Omar Portee

Omar Portee (born c. 1969),[1] also known as "O.G. Mack", is an American gang leader, known for founding the United Blood Nation gang while serving a prison sentence at Rikers Island, New York, in 1993.

Omar Portee
Bornc. 1969 (age 53–54)
New York City, New York, U.S.
Other names
  • "O.G. Mack"
  • "The Big Homie"
OccupationCrime boss
AllegianceUnited Blood Nation
Conviction(s)Racketeering, murder, conspiracy, credit card fraud, and drug trafficking (2002)
Criminal penalty50 years' imprisonment (2003)
Imprisoned atUnited States Penitentiary, Florence ADX

Criminal career

Portee began his criminal career as a robber at the age of 17.[2] In the early hours of August 16, 1987, he claimed to have witnessed Don Taylor shoot and kill Terrance Joyner in the Bronx. Based on Portee's eyewitness testimony, Taylor was convicted on April 25, 1989 and sentenced to 22½ years-to-life in prison. At the time of his original testimony, Portee was facing multiple charges in New York stemming from his arrest on August 31, 1987. He faced substantial prison time, 16⅔-to-50 years, if convicted. Instead, as part of a cooperation agreement, which included his testimony against Don Taylor in People v Taylor, Portee was allowed to plead to two to six years for all charged crimes (two 1st-degree robbery convictions), received credit for 21 months' time served and was promised a favorable letter to the parole board. He started serving his sentence on June 9, 1989. He was released on June 20, 1990. Portee later recanted his prior testimony, and Taylor's conviction was vacated in 2004, whereupon Taylor was released from prison after having served over 10 years.[3]

United Blood Nation

In August 1992, Portee was sentenced to 2 ½-to-five years in prison for criminal possession of weapon in the third degree. He and a fellow inmate, Leonard "OG Dead Eye" McKenzie, established the United Blood Nation, initially as a prison gang, while incarcerated at Rikers Island in 1993.[4] The United Blood Nation would become responsible for spreading gang violence from Los Angeles to New York City.[5] On March 12, 1996, Portee led an attack, armed with a shiv fashioned from a Scrabble game piece, on members of the rival Latin Kings gang.[2] Three inmates were slashed in the incident.[6]

Portee was released from prison on June 22, 1999 and returned to the streets to build the Bloods into a powerful street gang.[7][8] He divided the gang into numerous subgroups, or "sets", such as the One Eight Trey, Sex Money Murder, and the Gangsta Killer Bloods.[6] Basing his operations around 183rd Street and Davidson Avenue in the Bronx, Portee led the One Eight Trey faction and ruled over a drug, prostitution and theft empire by recruiting gang members as young as 16 years of age and ordering numerous acts of violence against rival drug dealers.[2]

Conviction and imprisonment

On August 27, 2002, Portee was convicted of ten counts of criminal activity, including racketeering, murder, conspiracy, credit card fraud, and drug trafficking.[6] He was sentenced to fifty years' imprisonment, by Federal Court Judge Naomi Reice Buchwald, on April 14, 2003.[2]

Portee is currently incarcerated in ADX Florence in Fremont County, Colorado. In 2021, Portee was moved from ADX to United States Penitentiary, Florence High, in the ADX step-down program. As of January 2022, Portee is back at ADX.[9]

In 2018, Portee was profiled in an episode of the documentary series Gangsters: America's Most Evil.[10]

References
  1. Find an inmate: OMAR PORTEE − Register Number: 30063-037; Age: 48 (October 31, 2017); Release Date: 02/04/2045. Federal Bureau of Prisons. Retrieved 31 October 2017
  2. Bloods-soaked – gang lord gets 50 yrs. for thug life John Lehmann, New York Daily News (April 15, 2003) Archived May 12, 2022, at the Wayback Machine
  3. "Case Papers & Decisions Search".
  4. Staff (May 18, 2017) "United Blood Nation history, terminology, background" WSOC-TV
  5. "State Police Lead Team of 500 Officers to Decapitate Most Violent Set of Bloods Street Gang". New Jersey State Police. Retrieved 2006-08-26.
  6. "FOUNDER AND LEADER OF VIOLENT PRISON GANG, THE 'UNITED BLOOD NATION', SENTENCED TO 50 YEARS' IMPRISONMENT BY U.S. COURT" (PDF). United States Attorney Southern District of New York. Archived from the original (PDF) on 1 December 2010. Retrieved 17 October 2010.
  7. Kinnear, Karen L.: Gangs: A Reference Handbook, p. 164 . ABC-CLIO, 2009. ISBN 1598841254
  8. Hedges, Chris (2000-01-31). "Old Colors, New Battle Cry; Gang's Founder Stresses Aiding Community, Not Assaulting It". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2020-09-12.
  9. "Inmate Locator". Federal Bureau of Prisons. Archived from the original on 29 June 2011. Retrieved 17 October 2010.
  10. OG MACK (Documentary, Biography, Crime), 2018-07-25, retrieved 2020-09-12
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