April 30, 2024 - LOS ANGELES – A member of the Hoover Criminals Gang was sentenced today to 144 months in federal prison for leading a drug trafficking enterprise that distributed narcotics, including crack cocaine and methamphetamine, which were sold from his storefront in South Los Angeles.

Andrew Tate, 56, a.k.a. “Batman,” of South Los Angeles, was sentenced by United States District Judge Stanley Blumenfeld Jr. Tate pleaded guilty in August 2022 to one count of conspiracy to distribute controlled substances. He has been in federal custody since his arrest in November 2020.

Tate is the lead defendant in an indictment targeting the gang's members and associates as part of an investigation dubbed “Operation Hoover Dam.” He also is the final defendant to be sentenced in this case. In total, federal prosecutors secured 10 convictions in this matter.

Tate owned a business named TNN Market and he sold methamphetamine, crack cocaine and powder cocaine from it. Tate and co-defendant Bobby Lorenzo Reed, 59, a.k.a. “Zo” and “Z,” who owned the South Los Angeles-based store H&E Smoke and Snack Shop, referred customers to one another, supplied one another, and directed their employees to engage in drug sales and referrals in dozens of narcotics transactions from June 2017 to May 2018. Reed is serving a 10-year prison sentence after pleading guilty in June 2022 to federal narcotics charges in this case.

“Tate participated in an extensive and long-running drug conspiracy to sell drugs, including methamphetamine and crack cocaine, in South Los Angeles,” prosecutors argued in a sentencing memorandum. “Tate’s role in the drug conspiracy was significant; he was the head of the entire drug trafficking enterprise pumping drugs into a vulnerable area of Los Angeles.”

The FBI, the Los Angeles Police Department and the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation investigated this matter.

Assistant United States Attorneys Jenna G. Williams of the Corporate and Securities Fraud Strike Force and Jason C. Pang of the General Crimes Section prosecuted this case.
Source: DOJ Release