During the 5 years that Edward Hanserd operated within Detroit's nefarious drug world, he ranked amoung the upper echelon of inner city traffickers. The 5'6" Hanserd was known as Big Ed, a name he once claimed to have gotten from the mother of his arch enemy Richard "Maserati Rick," Carter.
From Small time crook to big time drug dealer
Edward Hanserd was born and raised in Detroit's urban area attending Osborn High for a time before dropping out and concentrating on a life of crime. During his early years, Hanserd was a small time marijuana dealer receiving most of his product from childhood associates Richard Carter and Demetrius Holloway. Carter and Holloway would go on to become legendary figures dominating the crack craze which struck Detroit during the late 80's. Big Ed Hanserd seeing the success of his childhood associates began making plans to cut himself in for a piece of the pie. By the mid '80s Ed Hanserd began making a name for himself selling marijuana while runnig the Unisex Salon near Chryseler's Jefferson Avenue plant. The small scale operation provided Hanserd with enough capitol to purchase two houses in the 13400 block of Sparling street which he used to finance the expansion of his own venture into the lucrative crack trade. Shortly there after Hanserd broke ranks with the powerful ring run by Carter and Holloway and became their prime competition.
Big Time
Big Ed and Maserati Rick Carter one of the founders of the drug organization known as best friends became embroiled in a bitter battle of which the cause is not known for certain. Sources close to both men ascertain that the dispute arose from Hanserd's expansion beyond the east side of Detroit into other communities and areas known to have been under the controll of best friends while others claim that the problem arose from a debt owed to Carter by Hanserd, whatever the cause of the initial dipute, it provided the spark which lit one of the most violent battles in Detroit's drug world during the '80s. Hanserd was known to be something of a hot head whose afinity for guns and violence made him a dangerous foe for Carter who used his vast fortune to assemble a squad of killers which would gain notoriety as one of the most efficient killing machines ever assemble on the east side. Headed by Rock'n Reggie Brown, the gang under the name of best friends is believed responsible for hundreds of murders in the inner city area of Detroit during the late '80s into the early '90s. Despite the seemingly long odds of fighting Carter, Holloway and the rest of best friends, Hanserd's business flourished to the point where by 1987 he was deemed a major trafficker after LAPD officers spotted him and several associates tooling around the Sunset strip in a Mercedes 500SE and a brand new Porsche.
When the officers moved in to investigate the young men, they found Hanserd in possession of several sets of identification and another new Ferrari in his apartments parking garage. No charges were brought fourth but the episode marked the arrival of Big Ed Hanserd as a mover and shaker on a national scale. Following his return to Detroit, Hanserd sold Unisex Salon to one of his employees in an effort to hide his holdings in the business. 6 monts later, Hanserd was attacked by Maserati Rick and an associate with automatic weapons. Though wounded in the stomach during the attack which left him battered, bruised and stitched for months, Hanserd refused to identify Carter as one of his attackers instead chosing to take care of the matter himself. Following the attack, Hanserds longtime girlfriend Stephanie Jacobs purchased a home in Yazoo City Mississppi on Woodlea Avenue. Hanserd soon followed arriving with an entourage of hoods driving Jeeps, a Corvette, Maserati and several vans. Ed explained the source of his income as coming from his hair salons back in Detroit. Many of his neighbors found this claim hard to believe considering the armed men who surrounded his home and jumped to fill his slightest request. Many of the men would stay in the home when Hanserd would disappear for weeks at a time on business trips.
Trouble
Edward Hanserd managed to avoid getting into big trouble in Yazoo City picking up only a few drunk driving arrests from time to time. Hanserd maintained that he was only coming down to Yazoo in an effort to relax. Inspite of his notoriety on a national level, Hanserd spent almost two years building his organization to the point where he was finally able to compete with Carter and best friends but he would soon find trouble early and often. In February of 1988, Louisiana state police stopped Hanserd driving a GM van and confiscated a gym bag containing 1 pair of jeans and $198,000 in cash. Ed protested "to no avail," the seizure of the cash stating that the money came from the sale of his hair salon. The following month, a Hanserd associate by the name of Nathaniel Wilson was threatened after he was arrested with 31 kilo's of Hanserd's product. 3 more arrests would follow, all weapon related charges during the summer of 1988. During one of the arrests Big Ed issued the threat of "I am going to get Maserati Rick, and then I am going to get you," to officer Rico Hardy. In another arrest he was overheard stating to officer Randy Homan, "Do you know who I am? I am the number 1 hit man and dope man in the city." Inspite of the threats and boasts, law enforcement officials were forced to watch as Hanserd raised bail and walked free after each arrest.
Hanserd's final entry into the police ledger during the summer of 1988 came when he was stopped in September driving his convertible red Maserati. During this stop more than $3,000 in cash and a beeper were confiscated. Days later, Hanserd made his move against Carter attacking the 29 year old drug lord outside of one of a car wash owned by Carter at West 7 mile road and Mansfield in the northwestern portion of the city. In a gun battle which left Carter hospitalized with a wound in his stomach and Hanserd wounded in the arm, neither man was arrested as each declined to identify the other as the aggressor in the incident. Two days later a man entered room 307 at Mt. Carmel Mercey Hospital and pumped several shots into the head and face of the Eastside crack king. Carter was pronounced dead at 6:01 p.m. Just hours after his death, Carter was announced as a pivitol witness in a drug case.
Hanserd was provided an alibi which protected him from the suspicion that he was responsible for the brazen murder when it was learned he had been picked up at the hospital for possession of a firearm resulting from the shooting which had originally hospitalized his deceased enemy. When questioned about Carter's murder Big Ed denied any knowledge of Maserati Rick's killing but did admit to once throwing a brick through the window of one of Carter's car washes. Hanserd drew unwarranted attention following the November 12 disappearance of Carter's best friend and drug partner Demetrious Holloway from a Hamburger stand. The disappearance of Holloway turned out to be a staged event aimed at throwing investigator's and enemies like Hanserd off for a time. Once again detained as a possible witness to the fake abduction, Hanserd anserwed "He's just gone," and "I heard, he's just in hiding."
More Trouble
Hanserd continued his quest to controll the cities crack trade and appeared to have achieved his goal when a man later identified as Lodrick Parker approached 32 year old Demetrius Holloway from behind as he shopped for a pair of socks in the Broadway store at 4 p.m on October 8, 1990. Parker the prime suspect in the murder of Hollway's partner Maserati Rick, had established himself as Hanserd's most intimidating enforcer. Witnesses reported seeing Parker and another man enter the parking area before calmly enterring the store where Holloway was shot. This murder cleared the way for Hanserd to saturate Detroit with his brand of crack known as Tutti-Frutti, which he secured from major california crack dealers such as the notorious Freeway Ricky Ross. Hanserd was conveniently tucked away in jail on gun charges at time of Holloway's murder. Hanserd had continued his unlucky streak of run in's with law enforcement resuling in the confiscation of a 52 lb bundle of cash locked in a blue samsonite suite case which Hanserd claimed contained his underwear. Officer's who had stopped Big Ed in January of 1990 driving a two day old Bronco, later found that the cash totalled $369,000 seperated into $5,000 increments.
Hanserd did not protest the seizure of the cash as the proceeds of illicit activity. One month after the seizure of the almost half million dollars Hanserd settled his gun charges accepting a probationary sentence and a fine. Several weeks later, the star crossed Hanserd was arrested once more after Detroit police officer's chased Big Ed's white BMW after a home near Outer Drive and Gunston was ventilated with automatic weapon fire. The pursuit which wound through the street's of the East side ended when the BMW crashed into 3 cars. Upon reaching the accident scene, officer's found a semi-concious Hanserd laying just outside the open driver's door and inside the vehicle they found an Israeli made assault rifle and a MAC-10. Investigator's later determined that the shot's were fired from Hanserd's assault rifle. This was quicly followed by yet another arrest after officer's witnessed Hanserd threaten a man with "I will put a hundred holes in your ass." A search of Hanserd's car which was parked near the incident which occurred on the corner if Linwood and Richton turned up a korean made 5.56 mm semiautomatic assault rifle fitted with a 30 round clip. During his life of crime Hanserd had been wounded no fewer than 9 times in three seperate shootings.
Does crime pay?
Inspite of the frequent arrests, seizures and shootings, Big Ed still managed to turn his dream of running a big time operation into a reality. Investigator's figure that Hanserd's operation at it's peak transported an average of 250 keys of cocaine and another 20 keys of heroin from his suppliers in Los Angeles to through the territory he carved out on the east side and down into Mississppi where he took refuge from the battle's which raged in Detroit. "Note: a key is street slang for a kilogram of the drug mentioned which ways 2.2 lbs." The net worth of the Hanserd organization was placed at a conservative $54,000,000 dollars annually. This allowed the then 25 year old high school drop out to drive around in a fleet of exotic cars, live in plush upscale housing while sending jewlery and $200,000 cash to his elderly grandmother in Mississppi. Hanserd was ultimately taking down when Anthony Medina one of Hanserd's California menion's turned and began providing info against big Ed while attempting to keep his end of the operation going. What was sure to be another bloody chapter in the story of Ed Hanserd was averted when he received a 3 1/2 to 5 year term for his last gun arrests. Hanserd was put away for good when on May 9, 1991 he was sentenced to serve a 40 year sentence for drug trafficking and federal gun charges. At the time of his sentencing the 28 year old Hanserd lived up to expectations going on one of his famous tirades in which he attacked everyone from the witnesses against him to the judge to the D.A and his own attorney.
