300 Guns Seized During Vagos Crackdown

A multi-agency task force arrested 12 people accused of being "members of the Vagos Outlaw Motorcycle Gang," which started in Riverside County, and seized more than 300 guns and thousands of rounds of ammunition, the state attorney general announced Thursday.

The arrests were made in Riverside, San Bernardino, Los Angeles, Orange, San Diego, Imperial and Santa Barbara counties after an 18-month investigation by the California Department of Justice, Attorney General Kamala Harris said.

The operation, code-named "Simple Green," was run by the Department of Justice Riverside Inland Crackdown Allied Task Force.

About 70 special agents from the state DOJ along with law enforcement officers from 42 allied local and federal agencies, served 52 search warrants and arrested suspects for crimes ranging from murder, assault with a deadly weapon, conspiracy, rape and narcotic related crimes.

The weapons seized included semiautomatic rifles, shotguns and handguns, officials said.

In April 2010, a task force launched an investigation of the Vagos, a trans-national gang operating in the United States, Mexico, Canada, Germany, New Zealand and Puerto Rico, officials said.

Agents served 14 search warrants and arrested 25 people, seizing 46 pounds of cocaine, eight pounds of methamphetamine, more than $37,000, three stolen vehicles, 26 firearms, a grenade launcher, a rocket launcher, four practice grenades and body armor.

A member of the Vagos was recently arrested in the shooting of a rival gang member in a Nevada casino, Harris said.

The announcement Thursday came a month and a half after Hemet police issued a statement absolving the Vagos Motorcycle Club of any involvement in a series of attacks on Hemet police in 2010.

"After a thorough investigation, the Hemet Police Department is reasonably satisfied, at this time, that the Vagos International Motorcycle Club had no involvement in the 2010 attacks on Hemet police officers," the statement said.

"Any emotional or colorful remarks made by the City during the investigation which were expressly or impliedly offensive to the Vagos are unfortunate," the statement said.

In March 2010, after a series of attacks on Hemet police involving booby-trapped firearms and explosives, law enforcement agencies and the Riverside County District Attorney's Office targeted the Vagos as suspects.

"Early on, one aspect of the investigation directed the attention of the Hemet Police Department and the various other investigating agencies to the group formally known as the Vagos International Motorcycle Club," the Hemet police statement says.

"At that stage of the investigation, there was a great deal of media attention on the progress of the case. However, further investigation led the investigating agencies in other directions.

"Ultimately, two men who are not affiliated with the Vagos were arrested for and charged in connection with the attacks upon Hemet police officers," the police statement says. "They are currently awaiting trial."

The Vagos also call themselves Green Nation and consider themselves a one-percenter club. The first Vagos chapter formed in the 1960s in Riverside County, according to an online history.