The Crime Rate On Los Angeles

When young teens get involved with gangs they pretty much throw their lives away because they leave school and frequently get arrested taking away any hope of getting a real job and honest living.

I am proud to say that this book uses facts and number statistics to educate the reader on the happenings taking place in Los Angeles. Jill uses factual statistics taken from gang activity as well as the police files available to the public to write this amazing book. Accuracy is extremely important to this book because the author is focusing on a huge topic in our society.

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.

Although non-gang members may also participate in risky activities like binge drinking, marijuana use, and drug selling, gang affiliation greatly increases exposure and likelihood to partake in these activities. Studies show that “early alcohol use and early marijuana use are both identified risk factors for joining a gang among adolescents” (Swahn et. al 354). Youth gang members are also exposed to hard drugs because of gang involvement in the illegal drug market. Many youth gang members in these

With the leading number of gangs in the country, Los Angeles is thought of as the gang capital of the world. Employing gang suppression strategies that take distinct forms, from anti-gang injunctions to high rate of incarcerations, the City of Angels has failed to live up to its angelic name. Known instead for its demonic gang activity and police suppression efforts, Los Angeles has taken over media headlines as one of the most dangerous places to subsist. Representing a worrisome issue for residents, visitors, city government officials, as well as urban planners, gang violence has rapidly become a threat to public safety. Although current-day gang culture has eased off on the violence, it continues to be one of the greatest planning challenges

Individuals who are affiliated with gangs commit crimes such as homicide consistently. Gangs target areas where people are not unified and would be less likely to contact authorities if violence broke out. Drive by shootings occur so often that Detective Dale Wallis says “they [gangs] do not care who’s going to get shot” (qtd. in Minty 1). The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) did a report to determine the top five United States cities to have high levels of gang homicide. Those five cities were Los Angeles, California; Oklahoma City, Oklahoma; Long Beach, California; Oakland, California, and Newark, New Jersey. The study

Some of the reasons are abusive homes, low-income, and peer pressure. In Chicago, Illinois, Vice Lords, a gang that consist of African-Americans, use violence when they run into rival gangs. The recruitment of Vice Lord members start off young, in low income neighborhoods of Detroit and Chicago. Family problems play a key role in adolescents joining gangs. The American Journal of Community Psychology, stated, parents who provided maternal support and restrictive control to their children creates the adolescent to roam the streets. (http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF02512027 ) This gives teens the oppurtunity to be influced by violence, drugs, and gangs. Drugs, such as marijuana, are fairly easy to get and drive a huge profit. However, marijuana has medical benefits. Nancy Comeau, Addictive Behaviors, explains how the relations of anxiety, stress, and sensations are the motives for the use of marijuana in adolescents. (http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0306460301002386 ) Anxiety and stress are part of most teenage lives whether if its with cooping with school or family issues. Thus, explains a reason why adolescents join gangs. Adolescent teens are being charged as adults due to criminal activities. The teen mind is still developing and will become worse due to the actions of prison. Teen prisoners face depression and violence within the cell walls. This leads to suicides and long term mental breakdowns. (http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/abs/10.2105/AJPH.2004.056325 ) Familes are tramautized seeing their young children being sent away for many years and can also create depression for the familes, as

When we get into how society and people look at crime, it happens in every city, every neighborhood, people are victims every day, businesses, and even property. Crime dates back since colonization and the rates have varied over time, believe it or not, crime has decreased over the years. As a matter of fact, the United States has been on a decline. The crime rate for the year 2000 was a total of 11,608,072 a declining year in 2015 with a total of 9,225,197. (U.S. Department of Justice)

“Gangs have morphed from social organizations into full-fledged criminal enterprises” (Thomas, 2009, para 5). Gangs are highly sophisticated and more dangerous then ever. The number one reason to join a gang is money; and 95 percent of gangs profit comes from drug dealing

Another unintended consequence of the war on drugs has been a dramatic decrease in the rule of law. Gang culture has grown at such a rapid pace that there are now an estimated 900,000 current gang members involved in 20,000 different gangs in the U.S. One cop explained, “Street gangs don’t have to recruit; they’re not running around looking under mattresses for recruits; kids want to join.” Consequently, legalizing drugs would cut off the main draw to gang activity, which is profit from the drug

From my perspective, the most surprising gang myth was that gangs, drugs, and violence were linked. I was under the impression that gangs made their income from the sale and distribution of drugs to fund their activities. It was unique in that Coughlin and Venkatesh (2003) actually stated that drugs were secondary to that of identity, protection, and recreation (28). Though from just these two chapters, I can see there is a pattern to why youth join gangs and the gang’s desire for identity as a primary goal. All of the offered criteria of identity, protection, and recreation signal to me that of any troubled teen/youth trying to establish their way through not only a changing environment of high school, but also a changing body of hormones. I was curious in the details regarding to the fact that few gangs control distribution, in that if not them then who actually

To test the null hypothesis, if the P-Value of the test is less than 0.05 I will reject the null hypothesis.

“According to statistics from the National Youth Gang Center, more than 24,500 gangs, consisting of more than 770,000 members, exist in about 3,300 cities in the U.S.” (Rank 1). Although it is not illegal to be a member of a gang, it should be noted many gangs participate in illegal activity for funding and will use the money as a way to entice new membership. The “money begins flowing, and with that comes all of the things associated with material wealth that is usually beyond the reach of these adolescents without the criminal activity of being involved in a gang” (Nawojczyk 3).

Street gangs in this country can probably be traced back to the first wave of Europeans who migrated to the colonies for a better life for themselves and their families. Many of the first gangs were formed as a means of self protection, with the thinking that there is simply strength in numbers. The missions of gangs in today’s society have grown and emerged to include many violent criminal avenues, including drug trafficking, prostitution, money laundering, and extortion but the original thinking that there is strength in numbers remains true. Criminology experts believe that the number of teens involved in gangs or gang activity may be as high as 1 in every 5 people in most urban areas. Those number jump to 1 in every 3 people in

Abstract: This review studies in depth research done on street gangs. Social issues have social scientists turning away from including this in their research around this time. Sociological views have been changed dramatically in the past 40 years due to gender and racial studies. Also, women have started to join gangs since America has been changed with woman equality laws passing.