Category Archives: Organized Crime

Legal news for Mafia continually updated from thousands of sources on the web – Global Mafia News. News about organized crime. Commentary and archival information about organized crime from Lawstarz.

Blog, Criminal, Immigration, Legal News, Organized Crime

36 Killed in Month-Long Cartel War Near Texas

REYNOSA, Tamaulipas — Raging violence continues to take hold of this border city as rival factions of the Gulf Cartel fight for control claimed 36 deaths–including a bystander and one police officer.

As Breitbart Texas reported, the violence began in late April, shortly after Mexican authorities hunted down and killed regional Gulf boss Juan Manuel “Toro” Loiza Salinas. The death of the ruthless cartel kingpin led to an immediate power vacuum as various factions fight for control of the city and surrounding smuggling routes.

The fight has led to convoys of gunmen driving around Reynosa hunting for rivals. Some of the shooters ride in vehicles with “M-42” spray-painted on the side, indicating former allegiance to Toro. As Breitbart Texas reported, the violence has also led to a spike in crime as cartel gunmen carry out daytime robberies at various establishments and against unsuspecting motorists.

Over the weekend, rival gunmen clashed three separate times, spreading fear among local residents. In one of the clashes, forces exchanged gunfire in the Lopez Portillo neighborhood where neighbors reported that four gunmen died in the clash.

The fighting stopped a few hours after the initial gun battles began as Mexican authorities took to the streets to contain the violence. An official body count has not been released.

Editor’s Note: Breitbart Texas traveled to the Mexican States of Tamaulipas, Coahuila, and Nuevo León to recruit citizen journalists willing to risk their lives and expose the cartels silencing their communities.  The writers would face certain death at the hands of the various cartels that operate in those areas including the Gulf Cartel and Los Zetas if a pseudonym were not used. Breitbart Texas’ Cartel Chronicles are published in both English and in their original Spanish. This article was written by “A.C. Del Angel” from Reynosa, Tamaulipas. , “J.A. Espinoza” from Matamoros, Tamaulipas and “J.M. Martinez” from Piedras Negras, Coahuila. 

from – http://www.breitbart.com/texas/2017/06/01/36-killed-month-long-cartel-war-near-texas/

Blog, Civil Rights, Criminal, Drug Companies, Legal News, Organized Crime, Personal Injury

Ohio attorney general sues 5 pharmaceutical companies over opioid epidemic


The Ohio attorney general has filed a lawsuit against five leading prescription opioid manufacturers, alleging that the companies intentionally misled patients regarding the risks and benefits of opioid use with fraudulent marketing.

Attorney General Mike DeWine accused the companies of leading patients to believe that opioids were not addictive, which the lawsuit says fueled the current opioid epidemic in Ohio.

“We believe the evidence will also show that these companies got thousands and thousands of Ohioans — our friends, our family members, our co-workers, our kids — addicted to opioid pain medications, which has all too often led to use of the cheaper alternatives of heroin and synthetic opioids,” DeWine said in a statement. “These drug manufacturers led prescribers to believe that opioids were not addictive, that addiction was an easy thing to overcome, or that addiction could actually be treated by taking even more opioids.”

The five manufacturers listed in the lawsuit, filed in the Ross County Court of Common Pleas, are Purdue Pharma, Endo Health Solutions, Teva Pharmaceutical Industries and its subsidiary Cephalon, Johnson & Johnson and its subsidiary Janssen Pharmaceuticals, and Allergan.

The lawsuit was filed in Ross County since Southern Ohio was the area hit the hardest by the opioid epidemic, the press release states. A record of 3,050 people in Ohio died from drug overdose in 2015, The Associated Press reported. That figure is expected to rise significantly once the 2016 figures have been tallied, according to the AP.

The lawsuit alleges that the drug companies violated the Ohio Consumer Sales Practices Act and created a “public nuisance by disseminating false and misleading statements about the risks and benefits of opioids.”

Full Read – http://abcnews.go.com/US/ohio-attorney-general-sues-pharmaceutical-companies-opioid-epidemic/story?id=47750198

Blog, Criminal, Family, Legal News, Organized Crime

From the big house to the ‘burbs: Scottsdale ‘Mafia’ family stars in reality show

Check out Monique Griego’s full story on the Cantarella family’s transition from a life of crime to life in the Sonoran Desert TONIGHT on 12 News at 10.

It’s a lifestyle most of us only know about from the movies: The Mafia life.

“It was a great life — there wasn’t anything we couldn’t have,” said Richard Cantarella.

As a former mobster with the Bonanno crime family, Cantarella and his son Paul grew up in the Mafia. But in 2002, their world came crashing down when the FBI came knocking.

“I got arrested in 2002 and I wound up cooperating with the government,” Cantarella told 12 News.

Cantarella faced life in prison for his alleged ties to a string of Mafia hits and Paul was looking at 20 years for racketeering.

Both decided to cooperate with Paul heading into witness protection as his father waited in prison.

“I chose to be loyal to my family rather than my boss,”

Back then, he never imagined he and his wife Lauretta would end up out west, far away from New York.

“My son picked the state. He flew here, found a home and loved it,” Cantarella said.

In 2004, Paul left witness protection for sunny Scottsdale.

“It was like paradise to me,” said Paul, “The palm trees and your pool was open all year.”

Cantarella later followed, leaving the big house for the Phoenix suburbs.

“You know what I notice out here? There’s a lot of money out here,” Cantarella said. “I’ve never seen so many Bentleys, Maseratis … This would actually be a haven for the Mafia.”

Once in Arizona, the Cantarellas traded a life of crime for a legit family business.

Their Valley car washes are also now serving as the backdrop for the family’s latest endeavor: Unprotected, a reality show on the Oxygen network.

Blog, Business Law, Criminal, Drug Companies, International, Legal News, Organized Crime, Supreme Court

Physician and Pharmacy Help Fuel Demand for Illegal Pain Pills

He would visit the doctor during peculiar hours; between 8 p.m. and 2 a.m. on a Saturday or Sunday.

Under the cover of darkness, in a strip mall in La Puente, a man calling himself “Juan” came in search of powerful pain pills and other controlled substances. He didn’t have any identification and he told the doctor he was either drunk or on drugs.

It didn’t matter. He got what he came for.

Dr. Daniel Cham, who was a licensed physician in California at the time, handed “Juan” prescriptions for hundreds of pills including Oxycodone, a powerful opioid, Xanax, a sedative, and Soma, a muscle relaxer.

“Dr. Cham was not practicing legitimate medicine. Dr. Cham was, in the eyes of the law, a drug pusher,” said Ben Barron, an Assistant United States Attorney who prosecuted Dr. Cham who was charged with narcotics trafficking, money laundering, fraud, and making a false statement to authorities.

What Dr. Cham didn’t know was that the patient who called himself “Juan,” was actually an undercover Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department detective and that he was secretly filming his interactions with the physician.

During one visit, Dr. Cham asks the undercover agent, “What else do you need?” In response, the detective tells him, “How about some Soma?” Dr. Cham then asks how much he wants. “Let’s go with 3 times a day,” replies the agent.

Dr. Cham also asked the detective how he wanted the prescriptions filled out. “Is it all on one script?” asks Dr. Cham. The detective responds, “Can you make it two again like last time? Can you put the Oxy and Soma together and the Xanax on the other one?”

“Dr. Cham did no physical examination; he would tell the agent what symptoms he should claim to feel,” said Barron. “Dr. Cham demanded 300 dollars cash for a prescription for hydrocodone or vicodin.”

Barron says the doctor would sometimes ask for more money when the undercover agent asked for more powerful pain pills like oxycodone. The prosecutor says that’s typical in these cases. The more powerful the medication, the more money the physician wants in return for a prescription.

Source: http://www.nbclosangeles.com/investigations/Physician-and-Pharmacy-Help-Fuel-Demand-for-Illegal-Pain-Pills-423235214.html#ixzz4hgI92T68
Follow us: @NBCLA on Twitter | NBCLA on Facebook

 

Blog, Business Law, Criminal, Drug Companies, Organized Crime

Atlanta pharmacy shut down amid ‘pill mill’ investigation

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

6:06 p.m Monday, May 1, 2017 Neighborhoods

A south Atlanta pharmacy that generated more than $5.1 million dollars from unlawful prescriptions was shut down Friday morning, according to the Georgia Drugs and Narcotics Agency.

Special agents served emergency suspensions that stripped Rosemary E. Ofume of her pharmacist license and put the pharmacy she owned, the Medicine Center, out of business.

Ofume was found guilty on March 24 of several charges including aiding and abetting in the distribution of hydrocodone and oxycodone, controlled substance conspiracy and money laundering conspiracy regarding customers of the “pill mill” pain clinic across the street. Her husband, Donatus Iriele, was convicted of concealment of money laundering and laundering more than $10,000 of criminally derived property.

The Georgia Board of Pharmacy ordered the suspensions April 12 after it found that Ofume and Medicine Center’s continued ability to operate posed a threat to others. It is not clear whether Iriele co-owned the pharmacy, located at 1634 Jonesboro Road SE, when it was shut down last week.

Full Read – http://www.ajc.com/news/local/atlanta-pharmacy-shut-down-amid-pill-mill-investigation/DRKSK4NL4nL6d8Y82lUYEP/