Twenty members and associates of the LRGP Crew, which operated in the neighborhoods surrounding the Broadway Market, surrendered at numerous locations

 In the first salvo against drug traffickers this year, FBI agents, Buffalo police and dozens of other law enforcers reported Monday that they had begun to dismantle a violent East Side drug gang.

Twenty members and associates of the LRGP Crew, which operated in the neighborhoods surrounding the Broadway Market, surrendered at numerous locations starting at 6 a.m., as heavily armed SWAT teams using stun grenades burst into their homes and crack houses.

The immediate expectation with the arrests is that the number of shootings in the city will drop, authorities said.

Since the New Year started, there have been about 18 shootings, and it is believed that members of the gang were responsible for at least some of them.

DeWayne Gray Jr., 27, was identified as the gang's leader, and though he lives on the West Side, LRGP's prime area of operation was the East Side streets of Lombard, Rother, Gibson and Playter -- the gang's initials -- and other nearby streets.

U.S. Attorney William J. Hochul Jr., Mayor Byron W. Brown and Police Commissioner Daniel Derenda all vowed that Monday's raids were only the start of an aggressive campaign against gangs for 2012.

Guns, powdered cocaine, chunks of crack cocaine and other contraband were seized when more than 60 Buffalo police officers and dozens more federal, state and local police executed nine search warrants and 10 arrest warrants.

One individual who was present when a crack house was raided on the first block of Memorial Drive confirmed police assertions that LRGP gang members had been dealt a serious blow.

"They got the whole crew," Ranole V. Goodwin said, as he walked around the neighborhood after authorities released him from the Memorial Drive house. "When they threw in that stun grenade, I hit the floor. My money is scattered on the floor."

Most of the dozen gang members and affiliates taken into federal custody will face conspiracy drug-possession and -distribution charges because they agreed to work together in selling the drugs, Hochul said. If convicted, they each could face up to 20 years in prison and fines of up to $1 million.

Seven additional individuals were picked up in the raids and face state drug- and weapons-possession charges. One other person charged federally remains at large.

An investigation into the LRGP gang began last August, with authorities monitoring the phone calls of two of the gang's members, in addition to other surveillance.

And while tallies of what was confiscated were not available, Hochul said additional arrests by federal agents and city police are now expected as they sift through the evidence and conduct interviews.

This first phase of the investigation, he explained, will have a "cascading effect," likening it to the dismantling of the West Side 10th Street and 7th Street gangs by the FBI's Safe Streets Task Force.

At the afternoon news conference in Hochul's downtown office announcing the gang arrests, Derenda vowed that there would be many similar announcements this year because of the partnership with federal officials, as well as state and local police.

"Our focus is to go after the worst of the worst," he said, in pointing out that those arrested Monday are believed to be extremely violent.

At a separate news conference, Brown said the focus is to keep reducing the city's crime rate.

"We're coming off a year where we saw an overall drop in violent crime, and homicides down nearly 40 percent," the mayor said. "This is an early message that the Buffalo Police Department's crime-fighting efforts are not only going to continue, but intensify."

Christopher M. Piehota, special agent in charge of the FBI's Buffalo office, offered some sobering statistics in explaining why pressure on street gangs is necessary.

"Most recent assessments indicate there are 33,000 gangs in the country with 1.4 million active members, and as we have seen in Buffalo, many gangs are becoming more sophisticated and violent," Piehota said.

Gang members, he said, frequently move from one location to the next along with their drug stashes to stay ahead of police and rival gangsters.

That is why it is necessary for all levels of law enforcement in the region to work together through the Safe Streets Task Force, he said. It permits the free flow of intelligence gathering and sharing.

In addition to Gray, others arrested on federal charges included John P. Evans, 28; Shirley A. Covington, 27; Philip T. Brown, 19; John K. Hayward, 28; Joseph A. Martin, 24; Dijaon M. Bland, 22; Demario Devon Nance, 29; Alexis L. Mills, 29; Dayshawn Brazier, 20; Erika Gray, 30; and Kiara MacNamee, 20. As of late Monday, Justin P. Cotton, 21, had not been taken into custody.

The identities of the seven other individuals picked up on local charges have not yet been released.

Early Monday morning, that was evident as groups of police swarmed the LRGP's Broadway-Fillmore turf. At a raid on the first block of Memorial Drive, Goodwin was noticed being released by authorities.

"They didn't have an arrest warrant for me, and so I wasn't arrested. I know I caught a break. I'd just come back from going out to buy beer," he said.

Goodwin spoke with The Buffalo News as he headed over to a home of friends on nearby Clark Street, only to find a state trooper with a dog guarding that house.

Surprised at the thoroughness of the coordinated raids, he shook his head and then left the neighborhood.