Shower Posse linked to drug-running in Canada

The police in Canada are reporting that they have broken the back of a major illegal drugs syndicate with links to the infamous Shower Posse out of Jamaica.

According to the Canadian police, the Shower Posse, which emerged in the 1980s, has entrenched itself in Toronto, dealing drugs and fuelling internecine gang warfare.

News of the move against the alleged Shower Posse members came Monday during a media conference called by the police to announce an operation in which 78 people were arrested and almost 20 guns seized in Ontario.

It was reported that more than 1,000 police officers from several forces rounded up members of a crime network that allegedly extended through Canada and back to the Caribbean islands.

“Big-fish suspects and small ones were caught in the mix, but at the centre, however, are dozens of alleged Toronto gangsters. At their centre, about a dozen alleged members of the shadowy Shower Posse,” the report stated.

According to the police, the Toronto members of the Shower Posse brokered the sale of drugs shipped through the Caribbean to feuding Toronto street gangs, notably the Five Point Generalz and the Falstaff Crips.

It was further reported that a spate of shootings involving feuding gangsters in Northwest Toronto drew police interest last August, prompting the nine-month investigation dubbed Project Corral.

The police said these investigative avenues led, ultimately, to the Shower Posse.

“They’re not there front and centre, but they’re organised and they’ve been around a long time,” said Staff Inspector Mike Earl during the news conference.

Operating in toronto for years

He said the Toronto Police Service had never been able to get at the local members of the Shower Posse as they had in the past 24 hours, even though the gang has been operating in the city for years.

The police said they seized more than CDN$30,000 cash, CDN$10,000 in casino cheques, drugs of all kinds and even diamonds and body armour during the raids.

Canadian prosecutors plan to charge the most serious suspects as organised crime members, a designation that would mean stiff sentences if there are convictions.

The Shower Posse hit the international headlines in the 1980s as a ruthless gang with drug bases in more than 20 United States cities, Canada and the United Kingdom.

It was linked to more than 1,400 murders in what US authorities have described as a level of ruthlessness never before seen in that country.

The man believed to be the mastermind behind the operations of the Shower Posse in the US, Vivian Blake, died in March after suffering a heart attack.

Blake was deported to Jamaica last year after serving time in a US prison, having been convicted on several charges.

Be the first to comment

Leave a Reply