ORLANDO, Fla. – On Monday, Seminole County deputies announced that they arrested 13 people and are searching for another person in a 2023 drive-by shooting that killed a woman.
Sheriff Dennis Lemma called the incident a high-profile dispute between music stars Kodak Black and Jackboy, with ties to gang activity resulting in charges of first-degree murder, attempted first-degree murder and racketeering under Flordia’s RICO law.
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So, what does RICO mean?
The federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act became law in 1970 and its purpose is “the elimination of the infiltration of organized crime and racketeering into legitimate organizations operating in interstate commerce,” according to the U.S. Department of Justice.
Florida would later pass its own RICO law, largely mirroring the federal law but focusing on organized crime, including gang activity, taking place in the state of Florida.
News 6 legal analyst Steven Kramer pointed out that RICO charges can apply to multiple types of organized crime which could range from a counterfeiting operation to organized retail theft and even violent crimes like those in this case out of Seminole County.
He also said that several elements must be proven for a RICO charge to stick.
“There are all types of rackets, but you’ve got to be able to show that there is actually in the organization and that individuals (are) somehow tied to that organization and setting up or conspiring to set up and acting in conjunction with that organization,” he said.
Kramer added that there must also be multiple crimes tied to RICO charges.
“You can’t charge RICO when there’s only a single crime, you’ve got to be able to show that — the state has to be able to show that there are multiple crimes committed,” he said.
Essentially, prosecutors will have to prove that a criminal organization or enterprise exists, that multiple crimes were committed for the organization and that those who committed the crimes did so knowingly for the organization.
“Those arrested in this investigation are members of a criminal street gang known as OTF — On Top Forever — with a known presence in Seminole County,” Lemma said. “OTF is a known subset of the national gangsters murder Crips street gang.”
Lemma said investigators believe the OTF gang was looking to make a name for itself as a newly-established Crips affiliate. Lemma said that since 2021, 43 known or associated members of OTF have been arrested in Seminole County on 141 charges unrelated to this case.
“Clearly what Seminole County wants to do here is they’re trying to effectively target this gang that Seminole County believes is operating in Central Florida,” Kramer said.
The attorney pointed out that RICO is often used as a cudgel to coerce lower-level members of criminal organizations.
“Part of what RICO gives the government tools to do is to offer an incentive for these defendants to flip on people that are more important and involved in the leadership of that organization,” Kramer said.
RICO charges often come with much harsher penalties to help dismantle a criminal enterprise.
“They (investigators) are going to continue to dig in on that and RICO is the tool for the state to go after these organizations,” he said. “That’s because these organizations historically were so adaptable that they put this law into place to basically give the state more tools to deal with basically a hydra.”
RICO charges do cover a broad variety of crime, which Kramer noted is one of the criticisms of RICO. However, he believes the burden of proof incumbent on the state counterbalances that.
“The state still has some hurdles to overcome,” he said. “They’ve got to show that that same pattern of activity — that same type of crime — being committed in multiple instances. They’ve got to show that they’re related to the same criminal enterprise, which sounds easy, but it’s not as easy as you think. And they’ve got to show knowledge. They’ve got to show that the individual committing (a crime) is a willing participant, and if they’re not a willing participant — if they don’t have knowledge (of the criminal organization, then the state’s gonna have a difficult time proving that they’re tied to the organization and that Rico should apply.”
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