Alleged Minnesota gang members charged in string of murders during federal crackdown

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — A federal grand jury has indicted 11 alleged members of a Minneapolis street gang on charges including murder, conspiracy and drug trafficking, prosecutors announced Wednesday.

Some of the alleged gang members have been charged for their roles in seven shootings that left five people dead, unsealed court records show. Five people have been charged with gun murder, while all eleven defendants were charged with conspiracy.

The charges are part of a federal gang suppression authority announced in 2023 that has ensnared dozens of members or associates of several gangs in Minneapolis. More than 90 people have been charged with gang-related crimes since the operation began in Wednesday’s announcement, prosecutors said.

The alleged Lows gang members are also charged with trafficking fentanyl and possessing illegal weapons.

“The Lows are an exceptionally violent criminal street gang that has terrorized north Minneapolis for nearly two decades. Through threats and violence – shootings and murders – the Lows gang has long sought to establish control over large parts of our city,” said U.S. Attorney Andrew Luger. “My office will continue to respond to gang violence by treating it as the organized criminal activity that it is. This indictment is an important step in dismantling a violent street gang that has devastated families and communities in north Minneapolis.”

Luger’s office has built its gang-targeting operation around the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) statute. The anti-corruption law is used to tackle organized crime.

Instead of RICO cases, gang-related crimes in Minnesota have traditionally been prosecuted on an individual basis, Luger said. In recent years, his office has shifted its approach and started building cases against the criminal organizations to which individual gang members belong, he added.

Earlier this month, three other people charged in connection with the federal gang crackdown were convicted under the RICO statute.