34 Facts About Craig Petties

Craig Petties was born on December 11,1976 and is an American convicted drug trafficker best known for the criminal empire he led in Memphis, Tennessee, from the mid-1990s to 2008, and for his connections to the Mexican drug cartel.

Craig Petties was born in 1976 to Ever Jean Petties in Memphis, Tennessee, growing up with his sister at 263 West Dison Avenue in the impoverished Riverside neighborhood.

Craig Petties' mother made a little over US$15,000 annually serving as a foster parent and working in some capacity for the board of education in the Shelby County school system.

The area was a well-known haven for drug dealers, and Craig Petties began selling small amounts of drugs in the late 1980s when the crack cocaine epidemic was spreading to the Southeastern United States.

Craig Petties was given the nickname Lil' C because of his short stature.

The first arrest of Craig Petties came in 1992 at the age of 15 during his first year at Carver High School.

Craig Petties was caught possessing a sawed-off shotgun, a weapon he purchased to intimidate individuals who had stolen one of his coats.

Craig Petties had accidentally discharged the gun inside his home, and was actually the person who called police to explain himself.

Craig Petties had dropped out of school by the time he was 16 and was arrested on three more occasions, twice for selling crack during the summer of 1993 and once during the winter for attempted murder.

Craig Petties recovered the cache, the group double-crossed the car's owner by keeping the money, and they split it among friends with Craig Petties keeping US$50,000 for himself.

Craig Petties bought a Cadillac and gave some money to his mother to have an aging tree removed from their property.

Craig Petties invested the remainder of the money by purchasing large quantities of drugs to jumpstart his illegal business and then reinvested the profits buying more drugs.

Craig Petties grew the criminal enterprise into one of the largest and most violent drug trafficking rings in the history of West Tennessee, if not the largest.

Around this time, Craig Petties met cousins Clinton and Martin Lewis, two men who became his most loyal cohorts.

Craig Petties was arrested as an adult for the first time at age 21 in 1998 after pleading guilty to burglarizing boxcars in Memphis rail yards.

Craig Petties purchased a Bentley for US$339,000, a Mercedes-Benz for US$112,000, and property in Las Vegas.

At 23, Craig Petties bought 200 pounds of marijuana and 22 pounds of cocaine through middlemen with direct connections to Mexico.

Craig Petties coordinated efforts with cocaine and marijuana traffickers to prepare and package the drugs in at least eight states including Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Mississippi, Missouri, North Carolina, and Texas.

Craig Petties was reportedly making the group millions of dollars every week.

Craig Petties eventually settled in the Mexican state of Queretaro a few hours north of Mexico City, buying a home in the upscale Milenio III subdivision of Santiago de Queretaro, Mexico.

In Mexico, Craig Petties was protected by the Mexican cartel where he had a private driver, a personal chef, a maid, a nanny, a personal trainer, and armed guards.

The Lewis cousins ran operations in the United States on behalf of Craig Petties, traveling to Mexico, arranging deliveries, purchasing stash houses, and protecting Craig Petties' mother.

Friends of Craig Petties noticed his desire for revenge after he fled to Mexico, inspired by the Mexican drug cartels' propensity for violent redemption against rivals and informants.

Police believe the death toll linked to Craig Petties' organization is even higher than six.

In 2002, Craig Petties gave orders to kill his own cousin Antonio Allen by offering an associate Tobias Pride US$100,000, despite Allen being a friend of Pride's for 16 years.

Craig Petties had been hiding behind a bush and approached Allen firing guns in both hands.

Craig Petties had ordered his kidnapping and torture in search of information on Bobby Craft who stole 440 pounds of cocaine from the group worth millions of dollars that Craft was in charge of guarding.

Craig Petties was deported and US federal agents arrested the fugitive in Houston.

Craig Petties was held in the Federal Correctional Institution in Memphis.

In December 2009, Craig Petties secretly pleaded guilty to 19 charges including drug trafficking, racketeering, money laundering, and orchestrating four of the homicides.

In December 2010 during a court appearance, Craig Petties pleaded guilty to having a shank hidden in his prison cell mattress.

Craig Petties was later moved to the federal facility in Atlanta before being transferred on September 11,2012, to the Metropolitan Correctional Center in New York City.

Craig Petties faced the death penalty for coordinating six homicides and life imprisonment for numerous racketeering charges.

Craig Petties was the last of 40 individuals convicted in this sweeping investigation, with roughly 30 receiving significant sentences.