Nine alleged members of the Road 2 Riches (R2R) gang are facing a 68-count indictment, which includes charges of conspiracy to commit murder, weapon possession, and related offenses, Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez announced in a collaboration with NYPD Commissioner Jessica S. Tisch. Embedded in these charges are accounts of 10 shootings that led to four victims being wounded, with a 68-year-old woman being an incidental casualty, suffering a gunshot wound in the turmoil of daylight.
In a statement obtained by the Brooklyn District Attorney's Office, Gonzalez articulated, "Their actions endangered entire communities and include the murder of a 24-year-old man and the broad daylight shooting of an innocent 68-year-old woman." The DA emphasized the commitment to holding to account the minority responsible for such acts of violence. Commissioner Tisch pointed out the audacity of the gang members, many being teenagers, and credited aggressive police action for a significant decline in gun violence across Brooklyn.
Daubed a clear message by New York City Mayor Eric Adams, the gang crackdown symbolizes the city's stance against violent criminals. "With these arrests and indictments, we are sending a clear message that violent criminals have no place in our city," Adams told reporters. He lauded the efforts that led to a downtrend in major crime and shootings, reinforcing that public safety remains a pivotal point of his administration, as per the Brooklyn District Attorney's Office.
The implicated gang, R2R, purportedly a younger subset of the "Cocky Bama Bullies" and part of the larger Bloods network, has been chronicled to be deeply entrenched in East New York's violence narrative. Their reign of terror over the neighborhood made a pawn shop seemed like an arcade, where a fatal encounter between members and an opposing gang resulted in the death of a young man named Abdoulaye Ba, and where an elderly woman caught a stray bullet that her husband had to remove from her back. These narratives of violence were collected through long-term investigations carried out by the Gun Violence Suppression Division and the DA's Violent Criminal Enterprises Bureau, as put forth by the Brooklyn DA's Office announcements.
The defendants, arraigned yesterday in Brooklyn Supreme Court, have their ages ranging from 15 to 20 during the conspiracy's timeline. Key events from the case include a 14-year-old shot, and a deliberate murder outside a bodega, with evidence primarily derived from surveillance footage and brash postings by defendants on social media platforms. The case is spearheaded by several of the DA's seasoned prosecutors and supported by the NYPD's dedicated investigative division.
An indictment is not an assertion of guilt, the DA's office reminds, as it credits the collaborative work of the NYPD and DA’s Office and digital experts like VCE Paralegal Tania Lopez and KCDA Digital Evidence Lab analyst Rianna Persaud for piecing together the case. These efforts come together in the hope that the charges brought against the alleged R2R members may perhaps contribute to stitching the torn fabric of community and trust in East New York.
