Month: March 2017 (Page 3 of 7)

What struck me most in this reading is the way in which gangs have evolved to adapt in the 21^st century. The stereotypical drugs and guns we associate with street gangs are often inadequate to describe the modern gang which more and more often is getting their hands on prostitution, credit card fraud, and other lucrative, but highly specialized crimes. By engaging in illegal activity which require more complex examination and are not immediately threatening (such as guns and ‘turf’ wars), gangs are becoming more sophisticated and better able to evade the police.

Still, the question as to how we may combat further gang activity is a very real problem that needs to be addressed. On the one hand we have the argument presented by Lawrence Rosenthal who believes that preventative measures, such as greater police presence, injunctions, and other aggressive tactics are at the heart of curbing gang activity. However, it is clear from other chapters and from my observations that such practices only serve to fuel additional tensions between police and the community. Members of the community will be more likely to embrace the assessment of police as enemies trying to throw them in jail rather than as law enforcement officers trying to maintain peace and safety for all.

What’s more is that Rosenthal’s position fails to consider the socioeconomic and psychological underpinnings that lead individuals to congregate in gangs in the first place. Often the driving force in gang involvement simply has to do with the sense of identity a gang provides, especially for our youth and for those that have been beaten down by our discriminatory system after attempting to achieve success through a legal means. And so, instead of attacking them in such a fashion, and very likely impinging upon their constitutional rights in the process (as is suggested by Sanderson), it’s a good idea to look towards education, working with the youth in impoverished areas early on and giving them alternative means to express themselves as a long term solution to an ongoing problem.

For much of history, gangs have formed of those individuals who are cast out of higher groups or cannot attain higher status, who form a pack and work their way to secure resources or success in whatever form, be it territorial, financial, or otherwise, often by violent, and usually by illegal means. For almost as long as there have been gangs, law enforcement have tried to eliminate them, and usually fail.

As the technology age dawned and the world adapted to it, so have gangs. The internet allows for more efficient recruiting and more covert communication, very much like terrorist organizations, namely ISIS, have. Law enforcement also has adapted to fight online crime, but gangs seem to always be one step ahead, becoming resistant to developed techniques to stop them. With something as vast, complex, and opportunity-presenting as the internet, it only takes a few steps to start an anonymous life in a community, and, depending on how good at it you are, make yourself incredibly difficult to track. In fact, that’s most of what something called the Deep Web or Dark Web is all about.

The answer to obliterating gangs must come from the root. People vulnerable to recruitment into these communities are often from underprivileged areas, low on the socioeconomic hierarchy, with limited access to needed resources to improve their quality of life, and often an insufficient education to boot. Gang formation is a troubling, often dangerous symptom of much larger issues in a society, issues that have persisted for thousands of years and probably to some degree will continue to persist. However, treating those issues and alleviating some of the burden on lower socioeconomic tiers may make a gang dilemma less acute.

Throughout the reading I noticed one pattern which is gangs are developed due to specific ethnic or racial groups seeking survival. For example many immigrant gangs that were developed like the Mexican gangs were created in order to secure a neighborhood as there own, therefore protecting them from outside forces. Other racial gangs like those created by black people were used to provide them with financial security as many ended up living on welfare, and in project buildings due to not getting enough or low wage jobs, and being blocked from buying homes when moving up north from the Jim Crow south. Even prison gangs were made as prisoners were looking for protection to survive prison.  I feel that the chapter did not go into detail about why different racial, mainly street gang members, felt that being apart of a gang was necessary. For example; many gangs organized by black people were created to combat the poverty that was inflicted on them due discriminatory laws and practices. So many felt that they had to involve themselves in acts such as narcotics, weapons, and more recently human trafficking as a way of providing for their families, and maybe even getting themselves out of the projects. Although the chapter did mention that many gangs like immigrants were constructed to congregate against assimilated ethnic groups, they also did not mention that gangs like the CRIPS were established to fight police brutality, and to protect the neighborhood from unfair treatment by law enforcement. Although the ulterior motive of gangs was a sense of financial and security protection from outsiders, there overall production lead to heinous crimes that have hurt innocent bystanders, even the people within the gangs.

Although law enforcement, and the federal government have been cracking down on gang activity, I am skeptical of their actions because many of the attempts to catch gang activity have been aimed towards stopping street level gangs, which in many cases end up being minority who live in impoverished neighborhoods. I am questioning if it is easier to find street level gang activity because it is more out in the open, or because of the stigmas that are carried by minorities that live in low income areas, law enforcement feels more justified to crack down on them? I also wonder for the more organized gangs like biker or mobs, who are mainly white, does their whiteness play a role in them not being arrested for gang activity, or their activities and business tactics protect them from being caught by investigators?  Even though they implemented using injunctions on potential suspects to protect them from being profiled as gang members, I wonder if they will instill those same rule on all gang organizations. One activity that was developed to combat gang involvement is using ex cons and gang members to talk to young men about the consequences of joining gangs. Even though some are skeptical that the program may be secretly promoting gang activity, I feel that people listen to those that they can relate to not those who they feel threatened by like officers. An issue with gangs that is troubling me is the new tactic of human trafficking to generate money. I find it to be disturbing that they would utilize mainly teenage and adult women to make their profit especially because those women can be their mother, sister, daughter, and friend. I do wonder if the thousands of black and Latino women missing in the US has a connection to gang activity? Also, I want to know what is being done to detect it, and protect women from being kidnapped and sold into it? Overall I found the chapter on gangs to be quite insightful, even though I am questioning what is being done to stop all gang activity.

Gangs are becoming more sophisticated and law enforcement has to keep up. Gangs are using social media to recruit people. I wonder how they use social media and if the gangs are worried about a trail left behind because nothing is a secret on the internet. And I wonder what is posted on their sites? Many gangs have turned to human trafficking and law enforcement officials overlook gangs’ involvement in human trafficking more now. Human trafficking affects 20+ million people and it’s an organized business that needs more law enforcement attention.

I believe educating youths, offering job training programs and extracurricular activities can help reduce the likelihood of gang members that are vulnerable to becoming recruited. Others may not agree, but letting youths know there are other options than becoming a gang member can be beneficial. And the youths can’t just be told about the offers, they need guidance along the way because there will be gangs pressuring them to join.

The CQ chapter states that some gang crimes are not reported enough because they keep a low profile. For example, Asian gangs aren’t territorial and they victimize their community members. What is unfortunate is the fact that the members of the community don’t report the crimes because of fear (I would be afraid, too), but also language barriers. The members of the community shouldn’t feel that language barriers are in the way of justice. Law enforcement should have more translators if there aren’t enough, and law enforcement should educate communities that speaking another language is not an issue if they need help.

Injunctions sounds like it can work, but gang members will also be more careful about meeting in public and can avoid injunctions. But injunctions also rely on profiling as the CQ chapter says police and prosecutors make their own list of what gang members look like. I understand what Morreale says, that “the more gangs get hassled for the little things, the less time they have for the big things,” but it’s also not okay for people to be at family party or walking home late and be in violation.

Gang is a very unfamiliar term for me. I did learn about various types of gangs in New York when I was in elementary but that was about it. Living in peaceful neighborhood, people often forget about people in those rough neighborhoods. My last impression of gangs remains in violence outbreaks and distinctive clothing. However, Christina Hoag gave us the most recent update on how gangs work now. The fist gang ever appeared in 16th century, England. In the United States, gangs first appeared after the Revolutionary War to gain territory. After the mass immigration waves, immigrants began to form their own gangs for protection. The most famous one was the Latinos gang. Their connection with other Latino gangs provided more issues here.

As time has passed on, gang become more sophisticated. They no longer relied on drug and illegal weapon dealings, they move their businesses to more lucrative trades. For example, more and more gangs are set their hands in prostitution, human trafficking, online fraud etc. According to National Gang Intelligence Center, there is a 40 percent increase in gang membership since 2009. They find that, “Gangs are responsible for an average of 48 percent of violent crime in most jurisdictions and up to 90 percent in several others.” (434) Most violence incidents have connections to gang rivals. This directly cause to have more victims on the science because there will be more firearms and more use of synthetic drug. Teens are often the victims between the gang violence. They seek identity and protection which sometimes their homes cannot offer. Gangs become their second home. This is the case for both boys and girls. Experts has seen a rising number in female participation in gang activities. It is unknown why there is more female participation, but police often overlook the fact that women can commit violence acts as well. Additional to more female involvement, internet also become a strong weapon for the gangs. Because of the exponential growth of the social media, gangs start to use social media to recruit new members and wage wars against their rival gangs. Teens use internet a lot so it is easy to influence them over the internet. Rap and hip-hop music glorify the lifestyle of gangsters which can strike a false impression.

In order to prevent the growth of gangs, it is important to start with the youth population. They are often lure by the cool outlook of the gang. I find the Youth PROMISE Act is a good way to start because it teaches kids about the gangs and help rival gangs to negotiate when there is an issue. It is necessary to prevent kids from entering gangs because gangs are fueled by youth to commit crimes. At the same time, these youths can achieve higher education so they can bring their own family to a better neighborhood. It will also save taxpayer money from sending more people to the prison.

This weeks reading from Urban Issues shed light on a prevalent issue of gangs and gang violence plaguing NYC. The term ‘gang’ has a pejorative connotation and is associated with violence and criminal activity. The gangs of today are different than the gangs of yesteryear in that the latter formed for protection and fought over “turf” while the latter primarily fights over drugs and the like. This negative view of gangs underlies many of the initiatives that states have recently taken to combat gangs and gang crimes.

There have been a few general strategies in the fight against gangs such as counterinsurgency, prevention of gang formation, and youth engaging activities etc. Law professor, Lawrence Rosenthal advocates for preventative measures in the war against gangs and calls for counterinsurgency and gang injunctions which places restrictions and makes it more difficult for gang members to congregate. This concept of injunctions is a more aggressive and preemptive approach to criminal activity and is similar in approach to last weeks reading regarding racial profiling and the stop and frisk method.  While these approaches can be said to be on the safer side, averting problems before than can arise, opponents argue that this is an abridgment of civil liberties as explained by Caitlin Sanderson, an attorney at ACLU. She argues that our justice system is biased and suspectful of certain races, a separate issue on its own and injunctions not only hurt these youths’ futures long term but could also possibly worsen gang activity by initiating increased internet and technological uses.

While I do believe  that there is a strong basis in preventative measures such as gang injunctions and believe that we shouldn’t wait to fix something only after a problem arises, reading this weeks chapter opened my eyes to the harmful affects of it as well. Sanderson’s proposition of after school programs and early intervention provides for a more welcoming route of preventative policing and can be effective as well. Overall, I think that a combination of Rosenthal’s and Sanderson’s suggestions, with a few tweaks here and there on both sides, can effectively reduce gang activity and crime.

The main takeaway I got from reading Chapter 7 of the CQ Reader was the fact that, not only are gangs still prevalent, but they are becoming more of a problem; and that they are spreading with regard to what they do. Usually a gang is thought of in the most simplest of terms and in the way they have been portrayed in movies and the like for years: a group of guys who hang out together and fight ‘turf wars’  with other gangs. However, that is far from what gangs are or have become. This chapter informs you that there are now many woman who not only join gangs, but are leaders of gangs, and that what gangs do with their time has changed drastically as well. While another label people might have been used to associating with gangs was the fact that they weren’t the brightest, gangs today are stepping up their game; they are hacking, scamming banks, running well organized prostitution rings, etc.

The fact that the advancement of technology has been something gangs have used to become more spread out and effective is the least bit surprising at all. The internet has become a place where, anybody who wants to spread a certain ideal, recruit people to their ’cause’, or incite/rile up people, can accomplish their task extremely easily by using Facebook or Youtube or any other platform. Gangs aren’t the only groups to realize how the internet can help them and utilize it; terrorist groups around the world have taken to the worldwide web to do recruiting and incite attacks also. That is something that, in my opinion, can’t be so hard to track. Meaning, with all the intelligence and technology this country has, we should be able to find the posts or accounts of gangs/ gang members and just stop them from posting. It’s something that should be done with terrorists groups as well but hasn’t and the same thing applies to gangs.

With regard to the injunctions, it’s hard to believe that is the best way experts have come up with on how to stop gangs. This country is, as Judge Cohen said a couple weeks ago, a place that believes in and prides itself on second chances. So if someone was in a gang and decided that it was wrong and that they wanted to turn their life around for the better, why would we ever put obstacles in his or her path and keep that person on a list that associates them with gangs? While the idea behind these injunctions might be correct and might actually work, the implementation and way it’s carried out has to be changed.

This chapter of the CQ Reader presents at the forefront the debate among scholars and policy experts over the merits of gang injunctions. Injunctions are essentially restraining orders that can include restrictions on movement, congregation, or action taken by members of specific gangs, and violation of an injunction is equal to a contempt of court citation. The debate over the use of injunctions to constrain gang activity comes at a time when many cities within the United States already are making use of the tactic; however, though they have been found constitutional and have shown slight success in certain communities, there is outcry by critics who see the practice as an abridgment of constitutionally granted civil liberties.

The arguments of two main individuals are presented in this chapter. Lawrence Rosenthal, a California law professor, is on the side of advocates for the issuing of gang injunctions. Believing that injunctions banning gangs from congregating are effective, Rosenthal’s article argues that this method of aggressive policing has potential to be as effective as aggressive policies like stop-and-frisk. Conceding that it is possible that civil liberties could be compromised by “unduly broad” injunctions, Rosenthal seems unperturbed and concludes that it is better to err on the side of law enforcement than to risk “continued instability.” Though I disagree generally with Rosenthal’s position, and wonder how he would react now in the wake of new rulings on aggressive police strategies like his cited example of stop-and-frisk, I think that his idea of community involvement with the policing process in the case of gangs is interesting. From previous chapters in the Reader, I know that a major problem faced by law enforcement is distrust and disdain for them in the communities where they work. Though often this is a hate more deeply rooted than simple dislike for police, I think that an approach more similar to the one put forward by Rosenthal could be beneficial not just in approaching gang violence, but in policing in general.

The other argument posed in this chapter was from Caitlin Sanderson, an attorney with the ACLU of Southern California. She contends that injunctions are not only ineffective, but are also a violation of civil liberties (despite the prior rulings affirming their constitutionality). Claiming that these injunctions fuel a prison pipeline and violate adequate due process by law enforcement, Sanderson makes the case contrary to Rosenthal that these policies do not have substantial impact on the violence committed by gangs, instead serving to incriminate minority youths and further deteriorate the relations between communities and police. After reading this chapter, I tend to agree more with Sanderson’s general argument. Personally, I feel that the greatest asset of the country’s criminal justice system is the idea of due process, of needing to be found in violation of a statute by a jury of peers before punishment can be doled out. In the case of injunctions, however, law enforcement officials, though not necessarily guided by malicious intent, tend to cast wide nets in their enforcement of anti-gang policies. These nets can catch individuals who are blatantly not involved, who were involved in the past and have since distanced themselves, and who are currently involved in gang activities. Each is a recipient of equal distinction and lifetime punishment in the eyes of the law. This, to me, seems wrong. After all, do not our justice system take into account a degree of forgiveness for those past accused, even convicted of crimes (think: sealing the records of juveniles). Additionally, why should resources be devoted to a policy that does not dissuade gang activities, but rather just repositions their conduct from out on the streets to indoors? A better approach, one that I hope the country is gravitating more towards such as Senators Cory Booker and Rand Paul’s Redeem Act, would be to promote the well being of communities where poverty, lackluster education, and violence are in surplus. In targeting the root causes of gang formation, there doubtless would be greater long-term success in curbing gang activities than the short-term success won by liberty infringing injunctions.

While reading “Fighting Gangs” in Urban Issues: Selections from CQ Researcher Eighth Edition it occurred to me that no tactic employed by the courts or law enforcement has effectively reduced gangs and gang related crimes long term. Any good tactic reduced gang related violence for a short term, but, as the chapter points out, although gang violence has decreased, gang related crimes are still on the rise, evolved and adapted for the 21st century. Perhaps the real way to eliminate gang crime would be to look at the cause of gang membership, and prevent gangs from growing.

Information from the chapter has indicated that the bulk of gang members are older adolescents and young adults. Additionally, it would seem that the motivating factors to join a gang all basically stem from a lack of good social and economic standing and no where else to turn to. When different ethnicities created gangs, it was in response to an environment they found to be against them. Organizing into a gang gives a group the ability to draw territory boundaries, and enforce their will in their neighborhood. Rather than be the victims of society, these people are rising up in their own way.

Like law enforcement issues, it would seem the best way to prevent the expansion of crime is to provide neighborhoods with a properly functioning education system, and affordable living. How to do that is out of my depth, but it is clear that as more youth feel rejected and oppressed by their environment, more youth will take matters into their own hands. And not in a way that benefits the society they hate.