Two Niagara residents busted in Project Kronic

Two Niagara residents are among the 120 people arrested in a series of police raids across Ontario Friday morning as part of a year-long investigation into the drug trafficking operations of the Driftwood Crips street gang.

Devin Dinall, 63, of St. Catharines and Shannon Rolle, 32, were among those charged after police raided nearly 80 homes. Police say the arrests left a major hole in a sophisticated and growing Toronto-based street gang with tentacles across the province and Western Canada, Toronto police said Thursday.

Toronto Police Chief Mark Saunders said the raids that occurred between 1 a.m. and 5 a.m. in six cities, including Toronto and Sudbury, Ont., and netted a significant amount of drugs, including the deadly opioid fentanyl, cocaine and heroin, as well as weapons.

Theinvestigation—dubbedProject Kronic — was launched in May last year and targeted the Driftwood Crips street gang.

Saunders said police laid more than 660 charges that include criminal organization offences, attempted murder, trafficking firearms, kidnapping conspiracies, robbery and drug trafficking.

“These are thugs that are trying to intimidate neighbourhoods and gain control and participate in unlawful activity,” Saunders said at news conference Thursday afternoon.

Police allege the gang is a criminal organization with cells in Ontario, Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia.

“The Driftwood Crips has been one of the older gangs in the city of Toronto,” he said. “They go far back to when I was in the homicide squad running investigations, and they’re involved in murders back then.”

The primary goal of the investigation, the chief said, was to identify the gang’s leadership and its members, figure out who supplied drugs and weapons and “solve historical serious crimes.”

He alleged the Driftwood Crips have a clear, ranked structure with a number of leaders controlling separate cells, even some who run operations while incarcerated.

“We allege that a member of the Driftwood Crips was supplying a large quantity of fentanyl and cocaine to a network of dealers in the Sudbury area, which include a member from Hells Angels,” Saunders said.

Dinall is charged with commission of an offense for a criminal organization, conspiracy to traffick cocaine, participating in cocaine trafficking, possession of the proceeds of crime over $5,000 and possession of cocaine. Rolle is charged with commission of an offense for a criminal organization, conspiracy to traffick cocaine and cocaine trafficking.