I-TEAM: Trail of the Ghostface Gangsters in CSRA

AIKEN COUNTY, S.C. (WRDW/WAGT) - With as many as 5,000 members the I-Team spent the day piecing together a trail of the Ghostface Gang across our area. And we found their crime spree, and their influence is profound.

Take Rex Allen Stewart Jr. and Cyndi Faye Bowen for starters. The pair are indicted for racketeering, meth and weapons charges but also for aggravated assault on a public safety officer. In 2019, deputies say they stopped Bowen at a traffic stop on Peach Orchard Road and Stewart fired from his passenger window at the officer. It led to a shootout.

As for Stewart, he was previously charged with murdering Sean Bussard in 2019 in Augusta. Investigators said Stewart had ties to the Aryan Nation.

Robert Blake Purdue also charged in the roundup today with racketeering and gang violence. He was arrested for child cruelty in 2009 after his infant was found burned and the baby and another child tested positive for methamphetamine.

The I-Team found many of the names indicted tied to previous stories on meth busts and violent reports on both sides of the river.

You might remember a massive man-hunt back in 2017 after two inmates allegedly shot and killed two corrections officers on a Georgia state prison bus. They were captured days later in Tennessee after investigators say they ransacked houses, stole vehicles, and held two people at gunpoint. Our I-Team told you then one of those inmates Ricky Dubose was connected to the Ghostface Gangsters. And investigators say the Ghostface Gangsters have deep connections within the Georgia Department of Corrections. His trial is set for later this summer. He could face the death penalty.

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