Two injured in Northwest shooting

unidentified gunman riding in a car near the U Street corridor in Northwest Washington opened fire Thursday afternoon, injuring two people, according to police and a D.C. council member.

The shooting took place around 2:40 p.m. at 14th and V Streets NW. The intersection is one block north of the busy U Street corridor.

Council Member Jim Graham (D-Ward 1), who said he was briefed by police, said authorities are investigating whether the shooting stemmed from a rivalry between two gangs, the “7th and O St. crew” and the “9th and R St. crew.”

One victim was shot in the ankle, said Officer Tisha Gant, a police spokeswoman. A second victim also was injured, but the extent of that person’s injuries were not clear. Both were transported to a local hospital.

Graham said authorities are looking for a green Honda that fled the scene. He said police told him that the second victim was also shot in the ankle. Both are around 19 years old, Graham said authorities told him.

Graham said police told him that the victims ran south along 14th St after the shooting, toward U St.

Graham said the daytime shooting heightens concerns about gang violence in the city. “It’s an absolute outrage,” he said. “We’ve got to send a much tougher message to those involved in gang violence.”

The city’s text and email emergency notification system, AlertDC, described the suspect as a male about 5 feet six inches, 130 lbs, wearing a tan jacket and blue jeans.

 

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Drug gangs are beginning to muscle into a new territory: Central America – an action that is likely to cost U.S. taxpayers.

Even by the brazen standards of cocaine cowboys, what happened a few months ago at an air force base here set new levels for audacity: Drug traffickers snuck onto the heavily guarded base and retrieved a confiscated plane.

Confederates at the airbase had already fueled and warmed up the motors of the Beechcraft Super King Air 200, a workhorse of the cocaine trade. Within days, it would be again hauling dope from South America.

The stunt was a black eye for the Honduran military, and just one of many signs that parts of Central America have fallen into the maw of international organized crime, threatening decades of U.S. efforts to stanch the tidal wave of drugs headed to American cities and towns.

Washington has spent billions of dollars to help push drug cartels out of Colombia, and to confront them in Mexico. Now they’ve muscled their way into Central America, opening a new chapter in the drug war that almost certainly will exact further cost on U.S. taxpayers as American authorities confront drug gangs on a new frontier.

The extent of the infiltration is breathtaking. Drug cartels now control large parts of the countries of Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, the so-called Northern Triangle of Central America. They’ve bought off politicians and police, moved cocaine processing laboratories up from the Andes, and are obtaining rockets and other heavy armament that make them more than a match for Central America’s weak militaries.

Air Force Gen. Douglas Fraser, chief of the U.S. Southern Command in Miami, told a March 30 Pentagon news briefing that Central America “has probably become the deadliest zone in the world” outside of Iraq and Afghanistan. Homicide rates in cities such as San Pedro Sula in northern Honduras are soaring, making them as deadly as Mogadishu, Somalia, or the Taliban home base of Kandahar, Afghanistan.

The political influence of the drug gangs is burgeoning. One former member of Honduras’ Council Against Drug Trafficking estimated that fully 10 percent of members of the Honduran congress have links to drug traffickers.

“The overall situation is alarming, definitely,” said Antonio Luigi Mazzitelli, the head of the U.N. office on Drugs and Crime for Mexico and Central America.

The heavy footprint of the traffickers is visible everywhere.

A month ago in San Salvador, police arrested a 30-year-old man with five bags containing $818,840 in $20 bills. In September, Salvadoran authorities found a total of $15.7 million in cash buried at two locations outside the capital, San Salvador. Honduras seized $14.4 million in drug cash last year.

By many accounts, the tide of cocaine through the region has become a sea.

“We have evidence that about 42 percent of all cocaine flights that leave South America for the rest of the world go through Honduras. That’s a pretty staggering number,” U.S. Ambassador to Honduras Hugo Llorens said.

An accused Venezuelan drug lord, Walid Makled, told the Univision Spanish-language television network this month from his prison cell in Colombia that five to six aircraft loaded with cocaine leave Venezuela every day for Honduras.

In some ways, what unfolded after the theft of the twin-engine Beechcraft Super King Air 200 plane from the Armando Escalon air base in San Pedro Sula on the night of Nov. 7 was as instructive as the heist itself. The plane headed toward Venezuela, anti-narcotics officials said. Then it began hauling dope again.

 

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U.S. warns on travel to five more Mexican states

U.S. State Department on Friday broadened its travel warning on Mexico to include parts of five additional states, including a highway where suspected drug gangs shot two U.S. customs officials in February.

The warning advises U.S. government personnel and American citizens to defer nonessential travel in certain parts of Jalisco, Nayarit, San Luis Potosi, Sonora and Zacatecas.

It outright bans U.S. employees from traveling to Colotlan and Yahualica, two cities in the central-west state of Jalisco near the Zacatecas border due to increasing drug gang violence.

"Concerns include roadblocks placed by individuals posing as police or military personnel and recent gun battles between rival transnational criminal organizations involving automatic weapons," the State Department warning said.

The restrictions were added to a previous warning against travel throughout the states of Tamaulipas and Michoacan and to parts of the states of Chihuahua, Coahuila, Durango and Sinaloa.

Gunmen shot dead an unarmed U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent and wounded another on February 15 on a highway in San Luis Potosi in a daylight attack that outraged U.S. officials and put a strain on join U.S.-Mexican efforts to battle drug cartels.

The State Department advised against travel on that road, Highway 57D, a major north south route toward Monterrey, Mexico's commercial capital.

The latest warning also provides more specific information on travel in northern Mexico where drug gang wars have been most violent, naming cities and towns that require particular caution. For example, it says U.S. government officials are required to travel only in armored vehicles and in daylight hours in Sinaloa parts of the city of Nogales.

The warning can be seen at: here

More than 36,000 people have been killed in drug-related violence in Mexico since President Felipe Calderon launched a military-led crackdown on drug gangs in 2006. Mexico last month revealed that it is allowing unmanned U.S. drone aircraft into its airspace to hunt for drug traffickers.

 

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'R.I.P. Daddy': Man sentenced in Seattle killing

A purported gang member who killed a 24-year-old Seattle man was sentenced Friday to 15 years in prison.

Pleading guilty to second-degree murder in March, Jymaika S. Hutson, admitted to killing Tyree Lee on April 28, 2007.

Lee, regarded by law enforcement as a member of a Central District street gang, was shot to death outside a friend's home. Hutson, 32, had been a member of a rival gang, though he has since insisted that he abandoned the gang after a shotgun blast left his face severely scarred.

As his brother’s son looked on in a T-shirt reading “R.I.P. Daddy,” Tyrone Lee Jr. told King County Superior Court Judge Steven Gonzalez that Hutson’s actions four years ago left his family shattered.

Tyrone Lee noted that the young men were raised in the same community and had known each other for years. His brother left behind a family and a fiancée.

“They lost someone, something that they can never get back,” he said Friday.

Given the opportunity to speak, Hutson declined to address the judge or attempt to explain his actions the day Tyree Lee was killed.

On April 28, 2007, officers were called to the 2600 block of East Alder Street following a report of shots.

Police arrived to find Lee had been shot multiple times in the back, torso and legs. He died later that evening at Harborview Medical Center in Seattle.

Witnesses to the shooting told police a white Chevrolet SUV had pulled up as Lee was walking to a friend's home. Hutson got out of the vehicle, drew a pistol and fired at least eight shots at Lee.

One witness told police he heard what would be some of Lee's last words.

"Hey man, I don't have a beef with you," Lee told Hutson before he was gunned down, according to the witness.

Police were able to trace the car to Gilbert Kinney, Hutson's co-defendant.

Hutson pleaded guilty on the eve of trial as prosecutors were prepared to offer the testimony of Kinney to implicate him in the shooting. Kinney, who drove Hutson to and from the shooting scene and provided the murder weapon, pleaded guilty to a reduced charge and was sentenced to home detention.

Speaking with investigators, Kinney said he followed Lee's car at Hutson's request. He said he had no idea Hutson planned to kill Lee, and admitted that Hutson used his pistol in the shooting.

Hutson -- said by law enforcement to be member of Deuce 8, a Central District street gang -- had been seen arguing with Lee at Barnett Park shortly before the shooting.

Police initially interviewed Hutson five days after the shooting. He denied any involvement in Lee's death; nearly three years passed before prosecutors were able to bring charges against him.

In the prosecution's view, the killing was revenge for an earlier attack Hutson blamed on Lee. Hutson was shot in the face with a shotgun by parties as yet unidentified.

Prosecutors were prepared to contend that a rivalry between Hutson's gang and Lee's Low Profiles – a breakaway set of Deuce 8 – played a part in the shooting, a contention disputed by Hutson's attorney.

“At the time of the shooting, Mr. Hutson was working very hard to extricate himself from ongoing violence that was part of his younger life,” defense attorney James Womack said in court documents. “This change took place shortly after he was shot in the face by a shotgun in February 2006. He had to make a choice.”

The rivalry between the Central District gangs began shortly before the slaying of another Seattle man, Deuce 8 leader Terrell Milam.

Milam was widely believed to have injured then-Seahawks defensive back Ken Hamlin in a bar brawl in October 2005. He was shot to death not long afterward by Omar A. Norman, a Low Profile gang member currently serving a 52-year prison term for Milam's murder.

That killing was followed by years of gang shootings and slayings, including the drive-by shooting that saw Hutson shot in the face.

Writing the court, Senior Deputy Prosecutor John B. Castleton noted that Hutson was responding both to his own shooting and Milam's when he killed Lee.

"The defendant admitted to shooting Lee as retaliation for Milam's death," Castleton told the court. "This type of 'payback' is simply part of the gang culture and was just one more incident in the ongoing LP/Deuce 8 feud."

Hutson was sentenced by King County Superior Court Judge Steven Gonzalez

 

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Californian funeral parlour has become popular with gangs because cemetery shootouts in the 1980s made members reluctant to gather for funerals

Californian funeral parlour has decided to move with the times with drive-through viewing of an open casket.

The owner of Robert L. Adams Mortuary, Peggy Scott Adams, said it meant well-known locals could be viewed en masse; older mourners wouldn't have to leave their cars; and those afraid of funeral parlours wouldn't need to go inside.

The covered and paved 3.6m-wide drive-through has a bulletproof glass display window, which is visible from the street.

"It's a unique feature that sets us aside from other funeral parlours," Ms Scott Adams said.

"You can come by after work, you don't need to deal with parking, you can sign the book outside and the family knows that you paid your respects."

The cost of funerals at the mortuary start from $1295.

The venue had become popular with gangs because cemetery shootouts in the 1980s made members reluctant to gather for funerals, Mrs Adams said.

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Two British tourists have been shot dead in Florida in what is thought to have been a street robbery that went wrong.

James Cooper, 25, and James Kouzaris, 24, had been holidaying with family and friends in the Gulf coast town of Sarasota.The two men were found riddled with bullets 50 feet apart in a residential area off the tourist trail after police were called to the scene.Officers found the first body surrounded by up to 20 shell casings before discovering the second victim nearby in the early hours of Saturday morning. Local residents had reported what they thought was 'machine gun fire'.
 A 16-year-old boy has been arrested and charged with two counts of murder.
James Cooper - who had posted pictures of himself on Facebook from exotic locations around the world - was shot dead three days after his 25th birthday.
 He had previously visited Ecuador, Taiwan, Argentina, Vietnam and Laos.
Mr Cooper and Mr Kouzaris, who are believed to have met at Sheffield University, had been due to spend three weeks in Sarasota.
 They had been staying on the upmarket island city of Longboat Key, about 12 miles from the less affluent area where they were killed.
 Friends and family paid tribute to Mr Kouzaris, known as 'Jam', on his Facebook profile page.
 Posts commented on his positivity and one friend said Mr Kouzaris 'lived every day to the fullest'.
 Lynn Hucker wrote: 'To a beautiful cousin who I will never forget. Always happy and full of life. You will be so sadly missed James.'

Another post from a friend called Ben Stacey read: 'RIP Jam, absolute legend. It was an honour mate, I was so looking forward to seeing you again in Miami. The month travelling with you was some of the best times I've had and was so thankful I met you. Rated you very highly XO'.
Mr Kouzaris, from Northampton, was a guest of the Cooper family, from Warwick who were on holiday in the area, police said.
Police in Sarasota said neither of the men were in possession of drugs, but would not say whether they had cash or weapons.The area is a hotspot for gangs.

A police spokesman said: 'This is an area where not many tourists venture. We are still trying to ascertain why they were there.'

'Both victims were white,' said Sarasota Police Captain Paul Sutton.

A spokesman for the British consulate in Miami said: 'British consular officials can confirm that two British nationals were killed in Sarasota, Florida, on April 16. Next of kin have been notified.

'Officials from the consulate in Orlando are providing assistance. The two male victims were on holiday in Florida with other family and friends.'

Shootings of British tourists are rare in the U.S. but in November 2009 Thomas Reeve was gunned down while drinking with friends in a Texas bar.

The 28-year-old father of one was in Amarillo, Texas, when the bar he was drinking in was held up by an armed robber.

He was visiting the city during a road trip across the U.S. and had called in at the Spotted Pony Lounge in Amarillo because he liked the 1970s hit 'Is This the Way to Amarillo'.

Mr Reeve, of Maidenhead, Berkshire, was hit in the torso after the robber Ray Carlos Cisneros fired wildly into the bar.

Earlier in the year Craig Elford, 39 and Kenneth Watkinson, 48, were killed in a hit-and-run accident as they walked back to their hotel in Fort Lauderdale.

The businessmen, who were in the city recruiting for a health firm, were struck by a high-powered Porsche sports car and died instantly.

Ryan LeVin, 35, the son of a millionaire, is awaiting trial on vehicular manslaughter charges.

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