Pubdate: Thu, 15 Sep 2005
Source: Knoxville News-Sentinel (TN)
Copyright: 2005 The Knoxville News-Sentinel Co.
Contact:  http://www.knoxnews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/226
Author: Jamie Satterfield

VICE LORDS 'DRUG GANG' REFERENCES CHALLENGED

CINCINNATI - The landmark prosecution of an entire Knoxville street gang 
under federal drug conspiracy laws faced its first appellate court 
challenge Wednesday as attorneys accused prosecutors of effectively 
criminalizing gang membership.

"My client was the leader of the gang," defense attorney Phil Lomonaco said 
at a hearing in the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. "He was not a leader 
of a drug conspiracy."

Lomonaco's client is Walter "Heavy" Williams, leader of the Imperial Insane 
Vice Lords street gang.

Williams and two gang members, Allen "Capone" Young and Michael "New York" 
Smith, were convicted in U.S. District Court in late 2003 of conspiring 
with more than 20 Vice Lords members to dominate the crack cocaine trade in 
Knoxville's inner city.

The convictions came after the entire gang, whose members numbered as high 
as 26, was indicted as a drug-trafficking organization. The case was the 
first of its kind in Knoxville.

As such, it tested the ability of the government to prove that a gang is 
itself a criminal enterprise.

Being a member of a gang is just as legal as signing on with a civic group 
like the Lion's Club. Authorities could and did nab individual gang members 
for his or her misdeeds, but the gang itself was legally untouchable, 
absent some showing of Mafia-style racketeering.

The Vice Lords were no Mafia, but the gang was in a class of its own on 
Knoxville's streets. Unlike most Knoxville gangs, the Vice Lords were 
highly structured. They had bylaws and membership rituals. There were 
titles of rank and regular business meetings.

It was that level of organization that ultimately enabled authorities to 
infiltrate the gang. Using secret recording devices stashed inside the 
gang's meeting place, dubbed the "Honeycomb," authorities contended they 
gleaned evidence showing the organization's sole purpose was hawking crack.

Drug conspiracy indictments were handed up by a federal grand jury in 2002. 
Most members pleaded guilty, but Williams, Young and Smith took their case 
to trial. They lost.

Lomonaco argued before a three-judge appeals panel Wednesday that the gang 
leader and his two underlings were convicted not by proof of a drug 
conspiracy but by gang affiliation alone.

"Right from the start, the first words of the indictment said the 
defendants are all members of the Vice Lords gang operating in Knoxville," 
he said. "(Williams) was tried as a gang member rather than as a cocaine 
conspiracy member."

Young's attorney, Angela Morelock, told the appellate judges that jurors 
were prejudiced by repeated references to her client as gang "war chief," a 
title Young held within the gang in his role as head of security for the group.

Assistant U.S. Attorney David Jennings argued there was no distinction 
between the gang and the cocaine conspiracy.

"This gang was about nothing but the drug trade," Jennings said.

He said the government was essentially forced to use gang titles and 
nicknames during the trial to identify individual members and their 
respective roles in the drug conspiracy.

"This is how these guys identified each other on the street," he said.

Chief Judge Danny J. Boggs wondered aloud whether the appellate court 
ultimately must weigh the potential for prejudicing jurors with talk of 
gang activity against prosecutors' need to prove the gang was a front for 
drug trafficking.

"You can't talk about these events without a lot of gang talk and gang 
evidence, can you?" Boggs asked Lomonaco.

Lomonaco replied, "If the government had only used what was necessary, this 
wouldn't be an issue."

Jennings did concede at Wednesday's hearing that Williams, Young and Smith 
are entitled to new sentencing hearings because of a recent landmark U.S. 
Supreme Court decision on federal sentencing guidelines.

However, those sentencing hearings will not be held until the 6th Circuit 
first decides whether the trio's convictions will stand. It could be months 
before the court rules.
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