Yesterday, police raided a Bronx building which happened to house a five-story marijuana growing operation. Around 800 plants were seized, the equivalent of over 1500 pounds, including 75 pounds of dried marijuana. And the street value? Oh, around $7.5 million. more ›

The Sunburnt Cow, the East Village's pre-eminent Australian all-you-can-drink brunch emporium, was shuttered last night due to "criminal sale and possession of controlled substances," which in layman's terms, means: dudes were selling drugs! (Okay, it means someone was using the restaurant as a space to sell drugs, but still.) more ›

Twelve people were arrested for selling drugs out of a now-closed Queens restaurant following a ten-month investigation dubbed "Operation Dinner Out," which authorities say had members of the Trinitarios, Latin Kings and Bloods gangs working together. more ›

Yesterday marked two huge drug busts across the city, the first obtaining $10 million worth of heroin inside a duffle bag from two suspects in the Bronx. Andy Moscat, 28, and Francisco Ramirez, 41 were nabbed at the bust after a long undercover probe, and 40 pounds worth of heroin was found packed in bricks in the bag. Unfortunately, Special Narcotics Prosecutor Bridget Brennan said heroin busts are becoming all too common: "These big seizures are definitely more common now than they were. Even one kilo of heroin would have been a rare find five years ago." more ›

Police arrested 62 people in the past 24 hours as part of a massive undercover drug bust in Queens. Since last August, police have purchased (pdf) over $100,000 worth of crack cocaine, heroin, marijuana, oxycodone, ecstasy and BZP from the suspects, who range in age from 16 to 62, as part of "Operation Stampede." more ›

Police have arrested 19 alleged drug dealers from two warring Bronx gangs after a year-long probe by the Bronx Narcotics Bureau, and a total of 30 have been hit with federal charges of conspiracy to distribute narcotics. The two groups used to all be known as the The Wheeler Boys, but split off in 2008. One cop said, "These two gangs were like a divorced couple that lived next to each other." Sounds bad, but we can't get over their gang name sounding like the long lost rivals to the Baseball Furies. more ›

Four Staten Islanders, including three sanitation workers, were arrested early this morning for selling oxycodone and cocaine across the borough. Sanitation pair Gino Colella, 29, and Robert Miller, 30, are accused of selling the drugs to undercover cops on numerous occasions between April and December 2010, and their supervisor Bernard Basile is accused of supplying Miller with oxycodone on at least one occasion. The two were allegedly doing so well with their side business that they turned down opportunities for overtime. Finally, more people to blame for the awful blizzard response! more ›

Three men were arrested for possession of 200 grams of heroin (street value: $20,000) in Jersey City yesterday. The men, who are allegedly part of a wholesale heroin ring, were charged with heroin distribution. Two of them Nelson Alvarado-Jimenez and Geuri Green, both 27 and from Queens, were stopped in a car by Narcotics Task Force detectives, who found "100 grams of heroin and $700 in cash" and "Green's 5-year-old child was in the back seat." The child has been turned over to relatives; Green was also charged with endangering the welfare of a child. more ›

It's Operation Ivy League Part 2! A Cornell University senior has been arrested after police found her with a Tupperware container with six ounces of uncut heroin, worth about $150,000. Keri Lynn Blakinger, 26, was arrested in the parking lot of Ithaca's Hillside Inn, and Deputy Ithaca Police Chief John Barber said, "The preliminary weight of the heroin indicates it may be the second largest seizure of the drug by the Ithaca Police Department since September of 2008." She was also described as "not acting right." Was she peeing in bottles too? more ›

Twenty-two people were arrested Tuesday night as part of a massive $3.5 million quaaludes manufacturing and distributing ring, stretching from California to NYC. Twenty of those arrested as part of the three-year probe, dubbed "Operation Lude Behavior" (seriously), are expected to be arraigned today in Manhattan federal court. Among them are two current city public school teachers and a retired one. more ›

Cops raided at least six stores on Nostrand Avenue in Brooklyn this afternoon, arresting eight and seizing a firearm and two pounds of marijuana. For two months the "open drug bazaar," between Atlantic Avenue and Eastern Parkway in Crown Heights has been under investigation, during which time undercovers purchased pot and cocaine more than fifty times. (According to NBC, a pound of weed went for $1,100.) Many of the shops targeted for their over-counter drug sales were bodegas, reports ABC, though a jerk chicken place and a little CD store were also raided. A tipster tells us that around 1:30 p.m. there were "About 100 cops everywhere, chopper still circling, SWAT guys... I looked in and they were pushing up the ceiling tiles with a machete." more ›

The NYPD sting that culminated in the arrests of 28 accused drug dealers targeted two rival drug crews working out of a housing project near Lincoln Center. Officers raided the Amsterdam Houses at 6 a.m. yesterday in a sweep dubbed "Operation Opera House" and nabbed the suspects—three of whom are high school students. more ›

Police arrested 28 people—including three high school students—in a cocaine and crack bust in a housing project near Lincoln Center. The suspects are accused of selling drugs inside the Amsterdam Houses—a complex of 13 buildings between 61st and 65th streets, and Amsterdam and West End avenues, the Post reports. After Amsterdam Houses residents began complaining about seeing drug transactions and drug paraphernalia, officers launched an investigation and observed more than 50 drug deals in five different buildings since July. Officials told the tabloid that dealers used students who lived in the complex as "look-outs and dealers-in-training." According to the indictment [Word document], 12 of the suspects were charged with selling controlled substances near a school. more ›

A year-long investigation prompted by a double murder at the Pelham Parkway Houses in the Bronx culminated in a major drug bust yesterday. Narcotics and other units armed with arrest warrants raided the project around 6 a.m., arresting suspects in their apartments. 27 arrests were made, and investigators seized 800 bags of crack, a gram of heroin and 100 bags of marijuana. Resident Marlene Rodriguez told the Daily News, "There's a lot of good people here just trying to live their lives. They need to clean these places up." But one 71-year-old who has lived in the complex for 35 years wasn't impressed. "They got rid of them?" she said. "They'll be right back out here. Isn't that always the case? It's always the case." more ›

Feds have busted a Park Slope anesthesiologist accused of writing Adderall prescriptions for phony patients, who filled them and sold the study drug on the streets. The doctor, Michael Hosny Gabriel, may have used his profits to fund a gambling habit. He “carried large sums of cash to Atlantic City” one informant told the Feds, adding that the medical man kept a gun in his bedroom. And though Dr. Gabriel was the Adderall ring's kingpin, he had help: the Daily News says other doctors at his Brooklyn hospital are also implicated in the case. more ›

Cops broke up a major drug ring and arrested fifty suspected dealers operating out of a Far Rockaway housing project. After making 174 undercover purchases in six months, police raided the Hammel Houses, the Post reports. According to the Daily News, officers cuffed 45 suspects including members of the Bloods, Crips, and Money Over Bitches gangs. Police seized 41 bags of crack, 230 bags of marijuana, and smaller amounts of heroin and Oxycontin. Ten of the suspects had been arrested in a bust two years ago, and police continue to search for 13 other suspects. Queens Narcotics Capt. Thomas Marren says cops will pay close attention to the nearby Carleton Manor housing project so the dealers can't easily relocate. more ›

The chef at a Staten Island steakhouse known for being a police hangout has been arrested for selling cocaine to an undercover detective. Thomas "TJ" Gleason, 34, a chef at Ruddy & Dean—which is located just one block from the 120 Precinct and the state Supreme Court building—was hit with felony drug dealing charges after purportedly selling $100 of coke at the bar. more ›

A rookie Bronx cop and a second officer have been suspended and may face criminal charges after video surfaced showing them assaulting a handcuffed man on January 5th. The beating took place after two cops were wounded by a ricocheting bullet fired by a third officer chasing a drug suspect, whose pit bull had pounced at them. An area resident took the video (below) from a nearby apartment, but maybe it's nothing to get worked up about, because one NYPD source says, "It wasn't as bad as Rodney King." more ›

A gang of drug dealing thugs known as "Murder Set" or "Money Comes First" used MySpace to brag about their exploits—and help police round them up in a bust announced yesterday. NYPD and District Attorney detectives seized 190 grams of crack, 60 grams of cocaine and 51 glassines of heroin, with a street value of about $20,000, a source tells the Daily News. The gang allegedly terrorized the Grant Houses and schools near the Grant Houses in Morningside Heights. The investigation, dubbed "Grant Denied," began ten months ago, and resulted in 11 arrests and some heavy felony indictments. more ›

A drug bust in Springfeild Gardens led cops to a homemade zoo inside a home housing three geckos, two marmosets, three tarantulas, a monitor lizard, a snake, a baby caiman and two iguanas. Animal control was called in to bring in the illegal animals along with seven adult pitbulls, a bulldog and a puppy pitbull with cropped ears. An 84-year-old man who lives nearby said, "This is a nice block. Sometimes things like this happen, but I'm not leaving." [via NYDN]
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The two young women who were busted for scoring cocaine at Chelsea nightclubs and accused of reselling it throughout their FIT dorms look like they might have run into some good fortune due to some admitted sloppiness by the DA's office. Mickenzie Dippenworth and Christine Scafa turned down plea bargains of six months in jail for last November's coke bust. The Post reveals that investigators have admitted that they are missing $200 in "buy" money, transcripts of the contents of more than 15 text messages between the two women and the undercover cops who nailed them, and expense reports detailing how much buy money the undercovers put in their pockets. The pair have said that the cocaine sale was just the natural next step when meeting two undercover cops at the hotspot Home who claimed to be ultimate fighters and bragged about their penis sizes. The trial is set to begin this week. more ›

A 49-year-old handyman who was up from Pennsylvania visiting his sick mother in Clinton Hill was shot last night by an undercover cop in a separate drug bust that went awry. Shem Walker had just finished cooking his family dinner when he told them that was going out to buy cigarettes in the Brooklyn neighborhood around 8 p.m. more ›

Build-a-Bear has made a name for itself over the last decade by letting passers-by take a bird's eye view of the their bears getting stuffed inside workshops around the country. But yesterday police caught up with a group of criminals in The Bronx who have been filling up the teddy bears with bags of heroin over the last year right under their unsuspecting neighbors' noses. more ›

Drug Enforcement Agency agents arrested two bounty hunters in Washington Heights last night, charging them with possession of over 6 pounds of cocaine (street value: $300,000). NY1 reports that the two suspects, Chris Morel and Rensy Adrover, were arrested after being spotted as they put on "ballistics vests and police tactical gear. Investigators say they also had a stun gun, a dagger, bullet proof vests and handcuffs." DEA Officer Wilbert Plummer surmised, "I think they were using it as a cover. This way it would be a little more safe for them to travel through the city with drugs in the car. They didn't have it in a trap or compartment. They had it out actually inside a bag in plain view. [If stopped by cops] They could be en route to somewhere and law enforcement would just believe they were other law enforcement agents driving off somewhere." Morel and Adrover work for a bail enforcement firm in the Bronx; they will be arraigned on drug possession charges, which could bring up to 24 years in prison. more ›

The locally-grown produce movement has apparently reared its head into the marijuana trade. The DEA has broken up five hydroponic set-ups around town in the last couple of months, an equal number to those recorded for the previous fiscal year in its entirety. The five raids in total have netted 830 pounds of pot, worth $4.15 million on the street. Four of the five setups were uncovered throughout The Bronx last week, but no arrests were made. The fifth raid was the Queens basement belonging to a city firefighter who was growing over 100 plants under high-intensity discharge lights. The Post says that "with the nation's fiscal health in the tank, homegrown marijuana operations have soared by 60 percent." The paper adds that growing pot hydroponically leads to such strong weed that its value ends up being anywhere from three to ten times the amount that Mexican imported grass goes for. more ›

The undercover cops who set up the bust of two FIT students for selling them cocaine apparently knew the quickest way to the young women's hearts—they complimented their cleavage. That was one of several details offered by accused dealers Mickenzie Dippenworth and Christine Scafa in their defense that the sting was set up by a month-long seduction by the undercover officers "Chris" and "Jack" (they all met at a Chelsea club). The women also say that the cops bragged about being Ultimate Fighters and boasted of their penis size. On the night of the actual bust, the Post reports Dippenworth's lawyer's claim that: "at 1:30 a.m., one of the undercovers 'initiated a request for cocaine.' When Dippenworth gave him the little left of her stash, the undercover 'literally pushed $100 to the defendant and insisted that she take the money.'" The two young women are due back in court in a little under a month for the charges of selling a total of 11 grams of cocaine for $1,280. more ›

The TGI Friday's in the Financial District known for its uppers as much as its poppers has been reopened with an entire new staff after last week's drug bust. The Times checks in with the eatery where a bar maid tells them everyone was fired after the place was shut down following two men being arrested for openly selling pot and coke at the bar. One woman dining on mozzarella sticks was surprised to hear of the news and said, "He was selling it right here at the bar? Dag. I didn’t know it was that kind of place.” Friday's parent company, Riese Restaurants received a $50,000 fine for the bust where staff was accused of knowing about the dealings, an accusation the Times says is supported by the cramped quarters of the location. One patron at the bar seemed to think the incident gave the chain some character, telling the paper, “If some guy’s selling drugs at a bar—I don’t know, it doesn’t bother me. It’s actually kind of cool.” more ›

Cops raided a TGI Friday's in the financial district on the day of its namesake and shut it down after discovering that the family eatery was striped with cocaine. Apparently the business plan at this franchise location included looking the other way as dealers at the bar lured in high rollers from nearby Wall Street institutions. The Post says that the bankers and traders would "spend their nights getting high after the market spent the day going low." more ›

As two young women were led out of FIT student housing in handcuffs last night after getting busted for running a coke ring, the only emotions revealed from their faces came from having a case of the giggles. When they spotted reporters out front of their West 31st Street dorms following the arrests of the two as well as their supplier on multiple counts of cocaine possession and sale, 22-year-old Christine Scafa laughed and said, "Oh my God, are you guys serious? We're not Plaxico Burress!" This triggered her 21-year-old partner in crime Mickenzie Dippenworth to zing back, "Well, I'm a Plaxico Burress fan." Like her fallen idol, Dippenworth was no stranger to the city club scene, where she originally sold cocaine to an undercover cop at nearby hotspot Home. That led to a series of undercover purchases as police gathered evidence of the two dealing to a number of fellow FIT students. The Post says that both were from "very good backgrounds:" Scafa ran in this year's NYC Marathon and Dippenworth was once a girl scout. UPDATE: FIT's president sent an email to the school community: "this situation appears to be an isolated incident and involves no others on campus." more ›

WNBC reports that the NYPD shut down a drug operation in a Brooklyn meat market--Sikorski Meat Market on Manhattan Avenue. The police had caught the drug dealers on wiretaps referring to "hot kielbasa," and Police Commissioner Ray Kelly explained, "the ‘kielbasa’ was really cocaine, and thanks to outstanding police work it’s no longer available at the meat market." More details: Livery cabs were used for delivering the shipments and "Polish and Dominican crews teamed up to run the ring" (hello, melting pot!). more ›