Gang Violence-Personal Narrative

The lives of children are greatly influenced by the environment they grow up in, and the people they come in contact with. For years, psychologists, researchers, and social workers have studied children, and why they do what they do. All have developed many different perspectives on how to view social problems and the development of individuals.

The idea of violence is instilled in everyone’s head in some way or another. From the time we are born we are equipped with the idea that we must react when we are upset. When someone affects us in a negative way, there is an idea in our minds that urges us to fight back or cause harm to that person. This idea of causing harm stays with us from childhood until we take our last breath. Since 2013, there have been 242 school shootings within America. Even worse, there have been over a thousand mass shootings in the country resulting in mass casualties. Most recently, one single man murdered fifty-eight people at a concert in Las Vegas, Nevada and injured over 240 others. Although the motive may have been different between these shootings, one thing remains the same for all of them, the act of violence.

When working with the Alvarez family it is important to understand the complex nature of their situation. The Alvarez family is currently dealing with a difficult situation by way of their son, JC, losing one of his friends to gang violence. Additionally, JC is involved heavily involved in gang activity himself and is causing the family anxiety as they are afraid that he will place himself in danger attempting to obtain “revenge”. Rather than working from micro level, it can be helpful to approach this case from the broader mezzo level. As Mr. Alvarez is highly involved in the community, it would be beneficial to partner with him when approaching any community related issues, including the gang activity.

As demonstrated by Crime in Chicagoland, Little Village is an area plagued by high crime rates and gang violence. Although the community comprises only 4.4 square miles, police recorded 263 crimes from June 21-July 21, 2017, including 92 thefts, 20 robberies, 5 criminal sexual assaults and 58 quality of life crimes (Chicago Tribune, 2017). While these crimes rates may be construed as normal occurrences in an urban setting, violence and gang activities have a pervasive impact on the development of Little Village youth. According to Kimberly Shinew, Monika Stodolska, Caterina Roman, and Jennifer Yahner (2013), “fear of crime, level of crime victimization, and perceived level of incivilities in the community were related to physical activity,

In 2006, Memphis had the second highest violent crime rate in the country. The mayor of Shelby county at the time collaborated with the District Attorney, the Sheriff’s dept, Memphis Police Director and business leaders to try to address the issue (Goggans, 2014). Collectively they created a 15 point research based crime reduction plan. Due to Memphis’ data driven policing initiative, their safe community strategy has helped with the decline in serious crime in Memphis by more than 26.6 percent. In January of 2011, Memphis saw its lowest murder rate in 30 years. Nevertheless, despite the success, violence among their youth is still on the rise (Goggans, 2014).

Went shooting for the first time today and I must say I am hooked!!! Shot both the AR-15 (and no AR does not stand for Automatic Rifle...) as well as the Glock 19. Of the two my favorite was the AR-15. Of course had to go in repping YAL and all the work they do to maintain our freedoms and liberties. God bless the 2nd

On the beginning of January of the next year I tried to take my life because I saw no hope but luckily I got some sense and stopped the bleeding. I still wasn’t the same and a couple of weeks later I was locked up again. A couple of weeks after that my great grandma past away. I was locked up for two counts of second degree arson and was sentence to seven months in a juvenile group home. I started in a group home in Weatherford, Oklahoma but only lasted two weeks (I was to emotionally unstable) and lost control after some of the kids called me names. I began to hit the staff, hitting walls, and tried hard to injure myself and soon was sent to a mental hospital in Ada, Oklahoma were I was diagnosed with PTSD, dysthymic disorder, ADHD, and anxiety disorder. I then was transferred to another group home in Norman, Oklahoma called Harbor House where I spent about two months, but during the stay I was sent to another mental hospital because I started cutting myself with a pencil sharpener blade. They changed and adjusted my meds I was on and was sent back. I ended up running from that group home because it was so poorly run and kids were being sent to the hospital nearly every day. I and the two other kids that ran with me ended up walking to Oklahoma City were one ended up splitting and the rest of us found a place to stay. The other kid and I stayed there for about a week were we did drugs and worked every other day. Then we got a ride to Vinita were we were caught and I was sent to Enid, Oklahoma to a group home there called Sequoyah Group Home. I spent seven months there were I ended up trying to hang myself and when the staff tried to confront me I lost control, attacked everyone, and soon was restrained. After that I was sent to

On page 82, as Martin finally discovered the painful answer for the questions that had haunted him for month , Martin felt hurt than ever, especially when Martin's eyes reached Cesar's stare. Martin realized that revenge was a bad solution for his problem, that he was not the only victim of gang violence, that his family was not the only one that had to suffered the consequense from this battle. That answer is expressed clearly through Cesar and Martin compared how painful the answer was by using metaphors "his stare cutting me deeper than any blades". Martin's sourness was worse than any wound that caused by any blades. Violence always painful!

On 04/18/2016 I assisted Sgt. Patterson on a traffic stop in the 900 block of East K-53 HWY, Sumner County, Kansas. When I drove past I observed an older four door passenger vehicle stopped on the north side of the road with Sgt. Patterson's patrol vehicle behind it with emergency equipment activated. I turned around of K--53 and pulled in behind Sgt. Patterson, I activated my rear emergency lights and walked to the passenger side window of Sgt. Patterson's patrol vehicle. In the vehicle he had stopped I could see two white males sitting in the front driver and passenger seats, Sgt. Patterson was already back in his vehicle and was running the occupants information with SUCO 911. Sgt. Patterson told me that the passenger was moving around

Gangs have been occupied New York City for hundreds of years. In the 1950s, the city saw a rise of Latino immigrants from Latin America, the Caribbean, and notably Puerto Rico as well as a rise in gang violence. Leonard Bernstein’s musical West Side Story uses the real-world subject of gang warfare in New York City to depict a modern-day adaptation of Romeo and Juliet by playing into the ethnic divide between the two gangs, but in doing so it simultaneously acts as a medium through which the uninformed public can learn about the culture of the gangs from this time.

That day still haunts me. It was only my second month as a police officer. I remember the day time sky fading into the dark starry night sky. I flipped on my lights and that when the call came in. It was a 10-40, which means there was a murder. My heart started racing and the adrenaline started flowing through my body. Flipping my lights one I start racing to the scene. Living in Chicago murders were common, but this was my first time responding to a call like this. Getting closer to the park- where the body was- I slowed down and pulled into the park. As soon as I got out of the car this dewiness just took over me. Something felt extremely off. Taking in my surrounding I notice the body it was laying underneath a slide, somewhat hidden under

When I was in my teens, I got into a gang and caused lots of problems all over Maycomb County. The stories that go around about it, have most likely been altered. My friends and I stole a car and were driving around the square when the sheriff tried to arrest us. Obviously, nobody wanted to go to jail and since we were “bad” kids, we locked him in the outhouse. The children that live a few houses down the street and the entire community never came around my house. I've heard from my father and brother that the neighbors think i'm 6 and a half feet tall, have rotting yellow teeth, eat raw animals and am mentally insane. When I was in my 30’s, I was sitting in the livingroom cutting out articles and different pictures for my scrap book and when my father walked by me I drove

Sometimes something as simple as hanging out with friends ends in almost losing your life. I had grown up around kids from wealthy backgrounds, lived in an area with little to no crime, and been raised like any other kid. I wasn't completely oblivious to the fact that i was black, in fact my parents reminded me often that i wasn't the same as the kids I went to school with. Despite being told that I was different, I ignored it, I ignored everything and had the delusion that because of my personal background I was untouchable. When my friends and I decided to go trespass at a school to watch fireworks, no thought in my head told me I was in danger. It wasn’t long before we got caught, but when

I didn’t grow up in the best of circumstances. I grew up in a neighborhood filled to the brim with crime. My father was a low ranking gang member with little to no room for advancement. My mother was a heroin addict. Or whatever she had on hand. Sometimes my father joined her, but when he got high or drunk he became very abusive. That was typically when I snuck out and hid out at a friend’s house for a few hours. But I never stayed the night. My father made a habit of visiting my room, as if trying to make up for the fact that every time that he lifted his hand, maybe to catch my attention or something harmless like that, I would flinch away from him.

It would have been easy to resolve had either one of us wanted to end the squabble. Looking back, it is unbelievable to me that I acted the way I did. Again and again the situation runs through my mind, unveiling new ends to the argument. It was a perfect example of similar scenes playing themselves out all over the world - the most basic level of social conflict we have, the easiest to resolve.