Leader Of Brooklyn 'Folk Nation' Gang Behind Flatbush Shooting: Feds

BROOKLYN, NY — A leader of a major Brooklyn gang who fired 11 shots into a crowd in Flatbush earlier this year has been arrested, according to prosecutors.

Kwyme Waddell, 30, was brought in Tuesday on weapons charges for the March 22 shooting, where prosecutors say he opened fire from a scooter into a crowd of supposed gang rivals near East 21st Street between Ditmas Avenue and Dorchester Road, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.

"[Waddell] brazenly fired eleven shots into a crowd of people," said United States Attorney Breon Peace. "Thankfully no one was harmed."

Waddell is known as a leader of a violent subsect of the Folk Nation Gangster Disciples known as No Love City (NLC), whose members were behind several shootings in the early days of the pandemic, prosecutors said.

His arrest comes nearly a year after the last Folk Nation bust, which saw 11 of its members charged in seven separate shootings.

This time, investigators caught Waddell on security footage leaving a Newkirk Avenue apartment building, riding a scooter several blocks to the crime scene and returning to the building after the shooting, according to court records.

The gang leader was even caught on video celebrating when he returned to the building's lobby, pantomiming guns with his hands and bragging to his friends, prosectors said.

Waddell is charged with being a felon in possession of ammunition in connection with the shooting, prosecutors said.

The March shooting came only a few months after Waddell was released in October 2021 from prison, where he was serving an eight-year sentence for his role in various gang shootings from 2014 and 2015, records show.