Gang Injunction

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.

Fleisher & Decker (2001), note that there are several factors that can impede a successful integration back into the community when it comes to gang members. First, gangs are comprised of a vast network type system. Within this system there are countless members who become associates, this relationship does not have to include the same crime. The criminal link can be broad and range from misdemeanor crime to severe crime. Further, this is not only a complex network, but a social system where criminal activity is accepted. Therefore, desistance is an obstacle for offenders, especially if they remain in contact with these individuals. Also, gangs do not go away just because key members go to jail or prison. There are always others there to

A large reason for the writing of this book is that there is currently not much research concerning or call for a criminal justice reform. According to Alexander, the main goal of the book is to “stimulate a much-needed conversation about the role of the criminal justice system in creating and perpetuating racial hierarchy in the United States” (2012:16). Another premise for this research is that it is no longer socially correct to use race to discriminate against people, so Alexander argues that society as a whole is now

In There Are No Children Here, Kotlowitz describes the experiences of Pharoah and Lafayette to highlight the racist and classist undertones existing within the criminal justice system of Chicago in the late 1980s. This essay will utilize the theory of critical criminology to illustrate the structures of inequality within the criminal justice system and the subsequent marginalization of youth that exists within the Henry Horner community, leading to youth deviance and violent crime. Beginning with a brief outline of the major characteristics of critical theory, the essay will then address the increasing focus on gang involvement as an explanation for inner-city youth crime, using examples from the Disciples and Vice Lord gangs, and how that focus demonstrates the bias and inequality within the criminal justice system. Next, the necessity of the Henry Horner community creating a system of “self-help” will be analyzed, a result of the perceived inadequacy of the criminal justice system in addressing the problems that the community faces. The theory of critical criminology demonstrates how structures of inequality are represented in the criminal justice system: the incessant focus on gangs and inadequacy of the system to provide protection causes the marginalization of youth like Pharoah and Lafayette, reinforcing instances of youth deviance and crime.

However, as Billy Lamar Brooks Sr. explained in “The Case for Reparations,” if “you got a nice house, you live a nice neighborhood, then you are less prone to violence, because your space is not deprived.” But if “you grow up in a place like this, housing sucks. When they tore down the projects here, they left the high-rises and came to the neighborhood with that gang mentality. You don’t have nothing, so you going to take something, even if it’s not real. You don’t have no street, but in your mind it’s yours” (Coates). By Brooks’ standards, people turn to gang violence because they have no space and want something that defines them as a person. Once again, the negative assumptions associated with Blacks today, such as that all Blacks are criminals, derive from the segregation in the past. While some African Americans are criminals, they often are such because they were forced to live in segregated communities with fewer opportunities. To reduce crime, the government must open more programs that provide impoverished communities with “something that defines

The author and researcher of Punished: Policing the Lives of Black and Latino Boys, Victor M. Rios, was a former gang member from Oakland as well, who learned in his adolescence what a small break from police and educators could mean for a boy on his way to prison. Rios made it out of gang life through the support of concerned teachers, and a very fortunate break from a cop who gave him a last chance. After the death of his best friend and countless negative interactions with the police, Rios was forced to reflect upon the larger image of youth violence and criminalization. He wanted and needed to find out the reason of the prevalence of youth and police violence in his community. After graduating college, and attending graduate school,

The book: “Punished: Policing the Lives of Black and Latino Boys” was written by the author Victor M. Rios who was also a gang member in Oakland, California. He selected a total of 40 young men for this investigation, 30 of them had been previously arrested in the state of California. This book has two main sections. Over the first section we find Chapter 1 which sets the different methods and some of the experiences the author lived when he was working on this project. This chapter also deals with the punitive system developed in the city of Oakland, CA. If we turn pages to chapter number 2 we will find a brief description of Oakland along with its high level of poverty and reduced opportunities. Victor emphasizes that Latinos and Blacks have had a strong trajectory in criminal acts and punitive social control.

Criminal activities and gangs have been a continuous problem in California. Focusing on what helps society and the community become a safer environment has lead to civil gang injunctions. Keeping society safe is a responsibility for the local police departments. A civil gang injunction is a court order that prohibits a specific criminal street gang from engaging in various activities such as: fighting, trespassing, intimidation, association with the gang members and graffiti. CGI’s are a public nuisance, which is considered anything that is injurious or deleterious to one’s enjoyment of life, liberty, and property. Civil Gang Injunctions affects the entire community. CGI’s can best be described as behavior of criminal street gangs. City attorneys

It is no longer primarily concerned with the prevention and punishment of crime, but rather with the management and control of the dispossessed.” I grew up watching action movies where police officers are the heroes’ fighting crime and protecting the helpless and catching the bad guys. Imagine the young black kids of this generation growing up viewing the police as villains instead of heroes. This level of distrust only leads to rising conflicts between African-Americans communities and the law

This daily violence can manifest itself through gun violence, domestic violence, sexual violence, poverty, lack of access to education or health care, and other forms of violence that show up in everyday living. Specifically, policing is an arena in which being black means being a criminal in the eyes of the police and white population. Zero tolerance policing, militarization of the police, and police brutality has transformed black neighborhoods into war zones and open-air prisons (Kelley 17, 23). In the eyes of police, black people are reduced to enemy combatants, thugs, and criminals, thus making them “subject to regulation, containment, surveillance, and punishment, [. . . as well as] unworthy of [the] protection” allocated to white citizens (Kelley 28). Kelley describes being black in the United States as “living under occupation,” where all black civilians are to serve out their “collective punishment” for being born black

The purpose of this paper is to review and verify a recent study by Scott H. Decker of the University of Missouri – St. Louis, entitled Collective and Normative Features in Gang Violence (Decker & VanWinkle, 1996). The study will attempt to address why our local increase in gang violence has reached monumental heights causing an increase in gang members appearing your court.

In my opinion, there are many reasons on why the Chicago’s Housing Authority’s “Plan for Transformation” creates more problems that it solved. The Plan for Transformation pursues to demolish all low-income high-rise building in Chicago. Because of that, in some ways, the Plan for Transformation are continuing racial and class segregation, as thousands of residents were displaced to the poorer south and west sides of Chicago. Thus, in my opinion, all these situations caused the poor African-Americans to be concentrated at the same place and lead them to have more social ties and denser networks that lead to more crimes and deviance among them.

The “Mosaics: Reading and Writing Essays” textbook includes two essays with differing views on the effectiveness of anti-loitering laws. Richard Willard shares his opinion that anti-loitering laws are effective tools that discourage gang activity in his essay, “Anti-Loitering Laws Can Reduce Gang Violence.” He asserts that alternative methods of punishing gang members only cause them to develop animosity for police that leads to more trouble. Alternatively, “Anti-Loitering Laws Are Ineffective and Biased,” an essay written by David Cole, presents the view that these laws are a form of discrimination. Both authors support their opinions with statistics and previous examples of anti-loitering law enforcement.

I believe that the North Side Protectors gang was allowed to continue with their roles and delinquency in the community of Rio Sellas for so long because the Police Department didn’t file a civil injunction order against the gang members sooner. In the past the police department didn’t put their

Throughout history, people have immigrated to the United States for various reasons. Whether it is economically, politically, or socially; people of different races, traditions, religion, etc. are determined to start a life in America. Once immigrants settle they start to develop their own neighborhoods where they can unite and openly express one’s own culture, traditions, and customs but remain within the American restraints of what is acceptable. New York, in particular, began embracing this idea of ethnicity. From there, neighborhoods such as Western Heights and Harlem prospered. Though, with divided neighborhoods comes crime and gang warfare. In addition, dominance and control were sought between the different turfs (boundaries). Though integration was thought to reduce gang warfare, boundaries were established by neighborhoods which caused race related crimes and exclusion upon other ethnicities.