2 more dead in `Yardie' drug war

TWO MEN were shot dead and a third seriously wounded in what police say is continuing drug gang warfare in London.

Detectives are investigating links between the two separate incidents and a third shooting earlier this week when a couple were shot dead in front of their seven-year-old daughter. The killings are believed to be linked to "crack" cocaine dealers and alleged Jamaican "Yardie" gangsters.

In the latest incident, two black men in their late 20s were shot several times in a car in Acton, west London, at about 3am. One shot man managed to drive to hospital but later died. The badly wounded man had surgery yesterday and is being guarded by police.

Eight hours earlier a 23- year-old man was shot in the chest in a flat in Harlesden. He died in hospital yesterday. Four black men where seen in the area at the time of the shooting.

The killings are believed to be the result of feuds over drugs and territorial control. For more than a year, a team of detectives based in Lambeth, south London, has been compiling intelligence on Jamaican- born criminals. The Operation Trident squad includes several officers with Jamaican family backgrounds to help to breakpreviously impenetrable criminal circles. Detectives have drawn up a database of 200 Jamaican- born criminals linked to gun crime in Britain.

Earlier this month seven people were wounded during a shoot-out in a crowded nightclub in north-east London. In March, Jamaican-born Mervyn Sills, 36, was shot dead in front of 50 passers-by at 2.15pm on a busy street in Brixton, south London.