Dozens of motorcycle gang members were arrested today by federal agents in six states, including Washington, on warrants ranging from drug sales to murder after a three-year undercover investigation in which four agents successfully infiltrated the group.At least 38 members of the Southern California-based Mongol motorcycle gang were arrested under a federal racketeering indictment that included charges of murder, attempted murder, assault, as well as gun and drug violations, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives spokesman Mike Hoffman said.During some arrests, sharpshooters stood guard on surrounding rooftops and motorcycles were lined up and confiscated."It's going to be a large hit to their organization, we are arresting many of their top members," Hoffman said.Among those arrested were the gang's former national president Ruben Cavazos.Federal and local agents had 110 federal arrest warrants and 160 search warrants that were being served across Southern California and in Nevada, Oregon, Colorado, Washington and Ohio. The sweep, dubbed Operation Black Rain, was to continue throughout the day, agents said.Hoffman said the Mongols had been recruiting members of Los Angeles street gangs to assist in their operations.Four ATF agents infiltrated the gang and were accepted as full members, a difficult process that requires winning the trust of the gang's top leaders over a period of months, Hoffman said.In recent years, federal prosecutors in Washington have used racketeering laws to prosecute dozens of members of the Washington Nomads chapter of the Hells Angels and the Bandidos Motorcycle Club.
''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 an...
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