Gangs run gun pipeline from Delta to Chicago [View All]

[La_Serpiente]

Gangs run gun pipeline from Delta to Chicago

Marlon Jude had come down from Chicago for his Aunt Mini's funeral when he met Charles Westbrooks at a family barbecue.

On a Sunday afternoon in 2000, it was a typical Mississippi Delta social event, a gathering over smoking grills and sweet tea in a cousin's back yard. But the chance meeting would spell trouble for both men.

Jude was 28 and digging deeper into a life of crime that already included dealing marijuana on the South Side.

For Westbrooks, a 26-year-old underemployed father in need of money, it was a turning point. Born and raised in an isolated Delta hamlet known only by the country road it sat on--Starkey--Westbrooks came from a family of schoolteachers, his grandmother said. His principal from West Tallahatchie High School remembered him as a good kid who played football and signed up at the National Guard post after his graduation in 1993.

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Gangs run gun pipeline from Delta to Chicago