Twelve people in New Jersey were accused of being members of a drug network run by a street gang that prosecutors said was distributing approximately 50,000 doses of heroin and a kilo of crack cocaine per week.
State Attorney General Gurbir Grewal on Thursday announced the arrests centered on a local set of the Crips street gang in Paterson.
“Paterson is a regional distribution center for heroin and fentanyl, and this Crips set was running its open-air drug markets in an area torn by gang-related gun violence,” Grewal said.
Authorities seized over 21,000 single-dose wax folds of heroin, some of which contained fentanyl. Some of the heroin was stamped with the same brand names that have been linked to eight fatal overdoses in the state.
“In the midst of the COVID pandemic, there is still an opioid crisis and we are still doing all that we can to help those suffering from addiction,” the attorney general said.
