Family Matters: Black Guerrilla Family prison-gang case nets four guilty pleas

By Van Smith

Published by City Paper, Sept. 30, 2009

Four of the two-dozen alleged Black Guerrilla Family (BGF) prison-gang members indicted in Maryland federal court in April pleaded guilty recently before U.S. District Court Judge William Quarles. Lakia Hatchett was the first to do so, pleading on Aug. 27, followed by Marlow Bates (pictured on left) on Aug. 28, Darryl Dawayne Taylor on Sept. 9, and, most recently, former prison guard Asia Burrus, who pled on Sept. 16.

One of the BGF co-defendants remains a federal fugitive: 60-year-old Roosevelt Drummond (pictured on right), charged with robbery and drug-dealing.

The BGF indictments–one for a drug-dealing conspiracy headed by Kevin Glasscho, who is charged as the BGF drug distributor, and the other, led by imprisoned Maryland BGF leader Eric Brown, for drug dealing, robbery, and firearms–have heightened awareness of the extent to which an alleged prison gang can insinuate itself in civic life (“Black-Booked,” Feature, Aug. 5). The government’s case, as revealed thus far, paints a picture of Brown as a drug-dealing extortionist who doubles as a budding gang-interventionist with a book, a nonprofit, and the endorsements of local educators. Co-conspirators include a recently released murderer who worked as a public-school mentor for troubled students, a city wastewater technician who owns a clothing boutique, and an erstwhile bar owner and mortgage broker with separate federal bank-fraud and identity-theft charges against her. Mount Vernon, the midtown Baltimore neighborhood known for its cultural institutions and historic buildings, is the setting for some of Glasscho’s drug-dealing, according to court documents, and it’s where accused BGF heroin supplier Tyrone Dow operates a luxury-car detailing business.

The first to plead guilty in the Glasscho indictment was 29-year-old Lakia Hatchett, who Judge Quarles is set to sentence on Nov. 13. When Hatchett was arrested in April, agents searched her Charles Village apartment at 2735 St. Paul St. and seized a “bag containing brown powder” and two scales, court records show. Hatchett’s plea agreement, which reveals that the seized bag contained 10 grams of heroin, describes her as “a wholesale customer of heroin from Kevin Glasscho” and states that she “conspired to distribute more than 20 grams” of the drug.

Marlow Bates’ agreement states that he conspired with Brown and others to distribute heroin, and that Bates “was determined to be engaged in the distribution of narcotics,” both in the prison system and on Baltimore’s streets. The agreement puts the specific amount of heroin involved at 40 to 60 grams, much less than the multiple kilograms that often show up in federal cases. At his April 24 court hearing, Bates fist-bumped his attorney, Christie Needleman, when she arrived at the defense table, but when he pleaded guilty in late August, he had a different lawyer, Christopher Michael Davis. Bates’ state criminal record includes convictions in gun-and-drug cases. Bates, 23, is scheduled to be sentenced on Nov. 17.

Shortly after Bates, 41-year-old Darryl Dawayne Taylor, who is scheduled to receive his sentence on Dec. 19, pleaded as well. In court in April, assistant U.S. attorney Thomas Wallner explained that Taylor is the son of co-defendant Joe Taylor-Bey, who has spent more than 30 years in prison on a murder conviction. Taylor is accused of smuggling heroin into prison by putting it in balloons and “hiding it in his rear end, or in his cheeks,” Wallner said. According to Taylor’s guilty plea, he “was intercepted discussing and arranging transactions involving the wholesale distribution of heroin, and the smuggling of heroin into various prisons” on behalf of Glasscho. As in Hatchett’s case, Taylor admits to dealing in at least 20 grams of heroin.

Asia Burrus, a 22-year-old whose sentencing is scheduled for Dec. 7, admits to helping smuggle contraband into prison that “facilitated the distribution of narcotics inside the Maryland Correctional System” by Brown and others. She also admits she “was aware that Eric Brown was the leader” of the BGF in Maryland and “that the BGF is a violent, nationwide gang that has established a powerful presence within the Maryland Correctional System and on the streets of Baltimore City.” She was arrested in April at downtown Baltimore’s Maryland Transition Center, where she worked as a guard.

Meanwhile, on Sept. 3, a federal forfeiture case was filed against $4,659 in cash taken from Dow, and state prosecutors have already forfeited a 2005 Acura belonging to Glasscho. On Sept. 24, Glasscho’s girlfriend, BGF co-defendant Cassandra Adams, filed a motion to be severed from the case, claiming the evidence produced so far fails to put her in the conspiracy.