Pubdate: Thu, 09 May 2002 Source: Richmond Times-Dispatch (VA) Copyright: 2002 Richmond Newspapers Inc. Contact: http://www.timesdispatch.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/365 Author: Tom Campbell Related: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v02/n857/a04.html RAGE ERUPTS AFTER GUILTY VERDICTS 3 Fulton Hill Hustlers Convicted On All Counts Tension building up in the courtroom since last week between relatives of the Fulton Hill Hustlers defendants and those of the drug gang's victims erupted as trial verdicts came in late yesterday afternoon. Guilty on all counts, the jury decided. Two women on the defendants' side of the courtroom wept loudly and a man angrily stormed from U.S. District Court as the verdicts were read. Then, after the judge adjourned court and the audience started to file out, Robert Bradby, using expletives, shouted from the gallery to defendant Marcus Johnson a hope that he rot in jail. A woman identified as a Johnson relative angrily answered Bradby and the two started shouting at each other. Richmond Police Detective Clifton A. Jackson Jr., who worked on the case, walked over to Bradby and quietly tried to calm him. But Bradby resisted, kept shouting, pushed Jackson and, it appeared, tried to hit him. In seconds a half-dozen or so federal law officers came to Jackson's aid and swarmed Bradby. Jackson came out of the pile of bodies smiling and telling colleagues he was all right. Bradby, handcuffed and calmer, said something about "a lot of rage in six years" and "got to live with it every day" to the marshals who led him away. One of three murders the jury said Johnson committed was that of Bradby's son, Robert Tabb, in 1996. Jackson said he would not press charges. Bradby was to be released last evening, authorities said. The jury convicted Johnson and Angelo Irving of racketeering and conspiracy to distribute crack cocaine. The third defendant, Corey Murchison, was convicted of the conspiracy count alone. The crimes each carry penalties of up to life in prison. Judge James R. Spencer scheduled sentencing for Sept. 5. The three were the only defendants among more than a dozen indicted as Fulton Hill Hustlers go to trial. Others pleaded guilty and some have been sentenced. Some testified in the trial, which began May 1. Assistant U.S. Attorney Robert E. Trono called the verdicts "the culmination of a year of hard work" by Richmond and Henrico County police, the FBI, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. "We got convictions on all the counts and we proved all the racketeering acts that were murders," Trono said. He said charging some gang members under the racketeering statute "allowed us to bring [to court] not only the drug conspiracy but all the violent acts committed by the gang." Only the racketeering acts connected with a drive-by shooting attributed to the gang in Mosby Court in July 1997 were found "not proven" by the jury. However, those the jury found the government did prove were more than enough for Johnson's and Irving's conviction on that count. Irving's racketeering acts included shooting to death a 16-year-old boy, Walter "Ray-Ray" Broaddus, in June 1997. Witnesses said the motive was that Ray-Ray was from Mosby Court and was riding his bicycle on Fulton Hill turf. Johnson fired four shots at the car in which Robbie Tabb was riding with friends the night of July 20, 1996. Witnesses said Johnson saw the car pass his crack-selling spot on Williamsburg Road and mistakenly thought the occupants were rival drug dealers from Creighton Court. Tabb, a rising junior and an athlete at Charles City High School, was struck by one of Johnson's bullets in the back of the head as he talked to one of the girls in a car in the next lane that was stopped for a red light. He died at a hospital a few hours later. "I'm glad it's over," Tabb's mother, Rhonda Tabb, said last night. "I have closure now - somewhat - as to why it happened, but it still won't bring Robbie back. But maybe he can rest in peace now." - --- MAP posted-by: Ariel