GANG VIOLENCE AND HARSH PENALTIES

Chapter Four is entitled, “[The] Scope and Nature of the Current Gang Problem.” It focuses on recent trends in number of gangs, gang members and gang-related crimes in each city. In Inglewood, almost all the neighborhoods were claimed by at least one gang, with gang-unit officers agreeing that the city was facing a major gang problem. In Albuquerque, gangs were involved in drug trafficking and property offenses, with 7 out of 8 gang-unit officers believing the city had a major gang problem. In Las Vegas, migration from other cities was thought to be the primary cause of an increase in gang members. 50% of crime in Las Vegas is attributed to gangs, with most officers believing they had a moderate to major gang problem. In Phoenix, the gang problem is described as wave-like, with 70% of gang-unit officers thinking the city had a major gang problem. These statistics were backed up through interviews with officers and city records.

The United States features a prison population that is more than quadruple the highest prison population in Western Europe (Pettit, 2004). In the 1980s, U.S. legislation issued a number of new drug laws with stiffer penalties that ranged from drug possession to drug trafficking. Many of those charged with drug crimes saw longer prison sentences and less judicial leniency when facing trial. The War on Drugs has furthered the boom in prison population even though violent crime has continued to decrease steadily. Many urban areas in the U.S. have a majority black population. With crime tendencies high in these areas, drugs are also prevalent. This means that a greater percentage of those in prison are going to be black because law

As the years pass, the rate of gang affiliated crimes in the Unites States has progressed extensively, accumulating more inmates into our major prisons doubling the maximum occupancy that the jails can hold. In the U.S there are currently 33,000 active violent street, motorcycle, and prison gangs with a recorded 1.4 million members combined. The registered number of police officers is a mere 683,396; which is not even half of our countries gang population. Incredibly enough, even with their small numbers these officers do the impossible to control, learn, and manipulate the ways of the inmates; taking all of the precautions necessary to stop and protect the normal citizens on the streets and the

Even though gangs provide a sense of support, the "values" instilled in members are horribly dangerous to society. Murders and drive-by shottings go unpunished more often than not in areas like the Henry Horner Homes. Gangs have become powerful enough that high-ranking members who are forced to face the law are protected by high-priced attorneys and investigators (163).

“Prisons began to bulge with gang members when states enacted tougher laws for gang-related crime in the mid to late 1980s.”(Martinez) On one hand the laws enacted helped get gang members off the street, but in another way it backfired by not stopping the gangs’ activity. “In many ways their number and power grew even more in prison.”(Martinez) The problem of gangs and violence has been addressed many times throughout the years by the United States Correctional Board but the board has yet to take the problem seriously.

The past quarter century has seen an enormous growth in the American incarceration rate. Importantly, some scholars have suggested that the rate of prison growth has little to do with the theme of crime itself, but it is the end result of particular U.S. policy choices. Clear (2007) posits that "these policy choices have had well-defined implications for the way prison populations have come to replicate a concentrated occurrence among specified subgroups in the United States population in particular young black men from deprived communities" (p. 49).

Chicago has the biggest gang problem in the country (Thomas & Bass, 2009). “There are more gang members per citizen in Chicago than anywhere else in the country” (Thomas, 2009, para 4). The average Chicago gang leader is 43, convicted of murder and lives in the suburbs. That leader on many occasions directs his gang from jail (Main, 2006) and 95 percent of inmates in the Cook County Jail are gang members (Thomas, 2009). Gangs are everywhere today just like they use to be. The high number of gangs causes violence and deaths to rise in Chicago.

Gangs pose a threat to the safety of United States prisons by performing illegal activities and the encouraging violence. It is important to develop strategies to reduce gang recruitment, limit their influence, and sanction their misconduct in order to create a safe environment for all prisoners. With this, inmates that are involved in gangs should be put under twenty four-hour lockdown. By isolating these members, prisons will be able to limit their influence.

They have become such a large part of prison life that inmates need to turn to gangs to have guaranteed protection from violence. Many different factors contribute to this phenomenon, however, mass incarceration, suppression strategies, and the prison culture all provide fuel to the growth of prison gangs. For decades now the United States has seen a growing percentage of of the population entering

The article presented on this paper reveals the problem of gangs and gang related violence in our nation’s institutions. Corrections Canada has seen a 44 per cent jump in gang members in federal prisons in the last five years, to 2,040 in 2012 from 1,421 in 2007, according to the documents obtained under access to information. The correctional service constructed a strategic framework for dealing with gangs in 2006, and implemented its gang management strategy in 2008, aiming to convince inmates to drop their affiliation and limit security risks. Gang numbers have continued to rise, according to one correctional service management document. It raises a number of

I feel that there is a lot of gang’s violence in the world. There should be a way to be able to handle them before it get even worse than it is today. The problem is that gang’s cause’s harm not only to those who are involved in it but also people around gang violence. I feel that each various context and environment should have a way for coming up with solutions about gangs activities. First, political could have an impact solution on gang’s violence because their economy. Second, cultural could have an impact solutions to gangs because they are organized based upon race, ethnicity, territory and etc. Third, societal could have an impact on gang’s violence because it makes people in society feel unsafe. Fourth, racial could have impact

Inmates are constantly pressured or forced to join a gang and thus increasing the number of gang members in correctional facilities. “In the most recent survey, state and federal prisons reported that of their total male population, 24.8 percent were prison gang members and 4.09 percent of the female population were gang members” (Seiter, 2016). Gangs developed within correctional facilities today are generally created from offenders that were gang members before they were incarcerated. (Seiter,

The first article I reviewed by John L Worrall and Robert G Morris discusses how gang membership is linked with inmate misconduct (Worrall & Morris. 2012). John Worrall states that know “gang members are more prone than non-gang members to act violent during the time of their incarceration” (Worrall & Morris. 2012). Worrall and his team collected data on inmates from large southern states and examine the inmate on inmate violence.

Ruddell, R., Decker, S. H., & Egley Jr, A. (2006). Gang interventions in jails: A national analysis. Criminal Justice Review, 31(1), 33-46.

Working with other students, taking two weeks to finish, and creating a new and inventive topic that has no simple solution. For this group project we decided to present the topic of gang violence. We then talked about gang violence in a perspective that others may have not considered. The purpose of this speech was to have all the students involved and to get the information for each bullet completed and detailed. The target audience could be anyone that ranges to teenagers and adults who have considered joining a gang or others who are even being affected without knowing and to have more knowledge on the topics.