Part 12b:
Crimes Gang Members Commit

Gangs and Homicide

In just ten years, the number of juvenile murderers has tripled - with many of these killers belonging to gangs that kill over drugs and turf. In Los Angeles County, it is estimated that more than 40% of all killings are attributed to gangs - more than double the percentage ten years ago. (OJJDP, 1997)

Field Note: A parole officer with a specialized caseload of dangerous felons said "Many of the murders in this city are gang-related and they're never cleared by the police because witnesses aren't willing to testify. Their reluctance is due to their fear that gang members might retaliate against them."

It is impossible to create an accurate record of all crimes committed by members of gangs. If nothing else, some gang-related crimes are not labeled as such or police didn't know the parties involved were gang members. Similarly, the press may not properly designate a criminal act as gang-related when, in fact, it was.

Field Note: The probation/parole officer told me of an incident which took place recently between two black gang members. "One owed money to a gang member in another gang. He refused to pay and was murdered by the lender. The dead gang member's associates beat the lender and left him on the steps of the police department assuming he would be arrested for killing the borrower. Instead, the police let him go. He was later found dead - murdered by the rival gang members - at least that's what my clients told me, and I believe them. The press only mentioned the deaths in the obituary section and attributed them to 'youth violence.' The gang activities of the two weren't mentioned."

We don't even know how many crimes non-gang members commit each year. But we do have estimates of certain criminal activities and the data on homicides are among the most accurate we possess. 

By far the most visible and frightening of gang crimes is murder.  Contrary to popular belief, most murders committed by gang members are not random shootings nor are they direct disputes over drugs or some other crime. While those types of gang homicides do occur, most are the product of old-fashioned fights over turf, status and revenge. Drive-by shootings and other confrontations of this kind typically involve small sets of gang members acting more or less on their own, not large groups representing an entire gang. But each attack creates a chain reaction of complicity, vengeance and commitment. (Wiley, 1997, page)

In 1996 the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) estimated that from 2,221 to 2,925 murders were committed in the United States by gang members (see Figure 17 below). (Bilchik, 1999, page)  The OJJDP estimated that the number of gang-related murders rose to 3,340 in 1997 or, on average, 9 murders every day of the year. (Bilchik, 1999, page)  While no precise figures are available, some of the victims of these homicides were innocent bystanders.

(Bilchik, 1999, page)

According to Howell, "Gang violence - particularly homicide - has increased, owing mainly to availability and use of more dangerous weapons, especially automatic and semi-automatic handguns." (Howell, 1998, see "Conclusion," p. 14).  In 1976, 66.7% of gang related homicides involved the use of a gun whereas by 1999 that figure had grown to 92.1%. (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2001), table, chart)

According to the 2004 National Youth Gang Survey,

A total of 173 cities with a population of 100,000 or more reported a gang problem and gang homicide data (i.e., the number of homicides involving a gang member) in 2004. in 2 cities, Los Angeles and Chicago, more than half of the combined nearly 1,000 homicides were considered to be gang related. In the remaining 171 cities, approximately one-fourth of all the homicides were considered to be gang related.

In addition, the number of gang homicides recorded in these cities in 2004 was 11 percent higher than the previous 8-year average. More than 80 percent of agencies with gang problems in both smaller cities (under 50,000) and rural counties recorded zero gang homicides. (Highlights of the 2004 National Youth Gang Survey, p. 2)

Field Note: A parole officer told me "It's not unusual to hear about non-gang youths being shot in their- and other neighborhoods because they happened to be wearing a color which offended a gang member.  Recently, a twenty year old non-gang member was killed because he walked outside wearing a red jacket - the only jacket he owned and he was on his way to the grocery store to buy some things his mother asked him to get."

Los Angeles is, perhaps, the one community most often identified by Americans and Europeans as having a serious gang presence. The number of gang-related homicides in that community is shown in the bar graph below. If the OJJDP numbers are accurate, 450 of the 3,340 gang-related homicides committed in 1997 were committed in Los Angeles. That's roughly 13.4% of all gang-related homicides in the United States that year. The population of the Greater Los Angeles area was about 3.4% of the population of the United States in 1997 yet its proportion of all gang related homicides in the nation that year was 13.4%.*

Los Angeles County-Wide Gang-Related Homicides, 1979-1998. (From Streetgangs.com, page, with permission)

While attending a regional conference on gangs I was told by a national law enforcement gang educator that "Murder for hire is another of the crimes some of these gangs commit."

Involvement in Other Crimes

According to the OJJDP, the 4,219 police and sheriff's (county) departments reporting in 1996 "... were asked to indicate the degree to which gang members were involved in the following offenses in their jurisdictions: aggravated assault, robbery, burglary, motor vehicle theft, and larceny/theft. These crimes were selected because they are commonly associated with gang activity."  (Bilchik, 1999, page) The findings may be found in Table 24, below.

(Bilchik, 1999, page)

What Table 24 is telling us is that, in the 4,219 counties reporting to the OJJDP in 1996, gang members were involved at "high," or "medium" levels in 72% of all aggravated assaults and 46% of all robberies. This is disturbing as both of these crimes are crimes against persons - they involve physically harming the victim, or threatening harm.

Common assault is often considered less harmful than aggravated assault, which is defined as "...an assault with a deadly weapon or with the intent to kill, rob, or rape. An attempt to cause serious bodily injury to another or causing such bodily injury knowingly or recklessly under circumstances manifesting extreme indifference to the value of human life." (Statsky, 1985, p. 37)

The tally for crimes against property are no less disturbing as gang members participated at "high" or "medium" levels in 72% of all burglaries, 62% of motor vehicle thefts, and 83% of all larcenies (theft).   

Many of the kinds of crimes committed by gang members are not included in Table 24. Among them is extortion, or what is referred to by some gangs as "paying rent" or "taxes." Rent or taxes are extorted from store owners so their windows won't be broken, merchandise stolen or destroyed, or employees and customers beaten. Taxes may also be paid for the unhindered use of a street corner for the purpose of selling illegal drugs or prostituting oneself.

Field Note: A gang unit supervisor said "Some of our local gang members steal bikes and they sometimes 'beat in' new gang members. That's Big Time gang bangin' in this town" (a city of about 150,000 inhabitants). And he is not being sarcastic about this. He believes "You can't really minimize any of their crimes. They have victims and it hurts the community. That makes what they do serious enough to deserve attention and some meaningful action."

A gang unit supervisor said "We find kids with $2000 to $3000 in cash in their pockets. They don't have a legitimate job but they'll say they were given it or found it or some other lame excuse. It's mostly from selling crack and PCP."

Field Note: I received a call late last night from a police commander I've known for years. He said "There are hundreds of thefts-from-cars happening in the city every month and it involves gangs." I decided to investigate this little bit of intelligence myself. From the police commander in charge of tracking crimes against property I learned "We have four or five groups of young, white males, maybe three to five in each group, who are breaking into cars all over town," he said. "We have about 200 thefts from cars a month, sometimes as high as 300 to 400 - especially during Christmas when people leave expensive gifts in their cars. They do about one thousand dollars worth of damage to the average car and steal stuff worth about that much." At 200 thefts a month, $2,000 per theft, that's nearly $5,000,000 a year in losses. I asked the commander if the gangs had names. "No, not that we know of," he said. "Each group works their own crimes, have their fences in and around town where they sell what they steal. It's all for clothes, cars, apartments, women, sound systems. All the goodies. They range in age from about 15 to 22 years old."

In England, there currently are conflicts between Sikh and Muslim youth. A British intelligence officer told me "One of the phrases used by Muslim youth getting ready to attack some Sikh youths is 'We're going to knock some turbans off!'" In a North London Muslim neighborhood I observed a gang of Sikh youth as they destroyed public property walking down the main business district at one o'clock in the morning.

The officer also said Sikh youths in London "are middle-class and use their parents' nice cars to do 'drive throughs.'" The British use that term in the same way Americans use "drive-bys." He told me "Sometimes there are shootings, other times the youths arrive en masse, jump out of their cars, and do considerable vandalism to private and public property. They use bats and hammers and bash everything in sight." That's what I saw them doing in North London.

Field Note: A British prison official told me about the act of "streaming." Streaming occurs when "Groups of gang youth hop on an underground carriage [subway car] and, timing their movement to when the carriage will make its next underground station stop, run through one carriage, into another, and so on all the while grabbing necklaces, watches, purses, computers, backpacks, suitcases and anything else of value. It is a very popular activity at several underground [subway] stations. But, it's no longer restricted to the underground. Gangs of youth are also committing this act on the streets of London on buses. "When it is properly organized, as many as thirty youth will be involved. Outside the car, all during that time, are several enforcers from the group who are there to make sure nothing goes wrong - like some citizen or undercover cop getting in the way and trying to be a hero. We do have streaming gangs." One year later, while riding a bus from the Las Vegas Strip to the downtown casinos, I watched in amazement as a man entered the front of the bus at one of our stops. He immediately ran toward the rear door grabbing everything of value in sight. He exited the rear of the bus before the driver could close the door and trap him inside. I asked the driver why he didn't close the door. "This happens all the time," he said. "Our policy is to let them go rather than trap them inside the bus."

The youth or street gangs of today are different in several ways from gangs in the past. Today's gang members are more involved in illegal drugs, commit more crimes, more violent crimes, and use more deadly weapons in the commission of those crimes.

Field Note: I suggested to a British intelligence agent that one of the more significant differences between the gang situation in the United States and England may be the presence of guns in the hands of gang members in the United States. [Guns are difficult to acquire in the United Kingdom.]  He said "More and more guns are finding their way into Britain. While the Sikhs and Muslims don't normally use guns in committing their acts of violence against one another, it is not uncommon for guns to be involved in Jamaican gang activity." He told me about the Vietnamese gangs in England. "They do 'choppings,' wherein the victim is attacked using meat cleavers. They are butchered, but not sufficiently enough to cause death. One common blow is to chop through the foot between the big toe and the next toe straight through to the ankle. The more butchering or chopping they do reflects the extent to which the victim initially disrespected the Vietnamese attacker."

In Closing

Gangs, due to their involvement in criminal activity, are a major threat to communities across the United States, as well as in other nations where they are found. While the precise extent of victimization caused by gang members is inestimable, it is clear that it is substantial in both monetary terms and in the pain and suffering they inflict upon their victims. 

Like the crimes they commit, gangs are ever changing. The fluidity of gangs is the next topic of consideration.

*The estimated population of Los Angeles County on July 1, 1998, was 9,9223,807.  The estimated population of the United States on July 1, 1998, was 270,248,000.  (U.S. Bureau of the Census)