With a flurry of recent arrests and charges in the Operation Safe Union and Drug Market Initiative efforts to curb the drug trade around 23rd and Union, the legal process has played out for Jamell Webb, a “25-year-old drug dealer affiliated with a violent Seattle street gang” who was caught dealing cocaine at the intersection in August, the Seattle PI reports:

Writing the court, Assistant U.S. Attorney Vince Lombardi noted that Webb’s gang – the East Union Street Hustlers – and an affiliated Central District gang, Deuce 8, had been in a bloody feud with several South Seattle gangs.

Webb’s arrest, Lombardi said, “will hopefully serve to deter others who might be similarly inclined to drag neighborhood around 23rd and Union back into its former role as an open-air drug market.”

Prior to Friday’s sentencing, Webb apologized for his actions, which he described as “illegal and reprehensible.”

Operation Safe Union and the Drug Market Initiative have targeted dealers around 23rd and Union for more than one year.