The Iron Horsemen Motorcycle Club is an American outlaw motorcycle club that was founded in

Cincinnati, Ohio Cincinnati ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located at the northern side of the confluence of the Licking and Ohio rivers, the latter of which marks the state line wit ...

in 1967. Their insignia is a winged, metallic horse's head and their motto is "Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, if it weren't for the Iron Horsemen, the highways would rust".

Publicized crimes

Police arrested three Iron Horsemen for beating an off duty police officer to death and assaulting another on April 20, 1997. The attacks took place on two occasions at bars in

Hollywood, Maryland Hollywood is an unincorporated community located within St. Mary's County, Maryland, United States. It was named in 1867, when a storeowner at Thompson's General Store near the Uniontown section of Hollywood required a name for the post office ins ...

. Dean Hamblin, Ed Wiggins and Eddie Whitlow members of the Iron Horsemen were sentenced to five years in prison, and another three were given sixteen years in total on June 26, 2008 for drug dealing. They sold

methamphetamine Methamphetamine (contracted from ) is a potent central nervous system (CNS) stimulant that is mainly used as a recreational drug and less commonly as a second-line treatment for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and obesity. Methamph ...

and

speed In everyday use and in kinematics, the speed (commonly referred to as ''v'') of an object is the magnitude of the change of its position over time or the magnitude of the change of its position per unit of time; it is thus a scalar quanti ...

in the Western District of

Kentucky Kentucky ( , ), officially the Commonwealth of Kentucky, is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States and one of the states of the Upper South. It borders Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio to the north; West Virginia and Virginia to ...

between December 2003 and December 2005, and distributed between 50 and 200 grams each. Both the

Drug Enforcement Administration The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA; ) is a Federal law enforcement in the United States, United States federal law enforcement agency under the U.S. Department of Justice tasked with combating drug trafficking and distribution within th ...

(DEA) and the

Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (BATFE), commonly referred to as the ATF, is a domestic law enforcement agency within the United States Department of Justice. Its responsibilities include the investigation and prevent ...

(ATF) were involved in the case. On May 19, 2009, 15 Iron Horsemen, including a State President, were convicted of drug trafficking at the District Court in Portland, Maine. They smuggled

cocaine Cocaine (from , from , ultimately from Quechuan languages, Quechua: ''kúka'') is a central nervous system (CNS) stimulant mainly recreational drug use, used recreationally for its euphoria, euphoric effects. It is primarily obtained from t ...

and

marijuana Cannabis, also known as marijuana among other names, is a psychoactive drug from the cannabis plant. Native to Central or South Asia, the cannabis plant has been used as a drug for both recreational and entheogenic purposes and in various tra ...

, which they obtained from

drug cartel A drug cartel is any criminal organization with the intention of supplying drug trafficking operations. They range from loosely managed agreements among various drug traffickers to formalized commercial enterprises. The term was applied when the ...

s in

Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...

, to

Atlanta Atlanta ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Georgia. It is the seat of Fulton County, the most populous county in Georgia, but its territory falls in both Fulton and DeKalb counties. With a population of 498,715 ...

, Georgia and then

Haverhill, Massachusetts Haverhill ( ) is a city in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States. Haverhill is located 35 miles north of Boston on the New Hampshire border and about 17 miles from the Atlantic Ocean. The population was 67,787 at the 2020 United States Cen ...

before trafficking it to

Maine Maine () is a state in the New England and Northeastern regions of the United States. It borders New Hampshire to the west, the Gulf of Maine to the southeast, and the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Quebec to the northeast and north ...

where they distributed it throughout the state. The ring operated from 2004 until December 2007. The DEA and ATF investigated the club for over a year and carried out the final raids on March 12, 2008. During these raids, they arrested a total of 29 people and seized 10 kilos of cocaine, 600 pounds of marijuana, AK-47s,

AR-15 An AR-15-style rifle is any lightweight semi-automatic rifle based on the Colt AR-15 design. The original ArmaLite AR-15 is a scaled-down derivative of Eugene Stoner's ArmaLite AR-10 design. The then Fairchild Engine and Airplane Corporation d ...

handguns A handgun is a short-gun barrel, barrelled gun, typically a firearm, that is designed to be usable with only one hand. It is distinguished from a long gun (i.e. rifle, shotgun or machine gun, etc.), which needs to be held by both hands and also ...

and $37,000 in cash. The case was known as "Operation Trojan Horse". One member of the Iron Horsemen, Harrold W Seavey Jr. was shot in a gunfight with Cincinnati Police on September 18, 2010. Local media reported that a gang member opened fire on several identifiable police officers and 2 undercover officers as they approached JD's Honky Tonk and Emporium escorted by marked police cruisers.Police: 1 Dead, 2 Officers Hurt In Biker Gang Shootout
/ref>

References

External links

* {{OutlawMotorcycleGroups 1960s establishments in Ohio Outlaw motorcycle clubs Gangs in Maryland Motorcycle clubs in the United States Gangs in Ohio Organizations based in Cincinnati

Publicized crimes

See also

References

External links