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The San Jose Mercury News series, "Dark Alliance," made certainassertions about Ricky Donnell Ross' and Oscar Danilo Blandon's roles in the emergence ofcrack cocaine in South Central Los Angeles and across the nation. The OIG investigationhas surveyed social science literature, reviewed data from law enforcement agencies andfederal public health organizations, and interviewed social scientists and law enforcementofficials in an effort to analyze the articles' claims pertaining to the crack cocainemarket.
The Mercury News makes three principal allegations concerning the rise of crackcocaine in Los Angeles and in the United States. First, the Mercury News allegedthat cocaine was not available in South Central Los Angeles until Blandon and Ross made itso. The articles described cocaine as "a drug that was virtually unobtainable inblack neighborhoods" until Blandon brought it to South Central Los Angeles "atbargain-basement prices." The articles represented that Ross' drug network was thefirst in the nation to market crack cocaine and was dependent on cocaine supplied byBlandon.(49)
The Mercury News' second claim was that Ross' success as a drug dealer wasunique, owing to his unprecedented ties to a Colombian cocaine dealer. According to thearticles, Ross was the first black, South Central Los Angeles drug dealer to cultivate arelationship with a Colombian cocaine trafficker. As a consequence, Ross purportedlybecame the sole conduit for affordable, Colombian cocaine into the untapped blackcommunities of South Central Los Angeles. Since Blandon's Colombian supplier was Ross'source for the cheap cocaine that flooded the streets of South Central Los Angeles in themid-1980s, the Mercury News dubbed Blandon "the Johnny Appleseed of crack inCalifornia -- the Crips' and Bloods' first direct-connect to the cocaine cartels ofColombia."
Lastly, the Mercury News series asserted that Ross' and Blandon's drug networkwas the catalyst for the crack epidemic that erupted in the 1980s across America, not justthe epidemic that occurred in the city of Los Angeles. According to one article, "Thecocaine that flooded in [through Blandon's drug ring] helped spark a crack explosion inurban America . . ." During a June 22, 1997 interview with the RevolutionaryWorker, Gary Webb clarified the point he intended for the article to make:
What we were able to show was where the stuff was being sold, which was the inner cities, in Los Angeles primarily. And we were able to show what the effect of that was. Which was to help spark this horrible crack epidemic that went from Los Angeles to hundreds of cities across the United States in the years after that.
The OIG investigation found little to support the Mercury News' claimsconcerning Ross' and Blandon's allegedly seminal roles in the proliferation of crackcocaine in Los Angeles. The OIG uncovered even less evidence to support the allegationsconcerning Ross' and Blandon's roles in the spread of crack cocaine across the nation. Weuncovered conflicting evidence of the singularity of Ross' ties to Colombian dealers. Rossmay indeed have been one of the first black dealers in South Central Los Angeles to forgea tie, through Blandon, to a Colombian supplier. However, the significance of that fact isdebatable; other black South Central dealers who were Ross' contemporaries found their ownColombian cocaine suppliers either in the same timeframe or shortly after Ross did, andwithout Blandon's assistance.
While some of the Mercury News series' assertions about the origins of the crackcocaine epidemic are in fact accurate, others do not appear to be supported by fact or arethe product of untested supposition. For example, while Ross was a major cocainetrafficker in Los Angeles in the mid-1980s, there is scant evidence to support theassertion that he was solely or even principally responsible for the explosive growth ofcrack cocaine in Los Angeles during that period. The burgeoning of the crack cocainemarket -- both in Los Angeles and across the country -- is best explained by theconfluence of several factors that were not under the control of a single entity orindividual.
There is no doubt that Ricky Ross created a massive distribution network that pouredenormous amounts of crack into Los Angeles, and elsewhere, during the mid-1980s. One ofthe more challenging aspects of our inquiry has been to reconcile, or choose between,conflicting accounts by Blandon and Ross. Both admit to participating in repeated,large-scale drug transactions, but they differ on the duration of their drug dealing andthe quantity of cocaine sold. And each man's account has itself varied over time.
It is hard to pin-point exactly when Ross first became involved in the cocainebusiness, since he has been unsure of the precise date and has given at least twodifferent accounts of how he got started. However, these descriptions of his drug dealinghistory contain certain facts susceptible to being fixed in time.
Ross grew up in Los Angeles, and was a talented tennis player in high school. Accordingto Ross' testimony in his 1996 trial, he failed to graduate from high school, and enrolledat Venice Gilson Trade School, where he met "Mr. Fisher." Ross testified that heattended Gilson for only one month, until he transferred to Los Angeles Trade TechnicalCollege, where he played tennis for one or two years. Mr. Fisher then allegedly introducedhim to cocaine and drug dealing. Ross' school records from Los Angeles Trade TechnicalCollege indicate that Ross enrolled there in January 1979. While his academic recordsindicate that he remained enrolled until January 1982, his transcripts show that he playedtennis for L.A. Trade Tech until January 1981. Thus, according to this account of hisintroduction to cocaine dealing, he began selling cocaine either in early 1981, when hestopped playing tennis at L.A. Trade Tech, or in 1982, when he finished taking classesthere.
However, Ross also testified during a December 1991 trial and told both the LosAngeles Times in 1994 and the Mercury News in 1996 that he was first introducedto cocaine in the early 1980s by a friend, Michael Willie McLaurin, who was home from SanJose State University (SJSU). Attendance records from SJSU indicate that McLaurin attendedclasses there for one semester, from January 1981 to May 1981. Ross also told both the LosAngeles Times and the Mercury News that he began dealing cocaine after hisarrest for grand theft auto, which occurred in March 1982. This places Ross' beginnings ascocaine dealer in mid-1982, at the earliest. Whether Ross began selling cocaine at thebehest of Mr. Fisher or after his arrest for grand theft auto, both accounts suggest thathe started selling cocaine in or around early 1982. We believe that it is most likely thatRoss started dealing cocaine in early 1982.
Determining when Blandon became Ross' supplier is a more difficult task, complicatedboth by Ross' and Blandon's frequently shifting accounts of when they met. In variousinterviews and testimony, Ross has stated that Blandon began selling cocaine to him in1981 or 1982, or sometime during 1983 or 1984. Blandon, on the other hand, has assertedthat they met later: 1983, 1984, or 1985.
Despite the disagreement on the precise year, Ross and Blandon provide the same accountof how they met and began their dealings. In the early 1980s Blandon was selling cocaineto Henry Corrales and Claudio Villavencio (a.k.a. "Ivan Arguellas"), who were inturn supplying Ross with cocaine in relatively small quantities -- 6 to 8 ounces a week.Ross and Blandon agree that their relationship began shortly after Villavencio was shotand paralyzed. After Villavencio's shooting, Corrales attempted to continue doingbusiness. He ultimately gave up, arranged for Blandon to deal directly with Ross, and leftthe country. Police records confirm that Villavencio was shot in October 1983. It appears,therefore, that Blandon did not began selling directly to Ross until after October 1983.Because Corrales attempted to continue conducting business before introducing Rossdirectly to Blandon, Ross and Blandon probably did not begin dealing with each other until1984.
The scale of Ross' operation vastly increased once he starting dealing directly withBlandon, particularly after Blandon developed a Colombian source of supply, AparicioMoreno. Blandon has not been able to say precisely when he began to deal with Moreno but,based on the accounts of Blandon, Carlos Rocha -- one of Blandon's associates whom the OIGinterviewed -- and LA CI-1, it appears that Blandon did not develop his Colombian sourceuntil approximately 1985.
Establishing with any certainty how much cocaine Blandon sold to Ross is virtuallyimpossible. No one in Blandon's or Ross' organizations kept a careful accounting of suchmatters. Moreover, the quantity that Blandon sold to Ross was not constant. The amountswere relatively small at the beginning of their relationship, growing considerably as timepassed. To further complicate matters, the amounts Blandon sold to Ross fluctuatedaccording to his supply and competition with Ross' various other suppliers. Some estimateshave failed to take these factors into account and have instead assumed that the quantityRoss was buying at his peak in 1986 remained constant over the duration of hisrelationship with Blandon. From our interviews of both Ross and Blandon, we know that thiswas not the case.
When interviewed by the OIG, Ross recalled that the first kilogram he ever bought waspurchased from Blandon. Before that he was dealing in smaller quantities. As discussedabove, the OIG believes that Ross began buying cocaine from Blandon in late 1983 or early1984. According to Blandon, Ross bought two or three kilograms every few days, untilBlandon, wearying of these repeated transactions, started selling Ross about 25 kilogramsat a time. Blandon noted that this reduced his profit per kilogram because of volumediscounts, but increased his overall profit because he was selling more cocaine. Blandontestified at Ross' trial that he was selling 100 kilos per month to Ross in 1984. Blandonalso testified that by 1986 he was selling 100 kilos per week to a combination of four orfive different customers, including Ross. Blandon told the OIG that during 1985 and 1986,the amounts he sold Ross ranged from 50 kilos in a week, to nothing.(50)It is unclear from Blandon's account how long Ross bought cocaine a few kilograms at atime from Blandon before graduating to large multi-kilo purchases. It is possible thatRoss did not begin buying in large multi-kilo quantities until mid or late 1984.
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