USA - Suspected Pagans leader arrested in Hempfield raid

OFF THE WIRE
State police Wednesday evening executed a search warrant at a home in Hempfield, Westmoreland County, as part of an ongoing drug investigation of Dennis "Rooster" Katona, alleged to be the national president of the Pagans motorcycle gang.

A SWAT team entered the home on Ember Lane and took Mr. Katona into custody while troopers searched the house and a state police helicopter hovered over the scene.

Mr. Katona, who was released from federal prison in 2006 following his conviction for his leadership role in a bloody attack on the rival Hell's Angels in New York in 2002, has long been under investigation by state police on suspicion of distributing cocaine and methamphetamines.

The case had its genesis in a larger investigation of the Pagans, whose national headquarters is a farmhouse in Fallowfield, Washington County, that began in the mid-2000s.

A state grand jury presentment, handed up in Allegheny County in 2009, laid out the structure of the gang and charged members with distributing drugs supplied from Mexican dealers in Atlanta. Several members went to prison. One of those charged in that case, Raymond Overly of Belle Vernon, head of the Greensburg chapter of the Pagans, remains a fugitive believed to be in Florida.

Mr. Katona, formerly of Jefferson Hills, was still in prison when that investigation began and was not charged as part of it, but police have been building a separate case against him.

The Pagans have a long history in Western Pennsylvania and have been repeatedly hit by law enforcement here. In the 1980s, the Pittsburgh FBI largely dismantled them with two major federal prosecutions using the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act.

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