Photo Courtesy of DA Katz’s Office
Police recovered firearms, cocaine, heroin, heroin laced with fentanyl and other illicit drugs during the long-term operation.
By Michael V. Cusenza
A group of 21 suspects—mostly Queens residents, but some hailing from Long Island—have been indicted by a borough grand jury for allegedly running and/or possessing guns and dealing drugs in Far Rockaway and surrounding neighborhoods between November 2019 and March 2021, Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz recently announced.
Katz said the investigation began in November 2019 with a court-authorized eavesdropping warrant on a cell phone belonging to defendant Antoine Nance, 35, of Far Rockaway, who has been charged with criminal sale of a controlled substance, conspiracy and other crimes.
Monitoring this defendant’s calls led to the discovery of a network of two groups of alleged dealers in Far Rockaway. Law enforcement intercepted both narcotics and firearm-related communications between Nance and many of the other defendants.
According to the charges, calls and text messages between Nance and Kimiko Leonard, 34, of Jamaica, allegedly revealed that the female defendant was Nance’s main drug supplier. On a monthly basis Leonard, who works for the Metropolitan Transit Authority is alleged to have sold Nance his usual order of cocaine. The pair allegedly used code words to set up buys with Nance texting her that “he needed a ride to 200 Street,” which actually meant he wanted to buy 200 grams of cocaine.
Results of the investigation include:
According to the charges, one of Nance’s associates, Keith Alston, 53, of Arverne, was heard on a wire-tapped line on July 20, 2020, allegedly telling co-defendant Paul Reed, 53, of Far Rockaway that he had recently assaulted someone and needed to hide a gun. The pair allegedly worked out a plan to pass the illegal firearm so that authorities would not find the weapon at Alston’s home. Instead, police recovered the weapon in Reed’s residence following the execution of a court-authorized search warrant.
As outlined in the charges, another person with whom Nance was in contact with was Kasson Brown, 32, of Far Rockaway. Brown is accused of being a top supplier of both cocaine and heroin in the region who, to avoid detection by law enforcement, used runners to sell the drugs on the streets. One of his paid runners was allegedly Dewayna Edwards, 45, of Inwood, L.I. An undercover officer was introduced to Edwards as a drug buyer and at times when this “buyer” wanted to make a purchase, she would allegedly reach out to Brown to get the drugs. Brown, in turn, would allegedly contact defendant Resean Morris, 31, of Jamaica, to get him the needed heroin or Raymond Cowan, 57, of Freeport, L.I., for cocaine.
DA Katz said defendant Brown’s crew of runners even allegedly, branded their drugs, packing the heroin they sold in glassine envelopes stamped in red with the words “King of Death” along with a photo of the Grim Reaper. Tests on the substance within the little envelopes allegedly revealed a mix of heroin, fentanyl and tramadol. At times, tests showed the substance was pure fentanyl.
Another one of Brown’s alleged street runners, according to the charges, was Jason Bernadotte, 20, of Far Rockaway. During a court-authorized search of Bernadotte’s home in the Redfern Houses in Far Rockaway on Sept. 29, 2020, police allegedly recovered 117 glassine envelopes containing a mix of heroin, fentanyl and tramadol. There were also 65 “twists” of cocaine found.
During a Nov. 1, 2020 court-authorized search of the home of defendant Sekou Santiago, 32, of Far Rockaway, cops allegedly recovered a Glock pistol, a high-capacity magazine, a loaded magazine, a laser sight, 114 grams of heroin and fentanyl, and 269 grams of cocaine.
