The D.C. Blacks is an African-American prison gang in the United States whose members are from Washington D.C. They are allied with the Black Guerrilla Family and some other black prison gangs. The Aryan Brotherhood is one of their main rivals.[1] Although the D.C. Blacks are one of the largest prison gangs within penitentiaries, they are small compared to the gangs outside of the prison system, such as the Bloods and the Crips.[2]

History

The D.C. Blacks prison gang is said to have originated in the late 1960s or the early 1970s.[3] From being in prison, the D.C. Blacks became enemies with another prison gang called the Aryan Brotherhood, which is a group consisting of only convicted white men. The race wars against the D.C. Blacks raged across the federal prison system in the early 1980s and again in the 1990s when two of the high-ranking officers within the D.C. Blacks were stabbed and killed at the United States Penitentiary in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania by Aryan Brotherhood members. The race war in the federal system between the Aryan Brotherhood and the D.C. Blacks started on November 22, 1981 when a member of the Aryan Brotherhood, Thomas Silverstein, murdered a member of the D.C. Blacks, Robert M. Chappelle. An FBI investigation was sparked when Chappelle's body was found dead in his cell at the United States Penitentiary in Marion, Illinois. The race war continued when Silverstein killed the national leader of the D.C. Blacks, Raymond “Cadillac” Smith, on September 27, 1982. The violent campaign against the D.C. Blacks was at the center of the government's 2002 indictment against the Aryan Brotherhood when one of the leaders from the Aryan Brotherhood allegedly ordered the 1997 killing of two D.C. Blacks at Lewisburg with an invisible ink message written in urine. This message was sent to Lewisburg to warn their other members that the D.C. Blacks called hits on two of their members. Messages began to be going back and forth between the two penitentiaries calling hits on both gangs.[2]

Individuals from both the D.C. Blacks and the Aryan Brotherhood have testified in court, giving the public a general idea of what life at USP Marion looked like.[4]

References

  1. ↑ "Aryan Brotherhood: Prison Gang Profile". www.insideprison.com. Retrieved 2019-04-30.
  2. 1 2 Butterfly Blog (2011-10-25). "The Brand". Gorilla Convict. Retrieved 2019-04-30.
  3. ↑ "D.C. Blacks". unitedgangs.com. 2017-11-28. Retrieved 2019-04-30.
  4. ↑ "Black inmates defend Aryan Brotherhood". East Bay Times. 2006-06-29. Retrieved 2019-04-30.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.