Federal officials on Wednesday announced the arrest of 42 alleged members and associates of the violent white supremacist SFV Peckerwoods gang based in California, charging them with a range of crimes including racketeering, firearms and drug trafficking, bank fraud, identity theft and other felonies.
They were among a total of 68 people charged in a 76-count indictment unsealed Wednesday as those arrested were arraigned in U.S. District Court in downtown Los Angeles.
All but 13 who remained at large were either arrested Wednesday or already in custody, reported California’s Victorville Daily Press.
The group is deemed a domestic terror organization that’s aligned with the Aryan Brotherhood.
The SFV Peckerwoods have been affiliated with other organized crime groups based in California prisons, including an alliance with the Mexican Mafia prison gang, the attorney’s office said. They use “Nazi tattoos, graffiti, and iconography to indicate their violent white supremacy extremist ideology,” including swastikas and the “88” symbol that denotes allegiance to Adolf Hitler.
“What truly distinguishes them, what defines them is their hate and their animus toward racial, ethnic and religious minorities,” U.S. Attorney Martin Estrada for the Central District of California said in a statement, calling the group a “grave menace to our community” and “a destructive force.”
The gang also focused on making money, both by selling drugs and by stealing identities and defrauding banks. They robbed drug dealers and conducted “smash and grab” merchandise heists, prosecutors said.
Law enforcement officers investigating the gang’s alleged activities also seized “large quantities” of illegal firearms as well as dozens of pounds of fentanyl, methamphetamine and heroin, the indictment stated.