A dark tragedy unfolds in the heart of Los Angeles: Federal police have just launched a crackdown on the gang, and the hotel manager who aided them has also been arrested
Los Angeles pimps used “horrific” acts of cruelty to keep a vicelike grip on a sleazy stretch of south LA road where perverts can buy sex with children, and women turn tricks for as little as $40, cops and prosecutors said.
Vile flesh peddlers maintain a thriving sex business on LA’s Figueroa Corridor by branding prostitutes, recruiting girls from foster homes, forcing them to get abortions, and even biting and punching them with Rolex watches, authorities said.
The sickening sex trade secrets of the infamous Hoover Criminals gang’s brutal prostitution ring were revealed in a massive takedown of the Hoovers that saw the arrest of at least ten prostitution kingpins operating in the Figueroa Corridor, an area known to locals as “the Blade.”
“This is how they accomplish the sex trafficking in Figueroa,” explained LA’s top prosecutor Bill Essayli after Wednesday’s takedown, dubbed Operation Broken Blade.
“They do it first through coercion, and then through violence.”
“It’s horrific,” he added.
The Hoover Criminals, which originated in the late 1960s and early ’70s, are one of the largest and most powerful street gangs in Los Angeles.
After breaking away from the Crips, the gang flourished in the ’80s during the crack epidemic and expanded into several various criminal enterprises, including narcotics and prostitution.
After the 16-year-old girl had the procedure, Mouton then “ordered her to engage in commercial sex work the same day and threatened to fire her if she did not,” charging documents state.
Essayli said that 25 sex traffickers have been arrested and charged as a result of Operation Broken Blade, including Lockett, Armstead and Mouton, with more arrests to come.
“We’ve identified over 50 victims as part of this conspiracy, and our work keeps going,” said Essayli. “We’re not gonna stop.”
