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A rapper who boasted on Twitter about beating a murder rap is a violent drug kingpin who flooded Brooklyn's Gowanus Houses with crack and heroin, the feds said Wednesday.
Ronald (Ra Diggs) Herron, charged with eight others in a federal indictment, provided prosecutors with a wealth of incriminating evidence in his YouTube videos and in his Twitter musings.
He tweeted that he has "5000 n----- with them lorcins [handguns] ready to turn the pigs kids into orphins," federal court papers reveal.
The videos depict the ex-con wearing body armor and brazenly firing guns at a target range.
In them, he boasts he ordered a shooting from his hospital bed and "beat a body" - a reference to his 2002 murder acquittal after two witnesses were threatened and refused to testify against him.
Herron warned against people "snitching" and mentioned a murder in the Gowanus Houses housing project of a victim who reportedly helped authorities, Assistant U.S. Attorneys Shreve Ariail and Carter Burwell said.
The prosecutors said Herron was wounded by a rival drug dealer in 1998 and the gunman was killed two days later by Herron's cousin.
Herron, 28, was arrested by NYPD detectives early Tuesday outside Club Amnesia in Chelsea. He was arraigned in Brooklyn Federal Court and ordered held without bail.
A loaded 9-mm. handgun was found in the glove box of the Dodge Charger that Herron was riding in, authorities said.
"That s--- ain't mine and you ain't gonna find my prints on it," the driver, Algenis Caraballo, said after taking cops on a brief chase along W. 29th St.
Herron's crew had been linked to four killings but none is charged in the three-count indictment.
Brooklyn U.S. Attorney Loretta Lynch said the crew "victimized an entire housing development."
Undercover detectives made more than 65 drug buys from members of Herron's crew at the Gowanus Houses since 2008, many of which were recorded on video that could put the dealers in prison for at least 10 years.
Herron could face up to life in prison if convicted.
"Getting violent drug dealers and dangerous weapons off our streets is a recipe for safer neighborhoods," said Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly.
Teens at the project said they knew Herron by reputation - as a rapper.
"We'd see him around doing a video, he makes sure he reps his neighborhood," said Saquan Casilla, 18.
jmarzu✧✧✧@nydailyn✧✧✧.c✧✧
With Jake Pearson
Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/2010/10/06/2010-10-06_rapper_ronald_ra_diggs_herron_who_bragged_about_violence_on_twitter_youtube_is_d.html#ixzz120RPTuOd
― j. sargent & lil k3v (deej), Wednesday, 13 October 2010 04:41 (thirteen years ago) link