Former drug kingpin Ricky Ross arrested for sales suspicion, carrying $100,000: cops

BY Jason Silverstein | NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Updated: Sunday, October 25, 2015, 3:29 PM

Former Los Angeles crack cocaine kingpin (Freeway) Ricky Ross might have fallen back into the game.

Ross, 55, was arrested last week on suspicion of possessing drug money — just a few years after finishing a lengthy prison term, authorities said Saturday.

The Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office released few details about Ross’ arrest, citing an ongoing investigation, but said he was also cuffed on suspicion of conspiring to commit a crime. A law enforcement official told the Los Angeles Times Ross had more than $100,000 on him when he got cuffed.

He is no longer in custody.

The Orange County Register noted the arrest happened in the Emerald Triangle, a region in northwestern California famous for legal and underground marijuana production.

Ross — not to be confused with the gangsta rapper who took his real name as a stage name (and then got sued in a dismissed case) — was one of the most notorious drug runners of the 20th century, setting up a nationwide empire based in Los Angeles at the height of the nation’s crack epidemic in the ‘80s.

He controlled thousands of employees and earned more than $600 million before getting convicted in 1996 for selling cocaine to a police informant.

After his release in 2009, he went on speaking tours detailing his drug dealing days, and told his story in the 2014 memoir “Freeway Rick Ross: The Untold Autobiography” and the 2015 documentary “Freeway: Crack in the System.”