Police: Market Sold Cold Cuts, Cocaine

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The New York Sun

Police broke up a multi-million dollar narcotics operation in which buyers purchased cocaine along with cold cuts at the counter of a meat market in uptown Manhattan, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said today.

Police have arrested 25 suspects, including the operation’s alleged ringleader, Rafael Rodriguez, putting an end to the $4 million a year cocaine venture partly based out of the Fiesta Meat Market at 3661 Broadway in Washington Heights, Mr. Kelly said.

The investigation, in which undercover detectives made 24 documented narcotics purchases, found that the illegal business operated out of the meat market by day, and then changed venue at night to a nearby pool hall, D.D. Café Billiard Sport at 604 W 152nd St.

The ring would meet at a clothing store, Yaharra, and bought supplies including packaging materials and a powdery substance used for cutting the cocaine at a bodega, Broadway’s Finest Grocery, police said.

Police have shuttered the four businesses.

Police confiscated more than $175,000 and four and a half kilograms of cocaine, Mr. Kelly said.


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