Perryman arrested on federal charges

Carl Perryman, one of Rockville Centre’s most notorious residents, who police say has been involved in at least four local shootings dating back to 2007, is in jail again, being held without bail as he faces federal charges of attempted murder.

Perryman, 26, of 21B Old Mill Court, was arrested at his home at 5:15 a.m. on Feb. 17, according to police. Charles Sullins, 27, of 8C Old Mill Court, was arrested two hours later in front of the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Community Center on North Centre Avenue. Both men were charged in connection with what police described as a gang-related shooting last March 16 near the Old Mill Court housing complex, in which a 25-year-old Freeport man was shot in the back and arm.

Police said that Perryman and Sullins, members of the Old Mill Court Bloods street gang, which is involved in robberies and large-scale drug dealing, conspired to kill the man, a member of the rival Crips gang. They allegedly came upon their target, whom police have not identified, as he was doing a Crips “dance.” According to police, surveillance video shows Sullins handing a gun to Perryman, who then shoots the victim near an occupied car, which is also hit by bullets.

Witnesses identified both men at the scene, police said. In court papers, Assistant U.S. Attorney Thomas Sullivan stated that other witnesses have told prosecutors that Perryman admitted doing the shooting.

Perryman, a South Side High School dropout who was known in the neighborhood as “Carl Carl,” has been tried and acquitted in Nassau County Court, on charges of second-degree murder and attempted murder, in two other cases. The first involved the killing of a former childhood friend, David Baez. Baez, 27, who dated Perryman’s sister, was shot in the chest and leg in May 2008, in front of the MLK Center, after attending a birthday party there for Perryman’s father.

Less than a year later, Perryman was acquitted of the July 2009 attempted murder of 47-year-old John Bush, who police said was shot numerous times in the face and neck with a handgun as he was walking with Perryman on a footpath behind Old Mill Court.

Missing witnesses

In the Baez murder case, two witnesses who were expected to testify against Perryman declined to do so, and another could not be found. Prosecutors argued that Perryman had threatened the witnesses, and even though the judge agreed — allowing jurors to hear the witnesses’ original statements in lieu of their testimony — Perryman was acquitted.

Nassau County homicide detectives said that information gleaned in the investigation of Baez’s murder gave them “direction” in solving a previous murder — of 42-year-old Mark Davis of Central Islip, in June 2007 — that took place only 300 yards from where Baez was shot. “Our belief is that Perryman was involved in both of these murders,” said Detective Lt. Michael Fleming, commanding officer of the county Homicide Squad, in a press briefing at the time of Perryman’s July 2008 arrest. But Perryman was not charged in Davis’s murder.

Rockville Centre Police Commissioner Charles Gennario thanked the U.S. Attorney’s Office, the FBI’s Long Island Gang Task Force and the Nassau County Police Department for their assistance in the most recent case against Perryman. “The safety of our residents is paramount,” Gennario said in a written statement, “and these arrests will have a long-lasting positive impact on the welfare of the citizens of Rockville Centre.”

“While we were making these arrests, numerous residents [of Old Mill Court] came up and thanked us because they feel like a cloud was removed from there, said Lt. James Vafeades, the Police Department’s commanding officer of operations and the head of its Anti-Crime Unit. “And over the course of the past three years, we’ve been told that people were afraid to come forth because of the threat of violence from [Perryman].”

Village-FBI collaboration

This is not the first time that village officers have collaborated with the FBI task force. A pre-dawn raid last June resulted in the arrest of seven residents of Old Mill Court — four with alleged ties to the Bloods — and broke up what police described as a crack cocaine distribution ring that had been operating out of the North Centre Avenue housing complex. Perryman was not arrested during that sweep, Vafeades said, because police were still building their latest case against him.

Serious charges

Perryman and Sullins, who has no previous criminal record, are charged with attempted murder in-aid-of racketeering, conspiracy to commit murder in-aid-of racketeering, assault with a dangerous weapon in-aid-of racketeering and discharging a firearm during a crime of violence. They were arraigned by U.S. Magistrate E. Thomas Boyle at the U.S. Courthouse in Central Islip last Friday, and were scheduled to appear again this Friday before U.S. District Court Judge Arthur Spatt.

“Mr. Perryman has entered a plea of not guilty,” said his attorney, Matthew Brissenden, “and we’re looking forward to addressing these allegations at an appropriate time.”

“At this point, I’m trying to find out the extent of [Sullins’s] involvement, if any, and how we proceed from here,” Sullins’s attorney, Neil Checkman, said on Monday.

If convicted, each of the defendants faces a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years in prison and a potential life sentence.