1 killed, 3 in custody following gun battle during FBI drug

[NewsHound]

1 killed, 3 in custody following gun battle during FBI drug sting

It was just after 10 p.m. Tuesday when two cars pulled up to a darkened warehouse.

Three men armed with assault rifles emerged from one car and walked toward the building.

Suddenly, FBI agents exploded on the scene, announcing their presence and calling on the men to surrender. The gunbattle that ensued left one of the gunmen dead, two others wounded and the target of the operation in federal custody, an FBI affidavit said.

The drama near downtown West Palm Beach was part of a sting federal agents and city police set up to capture one man, Frank Jackson, and the other Broward County men he called his "goons," the report said.

Jackson, 37, of Fort Lauderdale and Pompano Beach, has an arrest and prison record peppered with convictions for cocaine possession and sales dating to 1991.

The sting was part of the Safe Streets Initiative, started in 1992 to curb violent street gangs and drug-related violence nationwide.

The operation was set in motion in May when an FBI informant contacted Jackson about buying some assault rifles to rob a Mexican drug dealer of some cocaine.

Jackson told the informant he wanted in on the robbery, the report said.

On or about June 24, the informant met with Jackson and another man, a West Palm Beach police undercover officer who told Jackson that he'd been cheated by the Mexican and wanted help robbing the dealer of 8-10 kilograms of cocaine. Jackson said he had some "big goons with AK-47s," the report said.

The three met again Monday, agreeing that the robbery would go down Tuesday. The rendezvous took place at 10 p.m. at the Holiday Inn on Belvedere Road.

Jackson arrived with Anthony Jackson, 36, of Fort Lauderdale, Michael Singletary, 21, of Pompano Beach, and Cory Caldwell, 18, of Deerfield Beach, the affidavit said.

The undercover officer drew a diagram of the warehouse and location of the drugs. Then he took Frank Jackson to the warehouse at 1100 Old Okeechobee Road and gave him the lay of the land. When they returned to the hotel, Jackson drove with his three men while the officer drove separately, the report said.

Jackson stayed in his car while his men walked over to the building. He tried to flee when he heard the gunfire but was apprehended after a chase that ended with a car accident, the report said.

The report does not detail the firefight except to say "a gunbattle ensued." West Palm Beach police assisted but did not fire any shots, police Capt. Pat Maney said.

All three men were wounded. Caldwell later died of his injuries, the report said.

The four men were charged with conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute cocaine. More charges could follow.

Unlike Frank Jackson, his three accomplices had fewer brushes with the law and only Anthony Jackson had a cocaine-related arrest. Singletary was convicted of aggravated battery with a deadly weapon in 2007, a charge reduced from attempted felony murder. Caldwell had been arrested for violence.

At Singletary's home Wednesday, his grandmother Bessie Martin said she didn't know anything until someone came to her house and said her grandson was shot. She said Singletary has a 2-year-old son, his mother is in prison and his father is dead.

Outside the warehouse, purple and green gloves, a pool of blood and orange circles spray-painted on a sidewalk and fence were all that was left of the shooting Wednesday morning.

Across the street at Fantastic Floor & Interiors Inc., Harry "Sid" Sidman and his daughter got an early start to their day picking up shards of glass. A bullet from the shooting flew through a front window.

"The first thing on my mind is how much more can we take of this?" Sidman asked. "It's the last straw when bullets start flying."

The FBI is sending a team from Washington to investigate, spokeswoman Judy Orihuela said.

"It's freaking creepy," said Gina Coyle, who works next door at Mickey's Plumbing. "It's horrible. It's too close to where we work."

Source

GOOD JOB on taking out the trash ! ! ! No LEOs hurt is GREAT! ! !

GOOD JOB on taking out the trash ! ! ! No LEOs hurt is GREAT! ! !

"Taking out the trash", get a life Ron T.

"Singletary was convicted of aggravated battery with a deadly weapon in 2007, a charge reduced from attempted felony murder"

Who reduces a charge like attempted felony murder and lets the criminals back out on the streets so they can do this stuff again? Oh yeah... our fantastic State Attorney's office...

I AM JUST SHOCKED ! ! ! ! I cant believe it wasnt reduced to retail theft with time served and adjudication withheld.