United States Drug Enforcement Administration

BOSTON – A member of the violent Boston-based gang, H-Block, was sentenced in federal court in Boston for drug conspiracy charges.

Dominique Carpenter-Grady, a/k/a “8 Zipp,” a/k/a “Eight,” “a/k/a “Eighty,” 36, was sentenced by U.S. District Court Judge Indira Talwani to 12 months and one day in prison, to be followed by three years of supervised release. In February 2026, Carpenter-Grady pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute and to possess with intent to distribute PCP, synthetic cannabinoids (K2). 

Carpenter-Grady was one of 10 H-Block gang members and associates charged in August 2024 following a multi-year investigation of H-Block in response to an uptick in gang-related drug trafficking, shootings and violence. Over 500 grams of cocaine, cocaine base (crack cocaine) and fentanyl, as well as over 20,000 doses of drug-laced paper were seized during the investigation.

Originally formed in the 1980s as the Humboldt Raiders in the Roxbury section of Boston, the gang re-emerged in the 2000s as H-Block. Current members of H-Block have a history of violent confrontation with law enforcement, including an incident in 2015 when a member shot a Boston Police officer at point blank range without warning or provocation. 

Carpenter-Grady was a long-time H-Block gang member and one of three members and associates of H Block charged with a conspiracy to smuggle illegal drugs into a Massachusetts prison. Carpenter-Grady facilitated intercepted calls coordinating the smuggling of drugs on saturated papers into the prison where alleged co-conspirators were incarcerated. Several sheets of paper containing PCP (Phenylcyclidine) and illegal K2 were seized over the course of the investigation. It is estimated that a single sheet of such paper would be worth as much as $80,000 inside the prison. 

According to court documents, the Massachusetts Department of Correction has seen a significant increase in the smuggling of synthetic cannabinoids, a/k/a “K2,” and other dangerous substances into the prison system. A common method of introducing the drugs is by exploiting the Department of Correction’s inmate mail policies, which prohibit delivery to inmates of original copies of any materials contained in incoming mail except for legal mail, original copies of which are inspected and delivered via the U.S. postal system. Sheets of paper are saturated or sprayed with liquid narcotics, dried, printed with fake legal correspondence and then mailed to inmates in an envelope marked as legal mail, in an effort to deliver the drug-laced paper undetected. 

Carpenter-Grady is the seventh defendant to be sentenced in the case. 

United States Attorney Leah B. Foley; Jarod A. Forget, Special Agent in Charge of the Drug Enforcement Administration, New England Field Division; Mark Comorosky, Special Agent in Charge of the U.S. Secret Service, Boston Field Office; Ted E. Docks, Special Agent in Charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Boston Division; Boston Police Commissioner Michael Cox; and Russell W. Cunningham Special Agent in Charge of the Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General Mid-Atlantic Region made the announcement. The investigation was supported by the Massachusetts State Police; Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office; Massachusetts Department of Corrections; and the Braintree, Quincy, Randolph and Watertown Police Departments. Assistant United States Attorney John T. Dawley of the Organized Crime & Gang Unit and Jeremy Franker of the Justice Department’s Violent Crime & Racketeering Section are prosecuting the cases.

This case is part of the Homeland Security Task Force (HSTF) initiative established by Executive Order 14159, Protecting the American People Against Invasion. The HSTF is a whole-of-government partnership dedicated to eliminating criminal cartels, foreign gangs, transnational criminal organizations, and human smuggling and trafficking rings operating in the United States and abroad. Through historic interagency collaboration, the HSTF directs the full might of United States law enforcement towards identifying, investigating, and prosecuting the full spectrum of crimes committed by these organizations, which have long fueled violence and instability within our borders. In performing this work, the HSTF places special emphasis on investigating and prosecuting those engaged in child trafficking or other crimes involving children. The HSTF further utilizes all available tools to prosecute and remove the most violent criminal aliens from the United States. HSTF Boston is comprised of agents and officers from HSI, FBI, DEA, ATF, USMS, IRS-CI, USPIS, DOL-OIG and DSS, as well as several state and local law enforcement agencies, with the prosecution being led by the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Massachusetts.

The details contained in the charging documents are allegations. The remaining defendants are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.