PORTLAND, Ore. — Four alleged Hoover gang members have been indicted by a federal grand jury in the fatal shooting of a Portland Uber driver in December 2020, the U.S. Attorney's Office announced on Wednesday.
Taezhon Tyreik Kelly, 23; Anthony Devion Bagsby, 32; Delane William Roy, 25; and Cocoa Dalonta Taplin, 28, have been charged with murder in aid of racketeering, using and carrying a firearm during a crime of violence, and causing death through the use of a firearm.
According to the indictment Wednesday, Kelly, Bagsby, Taplin and Roy are accused of intentionally killing Dhulfiqar Mseer, a 23-year-old refugee from Iraq, to maintain or increase their position in the Hoover Criminal Gang, an organization known for racketeering in California, Oregon and Washington.
Around midnight on December 11, 2020, Mseer was about to pick-up an Uber passenger in his white Honda Accord when he was shot and killed in a hail of gunfire near Northeast Stafford Street and 11th Avenue in Portland.
Police thought Mseer was murdered in a gang-related ambush meant to target someone else. Investigators believed multiple people fired approximately 70 rounds, then got into two cars and took off.
The Hoovers originated in Los Angeles and established a presence in Portland in the early 1980s. Its members are known to carry out violence on behalf of the organization to main status or increase one's position, officials said.
Mseer had moved to Portland with his family about seven years ago. He worked as an Uber driver and was trying to bring his wife, who he had recently married, to the U.S.
Portland police and the FBI arrested Bagsby and Taplin Wednesday. Kelly was arrested Tuesday in Halton City, Texas and Roy was arrested Wednesday in Kaplan, Louisiana. Both Kelly and Roy will be transferred to Oregon.
