Opinion ID: 772486
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Singh Enterprise

Text: 5 Dhinsa was the self-professed leader of the Singh Enterprise, a vast racketeering organization built around a chain of fifty-one gasoline stations that Dhinsa owned and operated throughout the New York City metropolitan area under the name Citygas. The enterprise was funded by a pump-rigging scheme that overcharged Citygas customers through the use of an elaborate electronic device located beneath the gasoline pumps at the various Citygas stations. Operated via remote control, the rigging mechanism overcharged each customer by about six to seven percent on each purchase. During the enterprise's ten year existence, the pump-rigging scheme generated tens of millions of dollars, which were used, inter alia, to bribe public officials, purchase weapons and carry out crimes of violence aimed at protecting the enterprise's operations and its profits. 6 As the leader of the Singh Enterprise, Dhinsa maintained an inner management circle consisting of his cousin Gulzar Singh (Gulzar), his brother Gogi Singh (Gogi) and Citygas employee Babu Singh (Babu). Gulzar and Gogi supervised and trained the Citygas employees on the pump-rigging scheme, and, along with Babu, collected proceeds from the various Citygas stations and assisted Dhinsa in carrying out his violent criminal activities. Equally vital to the enterprise's operations were Antonio and Otilio Galvan, the designers of the pump-rigging mechanism and Marvin Dodson (Dodson), Walter Jazz Samuels (Samuels) and Evans Alonzo Powell (Powell), the group of hitmen employed by Dhinsa in connection with the murders of former Citygas employees Manmohan Singh (Manmohan) and Satinderjit Singh (Satinderjit). 7 Manmohan and Satinderjit were both murdered on Dhinsa's orders. Prior to his death, Manmohan made numerous inquiries, and confronted various members of the Singh Enterprise, about the July 1995 disappearance of his brother Kulwant, a Citygas employee. 3 Dhinsa ordered Satinderjit murdered after learning that he was cooperating with police regarding, inter alia, Kulwant's disappearance, Manmohan's murder, and the enterprise's pump-rigging scheme. Dhinsa also employed Dodson, Samuels and Powell in an unsuccessful plot to kill Sarvjeet Singh (Sarvjeet), who witnessed a murder allegedly committed by Dhinsa's brother Gogi in 1991. 8 In an effort to conceal his pump-rigging scheme from the Department of Consumer Affairs (DCA) (the city agency responsible for oversight of gasoline stations), Dhinsa regularly bribed DCA inspector Lawrence Woods(Woods), who tipped off Dhinsa about DCA enforcement activities targeting the Citygas stations and provided him with special DCA inspection seals and stickers. The Singh Enterprise's ten year existence ended following the arrests of Dhinsa and other key members of the Singh Enterprise.