Gangs and Violent Crimes [Reader Post]

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Opine – % of Violent Crimes attributed to Gangs?

As we await the recommendations of the President’s Task Force to address gun violence or whatever it is called, one significant party was not invited to the party – GANGS!

The other day as this reaction to the terrible massacre in Newtown developed; I was befuddled by the conflicting statistics being flouted on the net. So, I decided to do some quick research.

And I mean quick. I think I got the result below in about 15 minutes. I guess that is what they don’t pay me the big bucks for – not enough noise and posturing when I give my results.

Go to the link above and you will find a lot of information on gangs in the USA. Folks, we got a big problem that somehow our leaders in DC choose to ignore.

Let me quote just a couple of paragraphs from the FBI report:

Gangs are responsible for an average of 48 percent of violent crime in most jurisdictions and up to 90 percent in several others, according to NGiC analysis. major cities and suburban areas experience the most gang-related violence. 

…Gangs encourage members, associates, and relatives to obtain law enforcement, judiciary, or legal employment in order to gather information on rival gangs and law enforcement operations.

Gang infiltration of the military continues to pose a significant criminal threat, as members of at least 53 gangs have been identified on both domestic and international military installations.

Crossposted from ThinkOpine

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This isn’t news IW, I was a very busy criminal street gang investigator in the 90’s. In the course of my work, I found tentacles reaching from the Chicago, New York and Los Angeles all the way to Miami Florida; from South America up into the US. All kinds and catagories of criminality; guns, dope whores and theft, especially mixed with violence and threats of violence. With the terror attacks of 2001, many of those investigations were tossed in the back seat as the investigators were re-assigned to other, terrorist related investigations, and never went back. Gangs have become the mafia of this generation, far more violent and ruthless, with no honor (at least the old mafia had that). And any gun bans or ammo bans that get shoved upon honest citizens will only enrich an already target rich environment in the view of the gangs, who will feel empowered by the lack of resistance they will face.

About 12% of homicides in the UA are gang related. They may be among the most difficult to reduce. And of course like the old mafia they mostly target other gangs. http://www.nationalgangcenter.gov/Survey-Analysis/Measuring-the-Extent-of-Gang-Problems
twice as many veterans about 4000 kill themselves each year with guns than the number of gang related homicides.

@john: I am in no way going to minimize the problem of suicides by our veterans, but you’re talking apples and potatoes. If you have a valid solution to the suicide problem, by all means write it up on another post. Gangs are the discussion here today, and the solutions to that problem are extremely difficult and will require much more than changes in existing law.

When CA strictly adhered to its 3 strikes law (25 years – to – life) gangs were forced to recruit younger and younger new boys.
There was a belief that a ”child” could ”get away with murder,” if he killed a rival gang member or a potential witness or troublemaker to them ”doing their bidness on the streets.”
But CA often charged these ”children” as adults.
The other big game gangs play to get people killed is emotional blackmail.
A youngster is ”saved” from some bad situation that may have been engineered by his savior.
Then he is beholden to that gang for a deed down the road.
Often that deed was killing someone.
These young gang members who are not too bright might think they wanted to join a gang.
But get them talking and pretty soon they are in tears about how easily they were played into being bag men and killers for their bosses…..who often sit in prisons serving life.

@Nan G: #4,
Here’s one answer to this problem I would strongly recommend:

• If you commit a crime, any crime, using a gun, any gun, and you are found guilty, you get an automatic minimum 10 years on the first offence regardless of your age.
• If you re-offend with a gun, you get an automatic minimum 20 years.

What crime? . . . . Doesn’t matter. If you use a gun to steal a pack of cigarettes = 10 years. No ‘twinkie’ defences and we don’t care if you were drop-kicked by your doctor at birth – 10 years.

@Nan G: Three strikes worked. Sadly the liberal wachos are trying their best to minimize its success.

@James Raider: That law is called “use of a firearm in the commission of a felony”, in some states the mere possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony is a separate chargeable offense. Part of the problem is the prosecutors often drop the gun charge while making a deal on the other crimes.

Oakland’s Police Chief stated this week that 90% of the murders in Oakland are the work of two gangs. Apparently a member of one killing a woman connected to a member of the other last summer set off a war. At the very least, 2012 was a record year for homicides in Oakland, and the gang-bangers are doing a bang-up job of getting 2013 off to a competitive start.

So … Mayor Jean Quan declares a state of emergency, then jets off to DC to take part in the inaugural hoo-hah so she can feel relevant again, over-the-hill 60s radical (self-styled) that she is. The City Council has just debated hiring a consultant who favors stop-and-frisk, which people packed the chambers to denounce as “racial profiling.” Most of the faces of the people holding their pre-printed signs to this effect were, on the television news, white.

The sad things is that the thug wannabes are terrible shots. They spray bullets, with the result that many of their victims are innocent bystanders. Children, often. So, we’re not even getting the benefit of their eliminating each other … [angle bracket mock stereotyped Italian-American accent] It’s an unfortannate ting [angle bracket slash mock stereotyped Italian-American accent].

90%.

@Beth just south of Berkeley and just east of San Francisco:
You comment made me wonder how long criminals would take to prove liberals wrong about more gun restriction laws.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Senate and Assembly rammed a bunch of new gun restrictions through just the other day.
Today, this:
Uncle and his niece shot dead execution style inside of parked car in Bronx

Gee, I wonder if these idiots on the Left think that criminals just don’t know all the laws yet?
Does it EVER occur to them that criminals simply IGNORE our laws?
Gov. Cuomo scoffed at the idea that restricting magazine sizes won’t make the public any safer.
LOL

@Scott in Oklahoma: #7,

” . . . .prosecutors often drop the gun charge while making a deal on the other crimes.”

Exactly. It is never implemented that’s why I wrote:
“. . . . you get an automatic minimum 10 years on the first offence regardless of your age.”
You make a hard law and then you enforce it.

Laws which apply to every crime from thugs on the street to thugs on Wall Street, should be enforced. They are NOT being enforced anywhere it seems. Look at the bankers. Has Holder done a single effective thing about the those thieves? Not much, etc., etc.,. . . .

@James Raider: You really aren’t expecting anything from Holder are ya? He, above all, should be locked up for a long list of crimes.

As a detective, I used to “stack” as many offenses as I could, knowing most would get dropped, hoping for the longest possible sentences. I actually got thrown out of the prosecutor’s office after a very heated arguement about charges NOT getting prosecuted. It was a good thing my chief was on my side 🙂

@Nan G:

Nan, preventing crime has nothing to do with it. It’s about disarming and controlling the populace.

@James Raider:

Holder has turned many criminals loose and seems to be a major supplier of firearms to gangs. When someone mentions Fast and Furious, Mexican drug cartels come to mind but I seem to recall that similar operations were going on elsewhere. Miami and Chicago were mentioned, I think. Its hard to keep up on the scandals of this misadministration.

Holder should be in prison himself rather than being the chief law enforcement officer of the nation.

they want to protect the criminals, telling of having only 5 bullets,
tell the criminals to come with another as a team,
we already heard of 2 of them came to steal the guns and could not do it in an empty house,
but stole every other valuables beside,
they will improve as OBAMA bring it on, he tell them all.

#5 James Raider

Here’s one answer to this problem I would strongly recommend:

Okay, stop there. I’m sure your recommendation would be a good one, if two ideas were true:

1. The Powers That Be consider this “a problem”.
2. The Powers That Be want to answer this “problem”.

I keep seeing folks posting ideas on what should be done to repair things in this nation and society.

The ideas that are proposed are made, apparantly, without the realization that the Democrats (and the Republicans who pretty much all roll over like a good doggy now) are not of a mind to REPAIR anything.

It’s like you’re walking up to a group of thugs actually intentionally sabotaging the engine of your car. Quite obviously, at that, they have drills, they’re ripping wires out and tossing them, and you say to them “No, fellas! How you fix it is by doing THIS!”

And they all pause, and very slowly turn toward you, smirking and starting to laugh a little… you can imagine the rest of the scenario.

GAH! I’m sure your, and anyone else’s, ideas to fix things would work. T.P.T.B. don’t want that.

JDR-Taq
hi,
you come into my site just when I finish to hear a new advance in the brain research , this target the warriors afflicted with ptsd,and had been given medications on the doctor questionable assurance that it was the right one prescription,
but now it seems that that scam is giving precise clue as to what medication is needed,
IT gave me a thought that that scam should definitely be done on the WHITE HOUSE PRESIDENT AND OTHER HE GIVE POWER TO DECISIONS FOR THE PEOPLE, which are not the good one as we see the decline of AMERICA IN JOBS AND SPIRITS TO INNOVATE AS THEY WHERE DOING BEFORE HIS ADMINISTRATION WAS VOTED IN.
IF HE WAS IN DRUGS AT HIS TEEN AGE, IT DID ALTER HIS JUDGEMENT AND OTHER GET A PASS
BECAUSE THEY ARE NOT IN LEADERSHIP, BUT IT’S DEFINITLY DESTRUCTIVE FOR THE CITIZENS
IF YOU HAVE A PRESIDENT WITHOUT HIS FULL BRAIN CAPACITY TO GIVE WISE DECISIONS
EVEN MORE WHEN IT IS IN THIS AMERICA,
THE SUPER CIVILIZATION WHO HAS HELP THE WORLD FREEDOM SINCE IT’S FOUNDATION
CENTURYS AGO. WHICH CANNOT ACCEPT A WORN OUT LEADER FROM THE FIRST YEAR OF HIS
PRESENCE ON THE HIGHEST POSITION OF THE WORLD, WHO IS NOT DOING HIS OUTMOST EFFORT
BECAUSE HE DOESN’T HAVE THE ABILITY REQUIRED OF HIM.
THAT SCAM WOULD OFFER THE PEOPLE THE KOWLEDGE TO JUDGE HIS QUALIFICATIONS,
AND DECIDE ON ACTIONS TO BE DONE EITHER WAY,
WE KNOW OBAMA HAVE NEVER BEEN RESEARCH ON ANY FACTS OF HIS ABILITY,
LIKE OTHER CANDIDATES WHERE BRUTELY VETTED,
SO THAT NEW INVENTION SCAM IS THE ANSWER TO UNEQUIVOKE RESULT COMING OUT OF IT,
HE SHOULD BE WILLING TO SUBMIT TO THAT SCAM,
SO TO GIVE THE ANSWER WITHOUT A DOUBT OF HIS BRAIN CAPACITY TO HOLD THE SEAT HE WAS GIVEN BY UNINFORMED CITIZENS

bees

No civilization lasts forever. Sometimes God doesn’t allow it — especially when a civilization becomes barbaric, reverts to barbarism and savagery. Ours is doing that, right now.

The top 5 center headlines on Drudge this morning, all so sad and savage:

VIDEO: Woman Thrown on Subway Tracks During Vicious Attack…

Woman With Baby Brutally Stabbed Inside BED BATH & BEYOND Store…

SHOCK: Robber Beats Clerk With Hammers…

Woman’s face slashed by razor at mall…
Girl, 14, vanishes after video of her being beaten at school goes viral…

And another, on the right-hand column, gone now:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2262958/Christina-Eilman-Chicago-pays-22-5-MILLION-woman-gang-raped-plummeted-seventh-story-window-police-failed-proper-care-her.html?ICO=most_read_module

Like Shannon Christian and Christopher Newsom — the “Knoxville Horror”.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murders_of_Channon_Christian_and_Christopher_Newsom

Savages, and we not only turn a blind eye to this reality, we persecute and prosecute those like George Zimmerman for defending himself against savage brutality.

Seriously. Our civilization HAS been judged, and a part the sentence is being meted out, right now.

We haven’t yet seen the really bad part of that sentence. Treblinka comes to mind, for some reason.

In American Horror movie culture, the main message has always been “Stay in the city! Don’t go to out to the country! They’ll do a Deliverance on you! They’ll make your life like Jason did in the Friday, the 13th franchise!”

Seriously — don’t go to the city. GTFO of the city. Stay the hell away from the city if you value your life.

@JDR-Taq: http://www.investors.com/image/RAMFNclr-011713-gun-IBD-COL_345.jpg.cms
Michael Ramirez and you are on the same page.
He is a Senior Editor and the editorial cartoonist for Investor’s Business Daily.

Read More At IBD:

Ramirez Cartoon: President Obama’s Green Military

JDR-Taq
I believe it yes, I hope this will pass, but it seems to increase in bloody events, NO PRESIDENT CAN FIX,
could it try to tell us, and we don’t capture the message
of the BEAST WITH MANY HORNS COMING FROM HELL,it does intensify,
is it because the effort to chase GOD AWAY FROM ALL PUBLIC EVENTS,
HERE JUST TO HEAR THE BIBLE WILL NOT BE PRESENT FOR OBAMA INAUGURATION,
HOW CAN HE SWEAR HIS OATH TO PROTECT
AMERICA ON THE BIBLE,
THAT ALONE IS TALKING TO THE PEOPLE AND VERY TROUBLING
thank you for the links.
BYE

JDR-Taq
it seems that GEORGE ZIMMERMAN as been refuse the freedom out of prison
because DE LARONDA MADE A EXPLOSIF FIT TO THE NEW WOMAN JUDGE
AND SHE AGGRED TO LEAVE HIM IN HIS CELL, WHERE THE BLACK PRISONERS ARE CONSTANTLY HARASS HIM AND THREATENING HIM OF BEATING TO DEATH IF THEY PUT THEIR HANDS ON HIM,
AN INNOCENT MAN, IT’S UNBELIEVEBLE

JDR-Taq
I remember reading the CHRISTINA STORY, WHEN IT HAPPENED, poor girl,
it made me hate those black criminals so much ganging up on a sick girl,one of them is out
of jail, he claim to not having touch her, sure sure ya.
it was around the BLACKS BEING INCITED TO LYNCH GEORGE ZIMMERMAN, THEY WHERE DANGEROUS AND THERE WAS ATTACK ON VULNERABLE OLD WHITE BY 6 OF THEM BEATING HIM LEFT HIM FOR DEAD THEY HIDE HIM IN THE WOOD, I sure hope they where caught, but I never heard about it,
yes the gun carryers are right to want to protect themselves and family,
because there are some heartless savages gangstas around ,out to no good,

Nan G
THANK YOU FOR THE LINK,
I found RICK PERRY GAVE AN ANSWER TO OBAMA
FOR HIS GUN CONTROL ACTIONS,
I LIKE HIM , HE STAND TALL AND CAN VOICE HIS OPINION
AS EASY AS IT COME. TO ANYONE,

JDR-Taq
I must tell you this,
you mentioned TREBLINKA ON YOUR COMMENT,
and I just seen a movie that made me think back on this comment mention of TREBLINKA,
I RECALL THE HORROR TOLD BY MANY, BY LOOKING AT THE MOVIE,
YES THE RETURN OF BEAST IN HUMAN, SEEM TO NEVER END,
IT SEEMS THAT IT IS A REALITY OF SOME MUTATION OF HUMAN RETURNING TO THEIR ORIGINS
WHEN THE BRUTAL HUMAN WAS NECESSARY TO SURVIVAL.
EVEN IN A WORLD OF TODAY, THIS TRAIT HAS SURVIVE IN SOME MORE PRIMAL THAN OTHER,
THEY ARE AIMING AT SLOWING PROGRESS WE TRY SO MUCH TO ADVANCE LIKE A NEGATIVE POWER REFUSING TO EVOLVE, WELL UNABLE TO EVOLVE BECAUSE TO NEGATIVE TO EVOLVE.
JUST TO SEE THAT MOVIE IS CHALLENGING ANYONE IN THEIR HOPE IN GETTING PASS AN ERA OF CRUELTY.

All the stories in my previous comments have something in common.

Something we’re not allowed to mention, for fear of being called “racist” by the racists who perpetrated every single one of the acts of savagery mentioned.

If I’m racist for noticing what is right in front of me, I didn’t make me that way.

So yeah, I’ll continue to cross the road when I see two or more low-pants hoodies walking toward me on the sidewalk. And when they think — inevitably, since they’ve been programmed this way by their detestable culture — “hey, he crossed the street! he must be a RACIST! LET’S CALL 20 FRIENDS AND GO KICK HIS A$$!!!”… I’ll continue in my racism.

I didn’t make me this way. You know, not stupid. So go ahead. Keep walking towards a group of loudmouth low-pants hoodies, just to prove you’re not racist. Go ahead and mingle.

It’s also not my fault some ignorant, non-black Americans are stupid and blind — and, unwittingly, suicidal.

JDR-Taq
scary, I had my own fears turned into horror movie in my memory,
but on this one I will cross to the other side without hesitation,
and hate the thought that they won,
bye

I see my post generated a fair bit of discussion. Thank you all for reading and commenting.

However, my point still remains that the gun violence statistics seem to indicate the biggest single group of perps are gang bangers.

It would therefor seem that if you go after the gangs, for instance make it illegal to have a weapon if you are a gang banger, that might serve to curtail some of the gun violence.

Taking weapons away from law-abiding citizens, is not the answer.

IB Wright

@IB Wright: As I have said before, I spent a good portion (5 years or so) as a gang detective, I was also a court recognized “criminal street gang expert” when it came to testimony in gang cases. That said, I can tell you it is already illegal for the vast majority of gang members to ever possess a firearm; they are either already convicted felons, which includes a lot of cases of juveniles tried as adults, or they are under 18 years old. Rarely does a gang banger reach the age of adulthood without a felony conviction. So obviously, more laws aren’t the answer.

IB Wright
you gave us a good POST yes,
we always learn much from THOSE POSTS,
we look for solutions but is it it the job of OBAMA
AS THE ONE HOLDING THE RESPONSIBILITY TO SERVE AMERICANS, OTHER WISE WHY ELSE IS HE HOLDING THE TOP JOB? IN THE GANGSTA PROBLEM HE DID NOT DO NOTHING TO STOP IT, HE IS BLACK AND HOLD A BIG INFLUENCE ON THE BLACK PARENTS OF THOSE GANGS, HE COULD DO A LOT BY
EDUCATING THE PARENTS TO HELP THEIR CHILDREN TO STAY OUT OF TROUBLING GANGS, IT’S HIS OWN TOWN, CHICAGO IS THE NO 1 DANGEROUS GANGS CRIMES,
HE DOESN’T DO NOTHING, AND HE TRY TO LIMIT THE GUN OWNERS HE HIS NOT IN THE REAL WORLD,
YOU DON’T LIMIT THE GUN, YOU WORK ON STOPPING THE GANGSTA
AND TAKE THEM OUT OF THE STREET WITH A RADICAL CURFEW
THANK YOU

in OK. I take your point and agree. That is one of the basic arguments against gun control. Only the law-abiding amongst us will maybe obey the law, while the criminal, by their very nature and inclination, will continue to carry guns.

But back to the gangs, what do we do? How do you curtail gang-related violence? Is it one of those things that might take generations to correct? In the meantime, what do we do? Or do we sit back and let them off one another? Hoping the innocent victims are limited?

IB Wright

@IBW: IB, the gang issue will take more than a generation to fix; when I retired I was seeing 3rd generation gang members just coming out. The fix is neither simple or easy, and I don’t believe we’ll ever see gangs go away. Young kids get in looking for a sense of belonging, mixed with some admiration for the older crowd with the cool stuff. The single parent homes, the cheapness of life, the poor role models… hell, the list is long, complicated and kind’a sad to think about.
As for the violence… severe and strict enforcement with mandated maximum sentences (from the first arrest), reducing the gang member’s opportunity to create innocent victims. Meet violence with violence, make them fear their victims (it’s a control thing, like mass shooters), show them from a very early age that there are incentives to not follow the gang life. Hard answers, not for the weak of principles; something we don’t have in government.