Guy Quenneville
Northern News Services
Wednesday, July 25, 2007

YELLOWKNIFE - The Crazy Dragons, an Edmonton-based street gang that traffics cocaine and operates in Yellowknife, has been dubbed the highest-profile organized crime group in Alberta by a criminal intelligence bureau.

"The most noticeable criminal group in Alberta - with cocaine operations throughout the province as well as in parts of British Columbia, Saskatchewan and the Northwest Territories - is known to the police as the Crazy Dragons," states the report by Criminal Intelligence Service Alberta (CISA), a partnership between the Alberta Solicitor General and provincial law enforcement agencies, at the head of a section titled "Significant Criminal Groups."

Studies of organized crime in the NWT falls under the mandate of CISA.

In June, RCMP visited both Sir John Franklin and St. Patrick high schools to warn teachers about the Crazy Dragons, whose operational tactics include recruiting high school students to deal drugs.

In the past, Sgt. Larry O'Brien said that the RCMP plans to hold a public information meeting on the matter some time this fall.

The Crazy Dragons' sphere of influence has spread to other Asian gangs, the report also said.

"Invariably, many Asian criminal groups that have been targeted for enforcement over the years were linked to the (Crazy Dragons') leader," the report stated.