Nineteen folks have been hit with federal prices for allegedly operating a brazen, open-air drug market in Manhattan’s Washington Sq. Park — flooding the world with fentanyl, heroin and crack cocaine.
The medication dealt by the alleged profession sellers led to 2 deaths final 12 months alone — together with an 18-year-old boy who had solely simply graduated highschool and a 43-year-old homeless particular person, a federal indictment prices.
“Over the past 5 years, officers with the New York Metropolis Police Division’s Sixth Precinct, which has jurisdiction over the Washington Sq. Park Space, have arrested the defendants on over 80 events for state drug-related offenses and different crimes; some over a half a dozen instances,” court docket filings state.
“Upon launch from these arrests, the defendants returned to promoting medication within the Washington Sq. Park Space, regardless of the defendants’ pending state prices, or phrases of state bail, probation, or parole.”
