Robert Sobel

Robert Sobel was a sergeant in the Majors I squad who supervised the Freeway Rick Task Force, the multi-jurisdictional operation targeting "Freeway" Ricky Ross in 1987. His detectives nicknamed him "El Diablo" because of his fierce demeanor and relentless work ethic.¹

Leadership Style

Sobel was described as a short, hard-charging narcotics detective whose personal motto was "March or Die." A former subordinate said: "He kind of fancied himself as a tough guy. Some guys, when they get a nickname, they say, 'Don't call me that.' But he kind of liked that one. He'd stay out or three days in the field. If he told you to be there at seven in the morning, he'd be there at six." All nine task force detectives were placed on full cash overtime to maintain twenty-four-hour surveillances.¹

Freeway Rick Task Force

On January 12, 1987, the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department and LAPD formally joined forces to create the Freeway Rick Task Force, one of the few times in L.A. law enforcement history that a single individual was the target of a multi-jurisdictional squad. Sobel was put in charge because Majors I had been investigating Ross since mid-1986. The task force's organizational report stated: "Ricky Ross is a Seven Four Hoover Crip whose success amongst Black gang members is well known. He has developed a large organization which handles weapons sales, multi-kilo cocaine shipments, and business enterprises as a result of surplus cash."¹

Sobel described Ross's enterprise as "a cartel. . .it's a major cocaine dealing organization that stretches from California to Texas and Cincinnati, Ohio. We hit one place that was a lab, a full-on laboratory to make rock cocaine, just 30-gallon garbage cans full of cocaine. We seized like 28 pounds of finished product there."¹

Escalating Tactics

As the investigation progressed, the task force's tactics became increasingly aggressive. According to federal court records, detectives ransacked an apartment owned by one of Ross's girlfriends, picked up a doll belonging to his daughter, plunged a knife into the doll's head, pinned it to a wall, and left a note reading: "This is you, Ricky." Detectives beat Ollie Newell and his friend Robert Robertson, smothering Newell with a plastic bag and taking $30,000 from Robertson. Ross's attorney Alan Fenster filed formal complaints accusing the officers of beatings, thefts, property destruction, and false arrests. Sobel responded by obtaining a search warrant for Fenster's financial records, accusing him of being a money launderer and cocaine fiend. The complaints were dismissed.¹

Sobel later acknowledged that "as time went on it became common knowledge among the entire task force that Polak was carrying around a kilo of dope in the tire well of his vehicle. Polak would be bragging about a present for Ricky Ross when they ran into him. There were constant jokes made about the dope they had ready [to plant on] Ricky Ross when they found him."¹

Results

By late January 1987, the task force had served fifteen search warrants, arrested five people, seized nearly eight pounds of cocaine worth $1.3 million, $63,122 in cash, and twenty guns. After Ross's arrest on May 5, 1987, the LAPD issued a press release announcing the seizure of $13.3 million in cocaine, $240,000 in cash, sixty-two firearms, and sixty-one search warrants served. Deputy LAPD chief Glenn Levant called the Freeway Rick Task Force "a model for other jurisdictions to follow to attack mid-level cocaine trafficking in California." The celebrations were short-lived; tape-recorded evidence of a frame-up led a judge to dismiss all charges.¹

Majors II and Operation Big Spender

After the Freeway Rick Task Force disbanded in late 1987, Sobel was hand-picked to lead the Majors II squad, which he drove to new heights. In 1988, the Majors brought in $13.6 million of the sheriff's office's $33 million total in seized cash. Sobel bragged in an interdepartmental newsletter: "My men are all trained to tear flesh when they scent blood!" But corruption had become endemic. The Majors routinely beat suspects ("tune-ups"), planted dope ("flaking"), lied in court, falsified search warrant affidavits, and stole drug money.²

In the fall of 1989, the Federal Bureau of Investigation launched Operation Big Spender, sending an undercover agent posing as a courier with cash to a hotel room. A hidden video camera captured deputies skimming $48,000 of marked money. Sobel joked to the undercover agent: "You can say room service left it." Within forty-eight hours of the raids, Sobel flipped and volunteered to testify against his crew, admitting the full scope of corruption. Ten deputies were indicted on twenty-seven counts.²