the place,” Atwell said under cross-examination from defence lawyer Glen Orr. “It’s just like hors d'oeuvres at a party.”
Orr noted that Atwell also smoked at joint of hashish and marijuana with Larry Pooler, another member of the downtown Toronto Hells Angel chapter.
“Why would you do it?” Orr asked.
“It’s a very difficult thing, being an undercover agent, and you have to keep up appearances,” he replied.
Court earlier heard Atwell was paid about $450,000 to work as a police agent during an 18-month investigation targeting the Hells Angels in Ontario.

In the past two weeks, two shootings and the fire-bombing of a house have been linked to the conflict involving the family.The probe centres on a notorious Melbourne crime family which has been linked to shootings, drug trafficking, bribery, abductions and bashings. There have been claims the family wants to move into the gap left by the dismantling of Tony Mokbel's drug empire. In an email to senior police -- including Assistant Commissioner Simon Overland -- Det-Sgt Paul Lunt of Broadmeadows withdrew from the investigation and threatened to resign over "the total incompetence of those charged with the responsibility of the management of investigations of major crime in this state".
"I can no longer stand by whilst the departmentally sanctioned spin doctors sugar coat what is a very serious gang war in the making and letting a very dangerous family run amok without proper co-ordinated attention," he wrote.
Det-Sgt Lunt wrote that local police had asked for help from the Australian Crime Commission and the Purana Taskforce in the investigation's early stages and had not received a reply. He said the Victoria Police armed crime taskforce had become involved recently. "None of you have obviously learned lessons from what come (sic) out of Purana," he wrote. "The only difference here is that no one has died. And that is only good luck, not good management. "But you're all more worried about your petty squabbles over staff ownership and whether you may get criticised in the media." Two men have been shot in Gladstone Park in the past two weeks in conflict linked to the family. Two men have been arrested by officers investigating one of the shootings, in which a man was shot in the legs.
On Monday, a man and woman were forced to climb down piping from the upper story of a Coolaroo house after it was shot at and firebombed The family, which is at the centre of a taskforce dubbed Lased, is known to deal large amounts of amphetamine. In the past three years, there have been shootings, armed road rage incidents, kidnappings, bashings and armed robberies which police suspect were the family's work. They have allegedly boasted to police about having superior firearms. Senior police last night defended their record, saying Operation Lased had achieved some outstanding results and heavily disrupted criminal activity in the area. Supt Richard Grant, who was one of the officers who received the email, said there had been three significant arrests in the past week bringing the total arrest tally to about 20 in the past six months. "Victoria Police respects the right of its members to express their opinions and concerns to their managers and members of senior command. However, it is confident that it is effectively managing the ongoing investigation known as Operation Lased. "A number of key arrests and firearms and drug seizures is evidence that this highly targeted approach is having a major impact." Supt Grant said Victoria Police believed enough resources had been committed to the operation so far but, if necessary, more resources would be provided in the future. Police Association secretary Sen-Sgt Paul Mullett said Det-Sgt Lunt's attack was proof the force's major crime management model had been an "abject failure". Sen-Sgt Mullett said the situation sounded like an episode of Yes Minister. "This is another example of our members crying for help. The member is right. Victoria Police is being more run by spin-doctoring and propaganda these days," he said. Sen-Sgt Mullett said Det-Sgt Lunt was a dedicated policeman who, he hoped, would not be made to pay for his comments.

Armed with a handgun and the knowledge he was a marked man, Bandidos member Francesco "Cisco" Lenti fired five shots at the four Hells Angels surrounding him before stepping over a felled man and firing a fatal bullet.
Lenti took responsibility yesterday for the chilling snapshot of violence that erupted at a Vaughan strip club in 2006.
The 60-year-old pleaded guilty to manslaughter for the shooting of Hells Angels sergeant-at-arms David (White Dread) Buchanan and the aggravated assault of then Hells Angels prospect Carlos Verrelli (now a full member) and full-patch member Dana Carnegie. Lenti will be sentenced May 12. Court heard a detailed account of the fatal shooting and the biker politics that fuelled it as Assistant Crown Attorney David Moull read an agreed statement of facts into the record. Lenti was working his job at Club Pro in Vaughan the night of the shooting. Working at the strip club for 20 years, his role was to keep drugs out of the business and to act as a peacekeeper. When Lenti came downstairs Dec. 2, 2006, at 12:53 a.m., he saw four Hells Angels members sitting in the club who quickly surrounded him and began arguing, the statement said. The Hells Angels objected to Lenti's Bandidos loyalties and the fact he was trying to establish the gang in Ontario. "Lenti said he felt threatened and that something was about to happen," the statement said. "He said he saw the butt of a gun in Mr. Verrelli's jacket." He moved to the front lobby of the club where two security cameras captured the escalating argument. Buchanan advanced on Lenti, punching him in the face and giving him a black eye. Lenti shoved Buchanan back, pulled out a 9-mm handgun from his waistband and shot Buchanan, Carnegie and Verrelli. A fourth biker took cover in a utility closet when he saw the gun. Carnegie fled the club as Buchanan and Verrelli collapsed on the lobby floor.
Lenti turned his attention to Buchanan who was still alive but bleeding and trying to pull himself off the floor. "At that point Mr. Lenti shot Mr. Buchanan through his left cheek, killing him," the statement said. As Lenti made his way to the door, he fired one final shot at Verrelli. Seven shots were fired within six seconds. "At no time during the incident were any of the Hells Angels seen to be in possession of or to produce a firearm," the statement said. Lenti turned himself in the same day but his gun was never recovered. He was originally charged with second-degree murder. The statement of facts also detailed how a member of the Oshawa chapter of the Hell Angels serving as a civilian police agent came across a plot to kill Lenti for refusing to be recruited from the Bandidos in June 2006. Two Hells Angels were assigned the job of killing Lenti to stop him from expanding the Bandidos. The third biker recruited for the murder was a paid police informant. "It was proposed the agent kill Lenti and leave him in the middle of the highway in his colours," said the statement. "Lenti couldn't just disappear; he had to be found to prove a point."
When police warned Lenti about the murder plot, he began carrying the gun and assured the officer delivering the message that he was keeping a low profile and watching his back. "He felt he was a target because he was trying to get the Bandidos Motorcycle Club 'off the ground,' " the statement said. The court heard Lenti had faced danger before. In August 1995, the 35-year veteran of outlaw motorcycle gangs was aligned with Satan's Choice and starting a new club called the Diablos when he was the victim of a car bombing in his driveway. The bomb put him in hospital for several months with life-threatening injuries.

leader of a Philadelphia-area motorcycle gang is going to prison for more than three decades. A federal judge Wednesday sentenced John Napoli of Levittown to 36 years in prison for distributing methamphetamine, racketeering and other charges.
Prosecutors say the PA "Breed" Motorcycle Club used assaults, death threats and intimidation to protect a multimillion dollar meth trafficking business. Two co-defendants are also going to prison after convictions in the October jury trial.

Benoit Fortin, 39, Wednesday afternoon. He is suspected of stabbing his roommate, a 41-year-old man, in the face during an argument in their apartment on 12th Ave. in the Lachine borough late Tuesday night. The victim was taken to a hospital to be treated for stab wounds, including a serious injury to his eye, said Montreal police Constable Anie Lemieux. The suspect in the case fled the apartment before midnight Tuesday.In 2004, Fortin was sentenced to four years and 10 months for the crimes he was convicted of in Operation Amigo, a 2002 investigation and roundup of the Bandidos biker gang in Montreal. Gang members and associates were charged with crimes related to Quebec's biker gang war between the Bandidos and the Hells Angels. The Bandidos, an international outlaw motorcycle gang, have since folded their chapters in Quebec.During one trial held in connection with Operation Amigo, it was revealed that Fortin tried to burn down the Chez Parée strip club on Stanley St. in May 2001. He also tried to torch a Montreal workout gym a month later. The strip bar was targeted because two members of the Bandidos were assaulted there the night before by men tied to the Hells Angels. The gym was chosen because the Bandidos thought it was a Hells Angels hangout. The arson attempts earned Fortin his patch in the Killerbeez, a former Bandidos puppet gang. Fortin is described as white, 5-foot-9 and 181 pounds. He has several tattoos, including one of a dragon on his chest, a skull on his left arm and an eagle on his right arm.

Indio police are investigating the San Bernardino chapter of the Hells Angels motorcycle club in connection with the death of a Yucca Valley man.Indio police served search warrants at three locations in San Bernardino and Highland on Tuesday that they say John Rocco Vanderstine, 41, of Yucca Valley, frequented, Indio police spokesman Ben Guitron said.Police were searching for evidence related to the discovery in February of Vanderstine's body, which was found by the side of the road on Avenida 42 and Madison Street in Indio. He was found shot to death about 8:15 a.m. Feb. 2, after his body was dumped north of Interstate 10 near a senior citizens community.A search warrant was served by Indio and San Bernardino police and San Bernardino County sheriff's SWAT teams at 6 a.m. at what authorities say is a Hells Angels clubhouse in the 1800 block of Medical Center Drive in San Bernardino, said Indio police Capt. Mark Miller.Search warrants were also served at the homes of two possible Hells Angels members, in the 5100 block of Vail Lane in San Bernardino and the 26600 block of Sparks Street in Highland, Miller said.Police have not confirmed whether Vanderstine was a Hells Angel, but he was known to associate with group members at the clubhouse, Guitron said."What's puzzling is why he ended up in Indio," Guitron said. "We don't know if he was already deceased or if he was killed there."The Hells Angels originated in Fontana and San Bernardino in 1948 and have come under scrutiny by law enforcement across the country. Many authorities have said the group fits the criteria of a criminal street gang, while members have long countered it is a motorcycle club.Indio police have had motorcycle groups pass through the region, but have not had any major incidents with the group in 25 years, Guitron said.

Gangs, who were armed with claw hammers, struck at Selfridges in Exchange Square and Harvey Nichols in New Cathedral Street at 1100 BST. Three men went into Selfridges and smashed glass counters before stealing several watches worth about £400,000.
Two men wearing helmets attacked a security guard in Harvey Nichols, before taking watches worth £300,000. The guard was taken to hospital with minor injuries. The five men left in a red Ford Transit van, which has since been recovered on Mirabel Street. These men were after high-value pieces The van is believed to have been recently stolen from the Prestwich area but had since been fitted with false number plates. The five men then made their getaway in an unknown vehicle. Greater Manchester Police said the two incidents were linked and inquiries were continuing.
Det Sgt Dave Turner said: "This incident has left one man with minor injuries and a number of other people extremely distressed. "These men seem to have had a clear plan of attack, they were after high-value pieces and knew which counters to target to find them." One man is described as 5ft 10in (1.77m) and of a stocky build and was wearing a red fleece jacket and a peaked BMX-style helmet. Another was slightly smaller wearing a light white high-visibility jacket.

"If someone is suspicious about a person's lifestyle and where they are getting their money from, all they need to do is tip us off and we will do the rest.
"They don't need to give their name, or give evidence in court.
"It may take us some time, but we are determined to take action against those who are living a life of luxury through crime - regardless of their background."200 officers carried out the raids, as part of a major investigation into organised crime.The operation, by North Tyneside Area Command, led to 14 people being arrested on suspicion of financial offences including money laundering.
Vehicles and false passports were also seized in the raids at homes in North Tyneside, Newcastle, Northumberland and Durham.The operation, supported Northumbria Police Crime Operations Department, was a joint venture between Northumbria Police and the Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA).The raids come hot on the heels of Operation Payback 2, a Northumbria Police initiative targeting career criminals.During the week-long campaign, officers seized nearly £250,000 worth of property and cash. Superintendent Peter Farrell of North Tyneside area command said: "These arrests are the result of many months of hard work."They represent Northumbria Police's commitment to tackling serious criminality whilst continuing to deliver responsive policing in our local communities through our neighbourhood teams.
"Operations like these prove that we are listening to people's concerns and taking action against the small minority who profit from organised crime.

Jerome Labossiere is a convicted drug dealer who got caught up in one of Manitoba's largest crackdowns on the Hells Angels.He was arrested in February 2006 as part of "Project Defence" and pleaded guilty to drug charges three months later. Labossiere admitted to selling two kilograms of almost pure cocaine on separate occasions in 2005 to undercover agent Franco Atanosovic, who was paid $525,000 by police to infiltrate the Hells Angels. Labossiere was sentenced to six years in prison, but has been out on day parole since last December. He will be granted full parole next month after serving just two years of his sentence.National Parole Board documents also show his parole officer was concerned that Labossiere's release could be thwarted by the temptation to return to a life of crime. Labossiere claims he's severed his ties with the Hells.

Turf war among drug Gangs has claimed more than 210 lives in the first three months of this year. Many of those killed were young gunmen from out of town. The number of homicides this year is more than twice the total number of homicides for the same period last year. Several mass graves hiding 36 bodies in all have been discovered in the backyards of two houses owned by drug dealers.At the height of the violence, around Easter, bodies were turning up every morning, at a rate of almost 12 a week.
Desperate, the mayor and the governor of Chihuahua State asked the federal government to intervene."Neither the municipal government, nor the state government, is capable of taking on organized crime," Mayor Jose Reyes Ferriz said in an interview.So in late March, President Felipe Calderon sent in 2,026 soldiers and 425 federal agents. They continue to patrol in convoys of Humvees and pickup trucks. But even they are intimidated. None dare show their faces, wearing ski masks instead.
"The mortuary is full of more than 50 unclaimed and unidentified bodies, proof that the soldiers in the underworld war come from other states, the mayor said.
Information about who is fighting whom is hard to come by.

The local police chief, Guillermo Prieto Quintana, professed ignorance of the conflict, despite having been an officer here for 30 years. He acknowledged that the 1,600-member force was riddled with corrupt officers, a consequence, he said, of low pay and a lack of opportunity for advancement that led them to seek other sources of money. "As long as freelancing exists, this corruption is going to exist," he said.Since the late 1980s, drug smuggling in Ciudad Juarez has been controlled by a group known as the Juarez Cartel, led by Vincente Carrillo Fuentes since the death of his brother Amado in 1997.The recent violence ripping apart Ciudad Juarez stems from a gang war between former allies. On one side is the Carrillo Fuentes family and its point man here, Jose Luis Ledezma, known as J.L. On the other, are several traffickers based in Sinaloa State, chief among them Joaquin Guzman, known as El Chapo, and Ismael Zambada, known as El Mayo, said a federal prosecutor, who, like some others interviewed, spoke on condition of anonymity for security reasons. Their uneasy alliance has been strained since one of the Carrillo Fuentes brothers, Rodolfo, was assassinated in September 2004, officials say. Guzman is widely believed to have been behind the killing.

One theory holds that the tension reached a breaking point in December when Zambada refused to pay the Juarez Cartel a tax for smuggling drugs through its area.Since then, Zambada and Guzman have begun an offensive against the Juarez Cartel, and Ledezma, the local crime boss, has fought back fiercely, prosecutors and city officials said. "Mayo and Chapo's people wanted to invade, and J.L. was not going to let them, and so the battles started," the prosecutor said.But a Mexican intelligence officer, also speaking on the condition of anonymity, said that since the assassination of Rodolfo Carrillo Fuentes, the Juarez Cartel has forged an alliance with the Gulf Cartel, led by the incarcerated kingpin Osiel Cardenas Guillen and his lieutenants in Tamaulipas State, across the border from south Texas.Over the last year, arrests and pressure from federal troops have weakened the Gulf Cartel. Sensing an opportunity, Zambada, Guzman and other Sinoloa drug traffickers who had fallen out with the Carrillo Fuentes clan have tried to take over the town, the official said."What you have is one cartel that is leaving an open space, and it's a takeover attempt by another," the intelligence official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.John Riley, the special agent in charge of the Drug Enforcement Administration office in El Paso, said the fighting in Ciudad Juarez stemmed from the same battle for territory among various Sinaloa traffickers, the old Carrillo Fuentes family and the Gulf Cartel that has shaken the entire country over the last two years, costing thousands of lives.
He added the alliances among various factions shifted constantly, creating a chaotic situation for law enforcement. "A lot of these lines have been blurred since the first of the year," he said. "It's extremely confusing."City officials said that before the recent gangland war, Ledezma had tried to establish himself as a gangster in the American tradition, controlling extortion rackets, prostitution and gambling, as well as the cocaine traffic.
Officials say he has also recruited local street gangs like Los Aztecas as gunmen and drug distributors. The Gulf Cartel has brought in a corps of hired hit men, known as the Zetas.Federal prosecutors and city officials say that Ledezma has also infiltrated the local police department to an alarming degree. Most of the officers killed in the recent violence had links to drug dealers, prosecutors said.
For residents, the federal police and military patrols have brought a brief respite from the state of terror they have been living under. But in interviews, several said they remain afraid to leave their homes at night or to let their children play outside as they did when they were young. Gunfire was a common sound after sunset, they said."Before, there was not much pressure on those who sell drugs, but with the army, things are changing," Janeth Ponce, 21, a homemaker, said as she sat in the sun last Saturday in the central square. "Now one doesn't feel so much fear, because there is more policing."But other residents said the federal intervention was only a temporary fix. The local police are outgunned, underpaid, prone to corruption and lack the authority to investigate drug dealers, they noted.
It has escaped no one's attention that the federal authorities arrested nine city police officers in late March on charges of drug dealing, and the former police commissioner, Saulo Reyes, was arrested in El Paso in January, on charges of marijuana trafficking.
"The police were doing nothing," said Janet Morales Castellanos, who was tending her father's herbal store in the market last Saturday. "One can't walk around here at night. I can't take her to the parks at night or even to the movies," she said, referring to her toddler daughter. "One stays at home."
The mayor and the police commissioner, who took office last October, agree that the only long-term solution is to clean up the police department and to give police officers the legal power to investigate drug trafficking, which only federal officers have now.To that end, they have toughened standards for recruits and are beginning to use a battery of tests to weed out drug addicts and others prone to corruption. They have bought 100 patrol cars and have permitted the officers to carry semiautomatic sidearms and machine guns, instead of service revolvers.
However, the force has changed little. Only about 30 officers have resigned or retired in the wake of federal arrests and the new tests. The first batch of 150 new recruits came out of the academy in January, but they entered a force where most officers either feared drug dealers too much to move against them or lived on their payroll.
"A municipal policeman knows everything but cannot act," said Jaime Torres, the spokesman for the department.

Gang of robbers who were involved in many robberies and thefts. Five members of this gang have been arrested along with sharp-edged weapons.
The arrested persons have been identified as Avtar Singh, Pargat Masih, Tarsem Kumar, Shankar and Rajesh Kumar. All are local residents. From them, the police have seized two knives, two kirchs (big knives) and one iron rod. These persons were arrested late last evening by a police party led by Sub-Inspector (SI) Dilpreet Singh, in charge of CIA-II police station. The police had received a secret information that these persons were planning to commit some big theft and were present near Lohara. The police claimed to have solved nearly half a dozen criminal cases, mainly thefts, with their arrest. The police said that further investigations were on in this connection and the further questioning of the arrested gang members was likely to solve more cases.

Ruben Molina, a prosecutor in Honduras, told media yesterday that the gangs are extremely violent - MS-13 particularly. They're known to dismember their victims and a candidate must commit a robbery and murder just to gain entry into the organization.
violent Central American gangsters turning up on Metro Vancouver's streets.
Supt. John Robins, the officer in charge of the B.C. Integrated Gang Task Force, said police have seen several members of MS-13 and M18 - two of Central America's biggest gangs - in B.C., but stressed that the organizations haven't set up shop here.
"It's been an ongoing trend over the last number of years," he said. "We want to make sure it doesn't develop into a huge significant problem in Canada. We have enough of a gang problem as it is."
To get a leg up on the groups, RCMP invited prosecutors from Honduras and Guatemala - where there are up to 200,000 members among the two gangs - to Vancouver during this week's Western Gang Conference.
Insp. Dean Robinson, the officer in charge of the Lower Mainland Violence Suppression Team, said the problems these gangs cause in Central America are "staggering" and reiterated that gang violence has risen to the top of the RCMP's national priority list

12 Drug dealers have been arrested in a widespread crackdown on hard drugs.Officers yesterday seized about a kilo of amphetamine with an approximate street value of £4,000, a small amount of cannabis and £5,000-6,000 cash.The 12 men and women were picked up after 16 raids.They include one from Aughton, Lancs; three each from West Derby and Everton; two from Old Swan; two from Formby and one from Crosby.
The operation is the result of 18 months of work by the Force Crime Operations Unit.
The unit has in that time seized cocaine, heroin, amphetamine and cannabis with an estimated street value of £1m, two handguns with silencers and ammunition and £24,000 cash. also found 51 cannabis plants in a house on DingleVale in Dingle, and three people were arrested.

The ongoing feud between the six main criminal gangs in Limerick has spilled over into the state’s main prisons in Cork, Mountjoy and Limerick, writes John Burke.
special protection is being given to more than 75 prisoners in Mountjoy Prison, due to feuding between gangs in Limerick city which has spread to include a number of gangs in Dublin. The number of prisoners under protection at the jail represents almost a fifth of the inmates.The number does not include others under protection, such as sex offenders. The feud is being directed by fewer than half a dozen inmates who are major players in drugs gangs in Moyross, Southill and St Mary’s Park in Limerick, as well as criminals from several major Dublin gangs.Senior prison sources have said that the prisoners under special protection have asked to go on 23-hour lock-up in a bid to evade the escalating conflict.A study earlier this year found that 45 per cent of 500 prisoners tested at Limerick prison tested positive for some sort of opiate, among which 37 per cent tested positive for cannabis.

hanging shoes can be a sign of something troubling Once they are pointed out, they are easily noticed: shoes hanging from utility lines.
For some they are little more than an oddity, barely arousing curiosity. For authorities in some cities they are the blood-chilling signs of gangs and drugs, and perhaps that style of covert advertising is creeping into Prince George.
"They are turf markers, in some places. They are a calling card for a drug dealer or a group of drug dealers," said Rick Stewart, research analyst for the RCMP's Drug and Organized Crime Awareness Services.
Have a look around and you'll see them dangling all over the place, and especially, perhaps coincidentally, in neighbourhoods where drug activity is particularly busy.
"It could mean it is a memorial to someone, or it might be a gang sign, it might indicate a place where drugs are sold, or it could be just some people throwing shoes up to see what happens. It could just be a copycat thing; some kids who saw it somewhere and thought it looked cool," Stewart said. "It should spawn questions in your mind and please have that discussion with kids about it. If they are removed and replaced, why are they replaced? You have to peer into those questions."
Perhaps the most common place to see shoes hanging from wires in big clusters is at the skateboard park. While thats fuel the stereotype that kids on skateboards are involved in nasty behaviour, kids at the skate park have a much more mundane explanation.
"It's the retire wire," said Trevor Moore, a 23-year-old avid boarder. "I've got a pair up there. Those have been up there about a year."
"The city cut them down every once in a while but I think they just gave up. They can't control it," said Braedon Olson, 15.
"We blow through shoes in only a few weeks sometimes," said Josh Bennett, 25, who gestures at the heavy friction a skateboarder's shoes endure. "There's my Adidas pair from more than a year ago."
A nearby parent of one of the boarders put some credence back into the drug connection, however. Without hearing any of the prior conversations, she said in passing that "it usually means there's a crackshack nearby, but I don't think that's what it means here (at the skate park)."
Stewart said one way or another, gangs are communicating to those in the market for drugs and they are communicating among themselves about the boundaries of doing business. The language and symbols may be highly evolved, like the Hells Angels patch worn on the backs of B.C.'s most notorious gang. It might be a certain kind of graffiti or clothes worn a certain way. Or it may be spontaneous and crudely thought out if the gangs involved are only small clusters of drug rabble, like the ones police describe as being around Prince George.
All are in the deadly business of hooking people on drugs, stealing and extorting money, sexually exploiting people, and carrying out untold violence, all in order to win power and money.
"This is not new to us," said Prince George RCMP Supt. Dahl Chambers. "You read about it in the newspaper every day, about it happening in our community. It is not a big city problem, it is a Prince George problem."
Stewart said the antidote to gangs is understanding them, trusting that your kids are smart about it and can help you understand what is going on out there in their community, and the obligation of adults to get involved in the subculture of youth - listen to rap music, read graphic novels, familiarize yourself with the popular social websites, look around the stores where they buy their clothes, go hang out where your kids gather with their friends -- so you too can learn the signs.
"Very few people in your community are involved in crime, and fewer still are involve in gangs," Stewart said. "The point I wanted to get across was for people to notice things, explore, ask questions, communicate, because things constantly change; it is always on the move in the gang world."

member of Quebec's Hell's Angels who killed a government witness in 1993 will be sentenced today.Reports say Richard Vallée has only expressed remorse that the victim, a witness who was about to testify against him, was driving a classic sports car when he blew him up. After a career marked by drugs, death plots, and unlikely prison escapes, Vallée will appear in a New York courtroom today to find out if he'll spend the rest of his life behind bars.Vallée's victim was known as the only person who could possibly identify him in a cross-border cocaine smuggling conspiracy.Richard Vallée, once a leading member of Quebec's Hells Angels, expressed some remorse for killing a government witness about to testify against him - he was sorry that his victim was driving a classic Porsche sports car when he blew him up in 1993. After a career marked by drugs, death plots, surprise acquittals and unlikely prison escapes, Vallée will stand today in a New York courtroom to learn whether he will spend the rest of his life in jail. On July 28, 1993, a thunderous explosion tore apart a white, 1977 Porsche, sending both car and body parts across the large parking lot of Bowl-Mart in Rouses Point, N.Y., about an hour's drive south of Montreal. When the victim was identified as Lee Carter, 31, who worked part-time as a bartender at the bowling lane and lived in an adjacent trailer, New York police looked north for answers. Mr. Carter was known as the sole witness who could finger Vallée, a founding member of the elite Quebec Nomads chapter of the Hells Angels Motorcycle Club, in a cross-border cocaine smuggling conspiracy. The Nomads were the architects of the biker war that would claim more than 160 lives. Mr. Carter's troubles, however, started in May, 1992, when he was asked by an acquaintance to move cocaine into Canada. Mr. Carter, whose namesake father said his son "just wanted to do the right thing," feigned interest and then called police, offering to work for them undercover. Working with police, Mr. Carter brought 54 kilograms of fake cocaine into Canada and, at a Montreal motel, was introduced to "Rick" who told him where to deliver the load. Mr. Carter later identified Vallée as the man he met and Vallée and fellow conspirators were soon arrested. In March, 1993, as Vallée's trial approached, his lawyer wrote to the Quebec prosecutor of the case. The letter, U.S. prosecutors claim in court documents, "intended to ferret out what witnesses or evidence connected Vallée to the cocaine." The lawyer was told Mr. Carter was the only witness who was willing and able to identify Vallée.
Mr. Carter did not get a chance to give his testimony; a month before the trial he started his Porsche on a sunny morning after it had secretly been loaded with explosives. Because of the murder of the only witness against Vallée, his drug charges were dismissed. Police in Canada and the United States were fairly sure Vallée was behind the bombing and slowly built a case against him. A neighbour of Mr. Carter said that two days earlier a man who looked like Vallée was asking where Mr. Carter lived. New York police recovered the detonator used in the blast and a year later police in Quebec seized a nearly identical detonator from a man who was visiting Vallée's apartment. Quebec police next searched the apartment of an associate of Vallée's and found a bomb-making kit with Vallée's fingerprints on it.
Then, in 1995, Serge Quesnel, a Hells Angels assassin, agreed to cooperate with police. He told officers that Vallée once learned that Quesnel's mother's maiden name was Carter. "He said, 'Is she any relation to the guy that I blew up in the States?' " Quesnel said. The subject came up a second time: "I was telling him how much the cops hate me because I had killed a guy; they knew it but they weren't able to pin it on me. And he said to me, he goes, 'Well the police hate me even more because I killed one of their witnesses in a drug deal in New York,' " Quesnel said.
"And he said that it was actually a bit of a shame because the guy was driving a really nice car and he had to blow up the car, so it was a shame." Vallée was arrested in Trois-Rivières in 1995 and charged in Mr. Carter's death. He was told there were two witnesses against him. Vallée was unfazed.
"You know what happened to Carter, I blew him up and he did not come to testify. The other two witnesses will also not come to testify," he told officers, according to court documents. Bold action followed those bold words.
In 1997, Vallée concocted a prison fight that gave him a broken jaw and he was taken to a Montreal hospital. There, two days before he was to be sent to the United States, a gun-wielding man confronted guards and helped Vallée flee on a motorcycle.
For years he was a fugitive, featured on both the U.S. Marshals' Most Wanted list and the popular TV show America's Most Wanted. In 2003, he again fooled police when he was stopped in Montreal for drunk driving. After giving officers forged documents and claiming he was a businessman from Costa Rica, he was allowed to walk out of the police station. It was not until the next day, when his fingerprints were checked, that mortified officers learned they had again let Vallée escape. He did not go far, however, and was arrested days later as he left a Montreal dépanneur.
In September in Albany, N.Y., Vallée faced a jury trial for -- as William Pericak, the Assistant U.S. Attorney who prosecuted the case, put it -- "procuring the unavailability of the witness by murder." Although the case was circumstantial and Vallée denied his involvement, an anonymous jury found him guilty.
Judge Thomas McAvoy will sentence Vallée this morning. Mr. Pericak is seeking a life term and $1.4-million in restitution to Mr. Carter's family for the loss of his income. "When you go to jail here we have a thing called the Inmate Financial Responsibility Program where you work," Mr. Pericak said.
"It is our hope that Mr. Vallée works every single day for the rest of his life and that every single day a fraction of that money gets paid to the family of Lee Carter so that each day he has a reminder of what he did."