COLUMBUS – Five members of a violent street gang that terrorized a North Side neighborhood for a quarter of a century face life sentences after being convicted of racketeering and murder in federal court.
The two-month trial of Robert Ledbetter and four other members of the Short North Posse’s self-styled “Cut Throat Committee” ended Thursday with all five convicted on all counts against them, accounting for 10 previously unsolved homicides, according to Acting U.S. Attorney Benjamin Glassman.
The five were among 20 people who were indicted in October 2014 in a racketeering case that included charges of murder, attempted murder, drug trafficking, weapons offenses, extortion and robbery, Glassman said.
The indictments marked the beginning of the end of the 25-year reign of terror in the Short North and Weinland Park and its statewide drug distribution network.
Robert Ledbetter, Christopher Harris, 28; Rashad Liston, 26; Deounte Ussury, 31, and Clifford Robinson, 38, all of Columbus, were found guilty and all face life in prison.
The Columbus Dispatch reports that Ledbetter was the ringleader of the “homicide squad” who got the others to rob and kill rival drug dealers or strangers on the street, and of killing Ledbetter’s girlfriend when he feared she was helping the police.
They were among the 10 remaining people who refused plea deals with the government. The other five go on trial in July and September.
Of the 20 total defendants, Glassman says nine have pleaded guilty and one has died.