Video surveillance, wire taps: Inside the Lewis Street drug bust

In one of the videos released this week, investigators identified Mr. Hopkins as the person who appears to be breaking up drugs atop a vehicle parked in the area that was being surveilled; it also appears that cash changes hands. In the second video, a pair of hands can be seen measuring out an estimated 25 to 30 grams of crack cocaine sitting on a folded $5 bill, which is on top of a digital scale.

Investigators declined to identify the people they believe are in that second video.

Mr. Spota said the drugs that were making their way to Riverhead and Southampton towns were coming from Harlem via Terrell Latney, 35, of Mastic. Mr. Latney was charged with third-degree criminal sale of a controlled substance, according to the DA’s office.

“The chain of command was Latney, from Harlem, to Hopkins” and others, Mr. Spota said.

Mr. Hopkins’ connections to the Bloods gang included, among others, Kotarra Jackson, a 32-year-old Riverhead native who was living in Mastic at the time of her arrest, according to the DA’s office.

“She claims to be the number one female, the highest-ranking female Blood in the State of New York,” Mr. Spota said. “Whether that’s accurate or not, we don’t know, but she certainly is up there, there’s no doubt about it.”

Ms. Jackson has served time at the Albion Correctional Facility, a women’s prison in Orleans County, for drug sales and possession, state records show. She has been charged with fourth-degree conspiracy, a felony, and is being held at the Suffolk jail on $50,000 cash bail or $100,000 bond.

Her attorney, Harry Tilis of Bohemia, vehemently denied that his client touts being a Bloods member.

“That’s what they claim, not what she claims,” said Mr. Tilis. “That’s not what they said at arraignment. They put it out there as their information. The issue is whether there is sufficient proof on the DA’s side [to prove the charges], and it seems that if they’re rushing to the newspapers, then something is amiss, don’t it? It’s puzzling to me.”

He declined to comment further, saying, “That’s why we have courts.”