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Raids net drugs, guns, 83 people

A daylong series of raids in Southwest and West Philadelphia yesterday culminated with police serving 70 warrants and arresting 83 people on drug charges.

A daylong series of raids in Southwest and West Philadelphia yesterday culminated with police serving 70 warrants and arresting 83 people on drug charges.

"We took a lot of bad people off the streets today," Narcotics Field Unit Capt. Debra Frazier said at a news conference at the 19th District's headquarters, 61st Street and Haverford Avenue.

She said that police and U.S. marshals confiscated $248,468 worth of drugs, $34,204 in cash, 13 firearms and three automobiles in the busts.

Among those arrested was John Thomas White, 73. Cops said he had 300 packs of crack cocaine and a handgun with an obliterated serial number inside a house on Regent Street near 54th in Southwest Philadelphia.

Also arrested was an Upper Darby man, Demond Bymun, who apparently rented the property to White. Frazier said Bymun had rented three other houses on that same block of Regent to drug dealers as well. Frazier said this was the third time this summer that cops executed daylong raids in different sections of the city, thanks to community tips. *