TROOPS DO DOUBLE DUTY IN GANGS

Army soldiers who belong to the Gangster Disciples have robbed people
to raise money for the gang, orchestrated drug and gun deals, and
even killed two people after gang members were kicked out of a bar.

About a dozen soldiers at bases in Texas and Colorado have been
sentenced to prison over the last decade as a result of federal
investigations into criminal activity they carried out for the
Chicago-based gang.

They highlight the danger of soldiers maintaining gang affiliations.

"It is a continuing problem, sure. It's ongoing," said Scot Thomasson
, a supervisor with the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and
Explosives who investigated dope dealing and gun trafficking
involving Fort Carson, Colo., soldiers.

Earlier this month, a Wisconsin National Guard sergeant serving in
Iraq provided the Chicago Sun-Times with photos he recently took of
gang graffiti on military equipment and buildings throughout Iraq.

Assault Rifles Seized

Other civilian and military investigators warned that gang membership
in the Army appears to be rising as more recruiters ignore
applicants' criminal backgrounds and gang tattoos. One investigator
at Fort Lewis, Wash., said he has identified about 320 soldiers as
gang members in interviews with them since 2002.

The Army Criminal Investigation Command has downplayed the problem,
saying gang activity in the Army is insignificant. Whatever the scope
of the problem -- both overseas and on the home front -- the cases in
Texas and Colorado show it's not new and it's not harmless.

The Colorado investigation focused on a retired Army sergeant, Arnie
Porter, a Chicago native who moved to Colorado Springs and ran a
faction of the Gangster Disciples, Thomasson said.

Porter maintained his gang contacts in the Chicago area and his ties
to noncommissioned officers at Fort Carson, near Colorado Springs.

In 1996, the feds targeted a gun-and-drug operation involving Porter
and 25 other Gangster Disciples, including Gerald Ivey -- an
active-duty sergeant at Fort Carson -- as well as other soldiers and
civilians, officials said.

Ivey was a medic who served in Operation Desert Storm, said
Thomasson, who is now assistant special agent in charge of ATF's
Seattle field division.

"By all accounts, these guys grew up in bad neighborhoods," Thomasson
said. "They got into the military and overcame their situations. They
were successful, yet they maintained their ties and gang activity. I
cannot understand why Ivey did what he did. He was a decorated
soldier. He was not financially strapped. He did not have a drug
habit. He just wanted to get back into the [gang] lifestyle."

The crew bought cocaine and marijuana in El Paso, Texas, exploiting
Ivey's past contacts at nearby Fort Bliss, Thomasson said. They'd
purchase marijuana for about $300 a pound in Texas and sell it for
$1,200 a pound in Gary, Ind., which was Ivey's hometown.

Ivey also shipped guns back to Gary. He acted as an illegal "straw
purchaser," using his military ID to buy weapons at a Colorado gun
store called Dragon Arms, prosecutors said.

ATF agents seized five sawed-off shotguns, three assault rifles and
other guns from the gang. Ivey bought other guns that were later used
in crimes in Chicago and Gary and were found in crack houses,
Thomasson said. Ivey was sentenced to 15 years of military confinement.

ATF foiled a plan by Ivey to send fully automatic machine guns back
to the Chicago area, Thomasson said.

'Like A Social Club'

Sgt. Jim Rodgers of the Colorado Springs Police Department said
officers continue to arrest Fort Carson soldiers affiliated with the
Gangster Disciples. "We bust them for slinging dope or for having a
pistol off base," he said.

No major gang conspiracy cases involving Fort Carson soldiers have
been launched since Ivey was busted, Rodgers said. Still, he said his
department is preparing for the Army to relocate members of the 4th
Infantry Division from Fort Hood to Fort Carson, and he has been told
that Gangster Disciples are prevalent among soldiers in that unit.

An FBI agent in El Paso has told the Sun-Times that law enforcement
agencies there are preparing for a rise in soldiers affiliated with
the Gangster Disciples and other "Folk Nation" gangs when they are
relocated from Fort Hood to Fort Bliss. The FBI is concerned that
Folk Nation-affiliated soldiers and their dependents could conflict
with a Latino gang entrenched in El Paso.

It's not a new problem for Fort Hood. In 1999, a Fort Hood soldier,
Spec. Jacqueline Billings of Milwaukee, was identified by military
prosecutors as the "governor" of a 40-member faction of the Gangster
Disciples -- many of whom were soldiers.

Chicago Police Lt. Robert Stasch was invited to Fort Hood to testify
as an expert witness in the trial against Billings. She was sentenced
to 27 years of confinement.

Hired through his private consulting firm, Law Enforcement Training
Consultants, Stasch identified Billings' tattoos of a pitchfork and a
six-pointed star as GD symbols. He led Army investigators to GD
graffiti in a culvert near the entrance to the base. And he explained
gang literature found in Billings' home.

"She claimed it was like a social club, like the Elks or Moose Lodge,
and she called it 'Growth & Development,'" Stasch said. "I told them
they were Gangster Disciples."

Convicted Of Battery

In July 1997, Billings allegedly ordered a hit on a club owner after
she and other gang members were thrown out. She felt the club was the
gang's "turf," prosecutors said. Two Fort Hood soldiers in the
Gangster Disciples bungled the job, killing two of the club's
employees but not the owner.

Those soldiers admitted to being the gunmen and testified against
Billings. But Billings claimed she simply ordered the men to rough up
the owner. She was acquitted of murder but found guilty of battery.

She also was convicted for her role in the robbery of a $15,000
Cartier watch and $2,500 in cash in August 1997.

"No member was to act on behalf of the gang without her approval,"
according to one government filing. Billings "led and recruited
active-duty soldiers and local civilians, including teenagers, into
an organization that settled disputes through murder and assault and
raised money through robbery."

Stasch, now a lieutenant in the Chicago Police tactical unit in the
Town Hall District, said the Billings case raises serious questions
about gang involvement in the military.

"Large gangs like the GDs have the ability to negotiate with Mexican
cartels to bring drugs over the border," he said. "What's to say GD
members in Iraq aren't over there for the sole purpose of making
friendships with large drug organizations?"