Gangs in the United States
Encyclopedia
Street gangs in the United States
date to the early 19th century. The most publicized street gangs in the U.S. are African-American; black gangs were not recognized as a social problem until after the great migration of the 1910s. An exception was noted in 1853 Philadelphia.
Some have argued that increasing gang activity is directly related to decreases in adult mentors, school failures, decreases in after-school programs and similar failures by the adults in the lives of children. While kids from more affluent neighborhoods may turn to other less dangerous alternatives, children from poorer neighborhoods often turn to gangs both as protection and a place to find love and understanding.
34%, Whites
13%, and Asians
6%.
and the Bloods
say they represent "brotherhood" and unity. Police say 80% of crimes throughout the country are committed by gang members. Although most gangs started in major cities like Los Angeles
, Chicago
, Miami and New York City
. After gangs in the USA started getting sophisticated and gained power, they migrated to other U.S. cities such as Atlanta, Memphis, Orlando
, Houston, Detroit and other major cities.
Herbert Asbury
depicted some of these groups in his history of Irish and American gangs in Manhattan. He described how gangs would fight for territory, control of criminal enterprises, and simply for the love of fighting. Asbury's book was later used by Martin Scorsese
as the basis for the motion picture Gangs of New York
.
Gangs in the 19th Century were often multi-ethnic as neighborhoods did not display the social polarization that has segregated different ethnic groups in the postmodern city (see Edward Soja
). A host of European nationalities including English
, Scottish
, Irish
and German
could be found in the same neighborhoods. This made territoriality for gangs much more important than ethnic homogeneity.
attempted to fight both the Vietnam War
and the war on poverty at home. Limited funding, incoherent local and national plans to combat inner-city poverty, and escalated police and military violence against blacks and immigrants all aided towards the conditions which would eventually give birth to gangs across the United States
, including the infamous Bloods
and Crips
of Los Angeles
, California
.
The Crips
were formed out of the poor socio-economic and repressive conditions which African-Americans living in Los Angeles
were subject to in the late 1960s. As police continued to jail black youths in seeking to destroy the Black Panther Party
, the Crips were formed in 1969 by Raymond Washington
, loosely acting as a community organization which aimed to help disenfranchised African-American communities of L.A. The Bloods
quickly followed, with a mandate to protect the community from external violence.
As job cuts continued to rise and employers began to hire from the cheaper labour pool of the expanding Latino immigrant community, unemployment rates of African-American men reached as high as 50% in several areas of South Central Los Angeles, opening up large recruitment markets for the burgeoning gangs. The increasing social isolation felt by African-American communities across the nation continued unabated in the 1980s and 90s, leading to higher rates of social pathologies, including violence.
As gang members and factions continued to grow, the introduction of crack cocaine
(cheap and highly addictive) to American cities would prove fatal. Crack money now could be used to purchase unprecedented amounts of weaponry, and as newly armed gang members began to fight over 'turf', or the territory in which gangs would run their lucrative drug-trades, violence soared, as the FBI's national data of gang-related homicides show: from 288 in 1985 up to 1362 in 1993.
which sparked the 1992 Los Angeles riots
. In the aftermath of the riots, leaders of the Bloods
and the Crips
announced a truce (spearheaded by Compton's then mayor Walter R. Tucker, Jr.
), and in May 1992, 1600 rival gang members converged on Imperial Courts, a main housing project of Watts, Los Angeles, California
to demonstrate their new-found companionship. But after only a few months of relative harmony, tensions between Los Angeles County's more than 100,000 gang members (in February 1993) began to raise the murder rates, rising to resemble previous levels.
Although various institutions and initiatives were introduced during the 1990s, including the Grant Research Evaluation and Tracking (GREAT) inter-state computer tracking system, which tracks the movements of 2,000 known gang members, and the Gang Violence and Juvenile Crime Prevention act of 1998, gangs continue to plague American inner-cities. Oakland, California
saw 113 drug- and/or gang-related homicides in 2002 alone, and 2003 sported similar figures. Many cities across America are still experiencing the effects of gangs on their streets, such as Baltimore
, Maryland
, whose gang problem is a major theme of HBO's critically acclaimed series The Wire
.
In 1994, Mary "Beth" Pelz, a criminologist at University of Houston–Downtown
, said that Texas lacked "a rich history of street gangs" compared to other parts of the United States. She said Houston area gangs began to branch out to newer developments in the 1980s.
The 1995 murder of Stephanie Kuhen
in Los Angeles, California
lead to condemnation from President Bill Clinton
and a crackdown on Los Angeles-area gangs.
article by Skip Hollandsworth, many street gangs in Texas have no organized command structures. Individual "cliques" of gangs, defined by streets, parts of streets, apartment complexes, or parts of apartment complexes, act as individual groups. Texas "Cliques" tend to be headed by leaders called "OG"s (short for "original gangster"s) and each "clique" performs a specific activity or set of activities in a given area, such as controlling trafficking of recreational drugs and managing prostitution.
It was reported in 2008 that 1-2% of the U.S. military belongs to gangs, according to FBI gang investigator Jennifer Simon in a published article, 50-100 times the rate in the general population. In 2009, David Kennedy, director of the Center for Crime Prevention and Control at John Jay College of Criminal Justice
of the City University of New York
, said that a lot of violence in inner cities in the United States is mislabeled as "gang violence" when in fact it involves small, informal cliques of people.
Transnational organized crime groups may be involved in crimes ranging from drug trafficking
, arms trafficking, human trafficking
, contract killing
, piracy
, counterfeiting, money laundering
, extortion
, and illegal gambling, to acts of terrorism
, to political assassination
. The complexity and seriousness of the crimes committed by global crime groups pose a threat not only to law enforcement but to democracy and legitimate economic development as well.
Criminal organizations exercise disproportionate control over the illegal means and forces of crime production. Members are likely to have mutated out of gang-members who are often used to service their needs. Motives that impel membership of these groups are similar to those that motivate business people in the legitimate economy.
Organized crime groups are not homogeneous. Some will be amateur affairs operated and managed by incompetent people. Others, however, will demonstrate more market acumen and more ruthlessness. These individuals may be difficult to trace because they will be more competent at hiding their activities. They may also have the financial muscle to acquire considerable legal protection through well paid lawyers and accountants.
There are numerous organized crime groups and they can be found in the majority of small to medium sized cities at varying degrees of size and organization. All large cities will house some kind of organized crime group. A further distinction could be made with what are often termed organized crime syndicates.
There are a number of widely known crime organizations as such whose operations span the world. Perhaps the most famous are the American Mafia
(often portrayed in New York mob movies), the Irish Mob
, the Chinese
Triad Society, the Japan
ese Yakuza
, the Sicilian Mafia, and the Russian Mafia
. Other large cities also play host to unique types of organized criminals. For example, London's East End
is home to a number of traditional crime families, and was the home of the infamous Kray Twins
, and Boston
's Irish Mob
was portrayed in the Martin Scorsese
film "The Departed
". Recently, Chicago
's Folk Nation
has broken out from a street gang into international business and is thought by many to be the newest entity of the organized crime
world.
The Latin Kings are said to be the largest and most organized Hispanic
street gang in the United States of America. The group has roots dating back to the 1940s in Chicago, Illinois. The Latin Kings first emerged in Chicago in the 1940s after several young Puerto Rican
males on the north side—and later, Mexican
males on the south side—organized into a self-defense group to protect their communities. The initial intention was to unite "all Latinos" into a collective struggle against "oppression" and to help each other overcome the problems of racism and prejudice that newly arriving Latino immigrants were experiencing. Hence, the name "Latin Kings and Queens", which as it denotes, is a reference to members of all Latino heritages. They organized themselves as a vanguard for their communities.
Like the Black Panthers, the Young Lords, and many other groups perceiving social injustices directed at their kind, the Latin Kings were broken as a movement. They lost touch with their roots and grew into one of the largest and most infamous criminal gangs in America. The group's members became involved in crimes including murder, drug trafficking, robberies and other organized criminal activities.
Mara Salvatrucha
(commonly abbreviated as "MS", "Mara", or "MS-13") is a criminal gang
that originated in Los Angeles
and has spread to Central America
, other parts of the United States
, and Canada
. MS-13 is one of the most dangerous gangs in the United States. The majority of the gang is ethnically composed of Salvadorans
, Hondurans
, Guatemala
ns, and Nicaragua
ns.
Their activities have caught the eye of the Federal Bureau of Investigation
(FBI) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), who in September 2005 initiated wide-scale raids against suspected gang
members, netting 660 arrests across United States. ICE efforts were at first directed towards MS-13, in its Operation Community Shield. In May 2005, ICE expanded Operation Community Shield to include all transnational organized crime and prison gangs.
ICE's Operation Community Shield has since arrested 7,655 street gang members. In the United States, the gang's strongholds have historically been in the American Southwest and West Coast states. Membership in the U.S was believed to be as many as about 50,000 as of 2005. MS-13 criminal activities include drug smuggling and sales
, arms trafficking, auto theft, carjacking
, home invasion
, assault
, aggravated assault,
assault on law enforcement officials, drive-by shooting
s, contract killing
and murder
.
The goal of many street gang members is to gain the respect that comes from being in a prison gang. Prison gangs use street gangs members as their power base for which they recruit new members. For many members reaching prison gang status shows the ultimate commitment to the gang.
A prison gang is a gang that is started in a prison
. Some prison gangs are transplanted from the street, and in some occasions, prison gangs "outgrow" the penitentiary and engage in criminal activities on the outside. Many prison gangs are racially oriented. Gang umbrella organizations like the Folk Nation
and People Nation
have originated in prisons.
One prominent example of a prison gang is the Aryan Brotherhood
, an organization known for its violence and calls for white supremacy. On July 28, 2006, after a six-year federal investigation, four leaders of the gang were convicted of racketeering, murder, and conspiracy charges. Founded in the mid 1960s, the gang, known as the 'Brand' or the 'Rock' in the federal and state prison systems, is famous for being affiliated with the white supremacist paramilitary hate group the Aryan Nations, with the Nazi Low Riders prison gang acting as the Aryan Brotherhood's foot soldiers. Besides fostering pseudo-theological hate, racism, sexism, violence, and intimidation, the Aryan Brotherhood is involved in drug trafficking, extortion
, illegal gambling, protection racket
s, and murder
inside and outside of prisons.
In the mid-1980s, the Aryan League
, an alliance between the Aryan Brotherhood
and Public Enemy No.1, formed. The sub-gangs (in collaboration with their wives and girlfriends who take jobs at banks, mortgage companies, and motor vehicle departments) work together in identity theft schemes. Money from the identity theft operations is used to fund the gangs' methamphetamine business. A gang hit list discovered in the Buena Park investigation has police worried that the gangs are using stolen credit information to learn the addresses of police and their families.
Once out of prison, gang members tend to regroup on the outside and often cross gang lines to further their criminal careers. One example of this is David Lind, an Aryan Brotherhood member, who joined the Wonderland Gang
with several non-AB fellow prison inmates in 1981. Post prison gang activities can be brutal, as evidenced by the ruthless quadruple murder of the Wonderland gang (see "Wonderland Murders
") which Lind narrowly escaped.
There has been a long running racial tension between African American
and Mexican American
prison gang
s and significant race riot
s in California
prisons where Mexican inmates and African Americans have targeted each other particularly, based on racial reasons.
is gang related activity - as proved by programs such as Operation Community Shield, which has detained over fourteen hundred illegal immigrant gang members. Mara Salvatrucha
publicly declared that it targets the Minutemen
, an anti-illegal immigration group who take it upon themselves to control the border, to "teach them a lesson", possibly due to their smuggling of various Central/South Americans (mostly other gang members), drugs, and weapons across the border. A confidential California Department of Justice
study reported in 1995 that 60 percent of the twenty thousand members of the 18th Street Gang
in California
are illegal immigrates.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
date to the early 19th century. The most publicized street gangs in the U.S. are African-American; black gangs were not recognized as a social problem until after the great migration of the 1910s. An exception was noted in 1853 Philadelphia.
Some have argued that increasing gang activity is directly related to decreases in adult mentors, school failures, decreases in after-school programs and similar failures by the adults in the lives of children. While kids from more affluent neighborhoods may turn to other less dangerous alternatives, children from poorer neighborhoods often turn to gangs both as protection and a place to find love and understanding.
Gang demographics
There were at least 30,000 gangs and 800,000 gang members active across the USA in 2007, up from 731,500 in 2002 and 750,000 in 2004. By 1999, Hispanics accounted for 47% of all gang members, BlacksAfrican American
African Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have at least partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa and are the direct descendants of enslaved Africans within the boundaries of the present United States...
34%, Whites
White American
White Americans are people of the United States who are considered or consider themselves White. The United States Census Bureau defines White people as those "having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa...
13%, and Asians
Asian American
Asian Americans are Americans of Asian descent. The U.S. Census Bureau definition of Asians as "Asian” refers to a person having origins in any of the original peoples of the Far East, Southeast Asia, or the Indian subcontinent, including, for example, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Japan,...
6%.
Gang Activity
Most gangs in America are formed with some type of intention. Gangs like Latin KingsLatin Kings
The Almighty Latin King and Queen Nation is said to be the largest and most organized Hispanic street gang in the United States of America, which has its roots dating back to the 1940s in Chicago, Illinois.-History:...
and the Bloods
Bloods
The Bloods are a street gang founded in Los Angeles, California. The gang is widely known for its rivalry with the Crips. They are identified by the red color worn by their members and by particular gang symbols, including distinctive hand signs...
say they represent "brotherhood" and unity. Police say 80% of crimes throughout the country are committed by gang members. Although most gangs started in major cities like Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
, Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
, Miami and New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
. After gangs in the USA started getting sophisticated and gained power, they migrated to other U.S. cities such as Atlanta, Memphis, Orlando
Orlando
Orlando is a major city in the U.S. state of Florida.Orlando may also refer to-Places:* in Florida** Orlando, a major city** Greater Orlando, the 27th-largest metropolitan area in the United States...
, Houston, Detroit and other major cities.
History
The History of African-American youth gangs extends as far back as the 1940s. Although lacking a definition, the gangs then were characterized by young people hanging out on street corners. It is thought these early groups formed to protect their localities from other similar groups of youths.Herbert Asbury
Herbert Asbury
Herbert Asbury was an American journalist and writer who is best known for his true crime books detailing crime during the 19th and early 20th century such as Gem of the Prairie, Barbary Coast: An Informal History of the San Francisco Underworld and The Gangs of New York...
depicted some of these groups in his history of Irish and American gangs in Manhattan. He described how gangs would fight for territory, control of criminal enterprises, and simply for the love of fighting. Asbury's book was later used by Martin Scorsese
Martin Scorsese
Martin Charles Scorsese is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and film historian. In 1990 he founded The Film Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to film preservation, and in 2007 he founded the World Cinema Foundation...
as the basis for the motion picture Gangs of New York
Gangs of New York
Gangs of New York is a 2002 historical film set in the mid-19th century in the Five Points district of New York City. It was directed by Martin Scorsese and written by Jay Cocks, Steven Zaillian, and Kenneth Lonergan. The film was inspired by Herbert Asbury's 1928 nonfiction book, The Gangs of New...
.
Gangs in the 19th Century were often multi-ethnic as neighborhoods did not display the social polarization that has segregated different ethnic groups in the postmodern city (see Edward Soja
Edward Soja
Edward William Soja is a postmodern political geographer and urban planner on the faculty at UCLA, where he is Distinguished Professor of Urban Planning, and the London School of Economics. He has a Ph.D. from Syracuse University...
). A host of European nationalities including English
English American
English Americans are citizens or residents of the United States whose ancestry originates wholly or partly in England....
, Scottish
Scottish American
Scottish Americans or Scots Americans are citizens of the United States whose ancestry originates wholly or partly in Scotland. Scottish Americans are closely related to Scots-Irish Americans, descendants of Ulster Scots, and communities emphasize and celebrate a common heritage...
, Irish
Irish American
Irish Americans are citizens of the United States who can trace their ancestry to Ireland. A total of 36,278,332 Americans—estimated at 11.9% of the total population—reported Irish ancestry in the 2008 American Community Survey conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau...
and German
German American
German Americans are citizens of the United States of German ancestry and comprise about 51 million people, or 17% of the U.S. population, the country's largest self-reported ancestral group...
could be found in the same neighborhoods. This made territoriality for gangs much more important than ethnic homogeneity.
20th century
The United StatesUnited States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
attempted to fight both the Vietnam War
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...
and the war on poverty at home. Limited funding, incoherent local and national plans to combat inner-city poverty, and escalated police and military violence against blacks and immigrants all aided towards the conditions which would eventually give birth to gangs across the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, including the infamous Bloods
Bloods
The Bloods are a street gang founded in Los Angeles, California. The gang is widely known for its rivalry with the Crips. They are identified by the red color worn by their members and by particular gang symbols, including distinctive hand signs...
and Crips
Crips
The Crips are a primarily, but not exclusively, African American gang. They were founded in Los Angeles, California, in 1969 mainly by Raymond Washington and Stanley Williams...
of Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
, California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
.
The Crips
Crips
The Crips are a primarily, but not exclusively, African American gang. They were founded in Los Angeles, California, in 1969 mainly by Raymond Washington and Stanley Williams...
were formed out of the poor socio-economic and repressive conditions which African-Americans living in Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
were subject to in the late 1960s. As police continued to jail black youths in seeking to destroy the Black Panther Party
Black Panther Party
The Black Panther Party wasan African-American revolutionary leftist organization. It was active in the United States from 1966 until 1982....
, the Crips were formed in 1969 by Raymond Washington
Raymond Washington
Raymond Lee Washington was the original founder of the South Central Los Angeles street gang the Crips....
, loosely acting as a community organization which aimed to help disenfranchised African-American communities of L.A. The Bloods
Bloods
The Bloods are a street gang founded in Los Angeles, California. The gang is widely known for its rivalry with the Crips. They are identified by the red color worn by their members and by particular gang symbols, including distinctive hand signs...
quickly followed, with a mandate to protect the community from external violence.
As job cuts continued to rise and employers began to hire from the cheaper labour pool of the expanding Latino immigrant community, unemployment rates of African-American men reached as high as 50% in several areas of South Central Los Angeles, opening up large recruitment markets for the burgeoning gangs. The increasing social isolation felt by African-American communities across the nation continued unabated in the 1980s and 90s, leading to higher rates of social pathologies, including violence.
As gang members and factions continued to grow, the introduction of crack cocaine
Crack cocaine
Crack cocaine is the freebase form of cocaine that can be smoked. It may also be termed rock, hard, iron, cavvy, base, or just crack; it is the most addictive form of cocaine. Crack rocks offer a short but intense high to smokers...
(cheap and highly addictive) to American cities would prove fatal. Crack money now could be used to purchase unprecedented amounts of weaponry, and as newly armed gang members began to fight over 'turf', or the territory in which gangs would run their lucrative drug-trades, violence soared, as the FBI's national data of gang-related homicides show: from 288 in 1985 up to 1362 in 1993.
1990s
As gang-violence accelerated, so too did police violence against African-American communities, which culminated in the arrest of Rodney KingRodney King
Rodney Glen King is an American best known for his involvement in a police brutality case involving the Los Angeles Police Department on March 3, 1991...
which sparked the 1992 Los Angeles riots
1992 Los Angeles riots
The 1992 Los Angeles Riots or South Central Riots, also known as the 1992 Los Angeles Civil Unrest were sparked on April 29, 1992, when a jury acquitted three white and one hispanic Los Angeles Police Department officers accused in the videotaped beating of black motorist Rodney King following a...
. In the aftermath of the riots, leaders of the Bloods
Bloods
The Bloods are a street gang founded in Los Angeles, California. The gang is widely known for its rivalry with the Crips. They are identified by the red color worn by their members and by particular gang symbols, including distinctive hand signs...
and the Crips
Crips
The Crips are a primarily, but not exclusively, African American gang. They were founded in Los Angeles, California, in 1969 mainly by Raymond Washington and Stanley Williams...
announced a truce (spearheaded by Compton's then mayor Walter R. Tucker, Jr.
Walter R. Tucker, Jr.
Walter R. Tucker, Jr. was a dentist who served nine years as the Mayor of Compton, California.- Biography :Walter Rayford Tucker, Jr. was born in Oklahoma. He became a dentist and moved to Compton, California in the 1950s...
), and in May 1992, 1600 rival gang members converged on Imperial Courts, a main housing project of Watts, Los Angeles, California
Watts, Los Angeles, California
Watts is a mostly residential neighborhood in South Los Angeles, California.-History:The area now known as Watts is located on the Rancho La Tajauta Mexican land grant...
to demonstrate their new-found companionship. But after only a few months of relative harmony, tensions between Los Angeles County's more than 100,000 gang members (in February 1993) began to raise the murder rates, rising to resemble previous levels.
Although various institutions and initiatives were introduced during the 1990s, including the Grant Research Evaluation and Tracking (GREAT) inter-state computer tracking system, which tracks the movements of 2,000 known gang members, and the Gang Violence and Juvenile Crime Prevention act of 1998, gangs continue to plague American inner-cities. Oakland, California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
saw 113 drug- and/or gang-related homicides in 2002 alone, and 2003 sported similar figures. Many cities across America are still experiencing the effects of gangs on their streets, such as Baltimore
Baltimore
Baltimore is the largest independent city in the United States and the largest city and cultural center of the US state of Maryland. The city is located in central Maryland along the tidal portion of the Patapsco River, an arm of the Chesapeake Bay. Baltimore is sometimes referred to as Baltimore...
, Maryland
Maryland
Maryland is a U.S. state located in the Mid Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware to its east...
, whose gang problem is a major theme of HBO's critically acclaimed series The Wire
The WIRE
the WIRE is the student-run College radio station at the University of Oklahoma, broadcasting in a freeform format. The WIRE serves the University of Oklahoma and surrounding communities, and is staffed by student DJs. The WIRE broadcasts at 1710 kHz AM in Norman, Oklahoma...
.
In 1994, Mary "Beth" Pelz, a criminologist at University of Houston–Downtown
University of Houston–Downtown
The University of Houston–Downtown is a four-year state university, and is a distinct component institution of the University of Houston System. Its campus spans 20-acre in Downtown Houston, with a satellite location in northwestern Harris County...
, said that Texas lacked "a rich history of street gangs" compared to other parts of the United States. She said Houston area gangs began to branch out to newer developments in the 1980s.
The 1995 murder of Stephanie Kuhen
Murder of Stephanie Kuhen
The murder of Stephanie Kuhen in 1995 in Los Angeles created significant media attention in the United States and led to crackdowns on Los Angeles street gangs....
in Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
lead to condemnation from President Bill Clinton
Bill Clinton
William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...
and a crackdown on Los Angeles-area gangs.
2000s
According to a 2006 Texas MonthlyTexas Monthly
Texas Monthly is a monthly American magazine headquartered in Austin, Texas. Texas Monthly is published by Emmis Publishing, L.P. and was founded in 1973 by Michael R. Levy, Texas Monthly chronicles life in contemporary Texas, writing on politics, the environment, industry, and education...
article by Skip Hollandsworth, many street gangs in Texas have no organized command structures. Individual "cliques" of gangs, defined by streets, parts of streets, apartment complexes, or parts of apartment complexes, act as individual groups. Texas "Cliques" tend to be headed by leaders called "OG"s (short for "original gangster"s) and each "clique" performs a specific activity or set of activities in a given area, such as controlling trafficking of recreational drugs and managing prostitution.
It was reported in 2008 that 1-2% of the U.S. military belongs to gangs, according to FBI gang investigator Jennifer Simon in a published article, 50-100 times the rate in the general population. In 2009, David Kennedy, director of the Center for Crime Prevention and Control at John Jay College of Criminal Justice
John Jay College of Criminal Justice
The John Jay College of Criminal Justice is a senior college of the City University of New York in Midtown Manhattan, New York City and is the only liberal arts college with a criminal justice and forensic focus in the United States. The college offers programs in Forensic Science and Forensic...
of the City University of New York
City University of New York
The City University of New York is the public university system of New York City, with its administrative offices in Yorkville in Manhattan. It is the largest urban university in the United States, consisting of 23 institutions: 11 senior colleges, six community colleges, the William E...
, said that a lot of violence in inner cities in the United States is mislabeled as "gang violence" when in fact it involves small, informal cliques of people.
Organized gangs
Hallsworth and Young (2005) describe an organized gang as a group of individuals for whom involvement in crime is for personal gain (mostly financial, though could be otherwise, sexual gratification as with pedophile rings). For most, crime is their 'occupation'. These groups operate almost exclusively in the grey and illegal marketplace where market transactions are unregulated by the law.Transnational organized crime groups may be involved in crimes ranging from drug trafficking
Illegal drug trade
The illegal drug trade is a global black market, dedicated to cultivation, manufacture, distribution and sale of those substances which are subject to drug prohibition laws. Most jurisdictions prohibit trade, except under license, of many types of drugs by drug prohibition laws.A UN report said the...
, arms trafficking, human trafficking
Human trafficking
Human trafficking is the illegal trade of human beings for the purposes of reproductive slavery, commercial sexual exploitation, forced labor, or a modern-day form of slavery...
, contract killing
Contract killing
Contract killing is a form of murder, in which one party hires another party to kill a target individual or group of people. It involves an illegal agreement between two parties in which one party agrees to kill the target in exchange for consideration, monetary, or otherwise. The hiring party may...
, piracy
Copyright infringement
Copyright infringement is the unauthorized or prohibited use of works under copyright, infringing the copyright holder's exclusive rights, such as the right to reproduce or perform the copyrighted work, or to make derivative works.- "Piracy" :...
, counterfeiting, money laundering
Money laundering
Money laundering is the process of disguising illegal sources of money so that it looks like it came from legal sources. The methods by which money may be laundered are varied and can range in sophistication. Many regulatory and governmental authorities quote estimates each year for the amount...
, extortion
Extortion
Extortion is a criminal offence which occurs when a person unlawfully obtains either money, property or services from a person, entity, or institution, through coercion. Refraining from doing harm is sometimes euphemistically called protection. Extortion is commonly practiced by organized crime...
, and illegal gambling, to acts of terrorism
Terrorism
Terrorism is the systematic use of terror, especially as a means of coercion. In the international community, however, terrorism has no universally agreed, legally binding, criminal law definition...
, to political assassination
Assassination
To carry out an assassination is "to murder by a sudden and/or secret attack, often for political reasons." Alternatively, assassination may be defined as "the act of deliberately killing someone, especially a public figure, usually for hire or for political reasons."An assassination may be...
. The complexity and seriousness of the crimes committed by global crime groups pose a threat not only to law enforcement but to democracy and legitimate economic development as well.
Criminal organizations exercise disproportionate control over the illegal means and forces of crime production. Members are likely to have mutated out of gang-members who are often used to service their needs. Motives that impel membership of these groups are similar to those that motivate business people in the legitimate economy.
Organized crime groups are not homogeneous. Some will be amateur affairs operated and managed by incompetent people. Others, however, will demonstrate more market acumen and more ruthlessness. These individuals may be difficult to trace because they will be more competent at hiding their activities. They may also have the financial muscle to acquire considerable legal protection through well paid lawyers and accountants.
There are numerous organized crime groups and they can be found in the majority of small to medium sized cities at varying degrees of size and organization. All large cities will house some kind of organized crime group. A further distinction could be made with what are often termed organized crime syndicates.
There are a number of widely known crime organizations as such whose operations span the world. Perhaps the most famous are the American Mafia
American Mafia
The American Mafia , is an Italian-American criminal society. Much like the Sicilian Mafia, the American Mafia has no formal name and is a secret criminal society. Its members usually refer to it as Cosa Nostra or by its English translation "our thing"...
(often portrayed in New York mob movies), the Irish Mob
Irish Mob
The Irish Mob is one of the oldest organized crime groups in the United States, in existence since the early 19th century. Originating in Irish American street gangs of the 19th century — depicted in Herbert Asbury's 1928 book The Gangs of New York — the Irish Mob has appeared in most...
, the Chinese
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
Triad Society, the Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
ese Yakuza
Yakuza
, also known as , are members of traditional organized crime syndicates in Japan. The Japanese police, and media by request of the police, call them bōryokudan , literally "violence group", while the yakuza call themselves "ninkyō dantai" , "chivalrous organizations". The yakuza are notoriously...
, the Sicilian Mafia, and the Russian Mafia
Russian Mafia
The Russian Mafia is a name applied to organized crime syndicates in Russia and Ukraine. The mafia in various countries take the name of the country, as for example the Ukrainian mafia....
. Other large cities also play host to unique types of organized criminals. For example, London's East End
East End of London
The East End of London, also known simply as the East End, is the area of London, England, United Kingdom, east of the medieval walled City of London and north of the River Thames. Although not defined by universally accepted formal boundaries, the River Lea can be considered another boundary...
is home to a number of traditional crime families, and was the home of the infamous Kray Twins
Kray twins
Reginald "Reggie" Kray and his twin brother Ronald "Ronnie" Kray were the foremost perpetrators of organised crime in London's East End during the 1950s and 1960s...
, and Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
's Irish Mob
Irish Mob
The Irish Mob is one of the oldest organized crime groups in the United States, in existence since the early 19th century. Originating in Irish American street gangs of the 19th century — depicted in Herbert Asbury's 1928 book The Gangs of New York — the Irish Mob has appeared in most...
was portrayed in the Martin Scorsese
Martin Scorsese
Martin Charles Scorsese is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and film historian. In 1990 he founded The Film Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to film preservation, and in 2007 he founded the World Cinema Foundation...
film "The Departed
The Departed
The Departed is a 2006 American crime thriller film, fashioned as a remake of the 2002 Hong Kong film Infernal Affairs. The film was directed by Martin Scorsese and written by William Monahan...
". Recently, Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
's Folk Nation
Folk Nation
The Folk Nation is an alliance of street gangs, based in the Chicago area, which has since spread throughout the United States, specifically in the Midwest and the South. They are rivals to the People Nation....
has broken out from a street gang into international business and is thought by many to be the newest entity of the organized crime
Organized crime
Organized crime or criminal organizations are transnational, national, or local groupings of highly centralized enterprises run by criminals for the purpose of engaging in illegal activity, most commonly for monetary profit. Some criminal organizations, such as terrorist organizations, are...
world.
Latino Gangs
Hispanic
Hispanic is a term that originally denoted a relationship to Hispania, which is to say the Iberian Peninsula: Andorra, Gibraltar, Portugal and Spain. During the Modern Era, Hispanic sometimes takes on a more limited meaning, particularly in the United States, where the term means a person of ...
street gang in the United States of America. The group has roots dating back to the 1940s in Chicago, Illinois. The Latin Kings first emerged in Chicago in the 1940s after several young Puerto Rican
Puerto Rican people
A Puerto Rican is a person who was born in Puerto Rico.Puerto Ricans born and raised in the continental United States are also sometimes referred to as Puerto Ricans, although they were not born in Puerto Rico...
males on the north side—and later, Mexican
Mexican people
Mexican people refers to all persons from Mexico, a multiethnic country in North America, and/or who identify with the Mexican cultural and/or national identity....
males on the south side—organized into a self-defense group to protect their communities. The initial intention was to unite "all Latinos" into a collective struggle against "oppression" and to help each other overcome the problems of racism and prejudice that newly arriving Latino immigrants were experiencing. Hence, the name "Latin Kings and Queens", which as it denotes, is a reference to members of all Latino heritages. They organized themselves as a vanguard for their communities.
Like the Black Panthers, the Young Lords, and many other groups perceiving social injustices directed at their kind, the Latin Kings were broken as a movement. They lost touch with their roots and grew into one of the largest and most infamous criminal gangs in America. The group's members became involved in crimes including murder, drug trafficking, robberies and other organized criminal activities.
Mara Salvatrucha
Mara Salvatrucha
Mara Salvatrucha is a transnational criminal gang that originated in Los Angeles and has spread to other parts of the United States, Canada, Mexico, and Central America. The majority of the gang is ethnically composed of Central Americans and active in urban and suburban areas...
(commonly abbreviated as "MS", "Mara", or "MS-13") is a criminal gang
Organized crime
Organized crime or criminal organizations are transnational, national, or local groupings of highly centralized enterprises run by criminals for the purpose of engaging in illegal activity, most commonly for monetary profit. Some criminal organizations, such as terrorist organizations, are...
that originated in Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
and has spread to Central America
Central America
Central America is the central geographic region of the Americas. It is the southernmost, isthmian portion of the North American continent, which connects with South America on the southeast. When considered part of the unified continental model, it is considered a subcontinent...
, other parts of the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, and Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
. MS-13 is one of the most dangerous gangs in the United States. The majority of the gang is ethnically composed of Salvadorans
El Salvador
El Salvador or simply Salvador is the smallest and the most densely populated country in Central America. The country's capital city and largest city is San Salvador; Santa Ana and San Miguel are also important cultural and commercial centers in the country and in all of Central America...
, Hondurans
Honduras
Honduras is a republic in Central America. It was previously known as Spanish Honduras to differentiate it from British Honduras, which became the modern-day state of Belize...
, Guatemala
Guatemala
Guatemala is a country in Central America bordered by Mexico to the north and west, the Pacific Ocean to the southwest, Belize to the northeast, the Caribbean to the east, and Honduras and El Salvador to the southeast...
ns, and Nicaragua
Nicaragua
Nicaragua is the largest country in the Central American American isthmus, bordered by Honduras to the north and Costa Rica to the south. The country is situated between 11 and 14 degrees north of the Equator in the Northern Hemisphere, which places it entirely within the tropics. The Pacific Ocean...
ns.
Their activities have caught the eye of the Federal Bureau of Investigation
Federal Bureau of Investigation
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency . The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...
(FBI) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), who in September 2005 initiated wide-scale raids against suspected gang
Gang
A gang is a group of people who, through the organization, formation, and establishment of an assemblage, share a common identity. In current usage it typically denotes a criminal organization or else a criminal affiliation. In early usage, the word gang referred to a group of workmen...
members, netting 660 arrests across United States. ICE efforts were at first directed towards MS-13, in its Operation Community Shield. In May 2005, ICE expanded Operation Community Shield to include all transnational organized crime and prison gangs.
ICE's Operation Community Shield has since arrested 7,655 street gang members. In the United States, the gang's strongholds have historically been in the American Southwest and West Coast states. Membership in the U.S was believed to be as many as about 50,000 as of 2005. MS-13 criminal activities include drug smuggling and sales
Illegal drug trade
The illegal drug trade is a global black market, dedicated to cultivation, manufacture, distribution and sale of those substances which are subject to drug prohibition laws. Most jurisdictions prohibit trade, except under license, of many types of drugs by drug prohibition laws.A UN report said the...
, arms trafficking, auto theft, carjacking
Carjacking
Carjacking is a form of hijacking, where the crime is of stealing a motor vehicle and so also armed assault when the vehicle is occupied. Historically, such as in the rash of semi-trailer truck hijackings during the 1960s, the general term hijacking was used for that type of vehicle abduction,...
, home invasion
Home invasion
Home invasion is the act of illegally burgling or entering a private and occupied dwelling for the purpose of committing a crime Home invasion is the act of illegally burgling or entering a private and occupied dwelling for the purpose of committing a crime Home invasion is the act of illegally...
, assault
Assault
In law, assault is a crime causing a victim to fear violence. The term is often confused with battery, which involves physical contact. The specific meaning of assault varies between countries, but can refer to an act that causes another to apprehend immediate and personal violence, or in the more...
, aggravated assault,
assault on law enforcement officials, drive-by shooting
Drive-by shooting
A drive-by shooting is a form of hit-and-run tactic, a personal attack carried out by an individual or individuals from a moving or momentarily stopped vehicle without use of headlights to avoid being noticed. It often results in bystanders being shot instead of, or as well as, the intended target...
s, contract killing
Contract killing
Contract killing is a form of murder, in which one party hires another party to kill a target individual or group of people. It involves an illegal agreement between two parties in which one party agrees to kill the target in exchange for consideration, monetary, or otherwise. The hiring party may...
and murder
Murder
Murder is the unlawful killing, with malice aforethought, of another human being, and generally this state of mind distinguishes murder from other forms of unlawful homicide...
.
Prison based gangs
Prison gangs, like most street gangs formed for protection against other gangs.The goal of many street gang members is to gain the respect that comes from being in a prison gang. Prison gangs use street gangs members as their power base for which they recruit new members. For many members reaching prison gang status shows the ultimate commitment to the gang.
A prison gang is a gang that is started in a prison
Prison
A prison is a place in which people are physically confined and, usually, deprived of a range of personal freedoms. Imprisonment or incarceration is a legal penalty that may be imposed by the state for the commission of a crime...
. Some prison gangs are transplanted from the street, and in some occasions, prison gangs "outgrow" the penitentiary and engage in criminal activities on the outside. Many prison gangs are racially oriented. Gang umbrella organizations like the Folk Nation
Folk Nation
The Folk Nation is an alliance of street gangs, based in the Chicago area, which has since spread throughout the United States, specifically in the Midwest and the South. They are rivals to the People Nation....
and People Nation
People Nation
People Nation is an alliance of street gangs generally associated with the Chicago area. They are rivals to the Folk Nation.The People Nation were formed much in the same way as the Folk Nation. In 1978, the El Rukns People Nation is an alliance of street gangs generally associated with the Chicago...
have originated in prisons.
One prominent example of a prison gang is the Aryan Brotherhood
Aryan Brotherhood
The Aryan Brotherhood, also known as The Brand, the AB, or the One-Two, is a white supremacist prison gang and organized crime syndicate in the United States with about 20,000 members in and out of prison...
, an organization known for its violence and calls for white supremacy. On July 28, 2006, after a six-year federal investigation, four leaders of the gang were convicted of racketeering, murder, and conspiracy charges. Founded in the mid 1960s, the gang, known as the 'Brand' or the 'Rock' in the federal and state prison systems, is famous for being affiliated with the white supremacist paramilitary hate group the Aryan Nations, with the Nazi Low Riders prison gang acting as the Aryan Brotherhood's foot soldiers. Besides fostering pseudo-theological hate, racism, sexism, violence, and intimidation, the Aryan Brotherhood is involved in drug trafficking, extortion
Extortion
Extortion is a criminal offence which occurs when a person unlawfully obtains either money, property or services from a person, entity, or institution, through coercion. Refraining from doing harm is sometimes euphemistically called protection. Extortion is commonly practiced by organized crime...
, illegal gambling, protection racket
Protection racket
A protection racket is an extortion scheme whereby a criminal group or individual coerces a victim to pay money, supposedly for protection services against violence or property damage. Racketeers coerce reticent potential victims into buying "protection" by demonstrating what will happen if they...
s, and murder
Murder
Murder is the unlawful killing, with malice aforethought, of another human being, and generally this state of mind distinguishes murder from other forms of unlawful homicide...
inside and outside of prisons.
In the mid-1980s, the Aryan League
Aryan League
The Aryan League is an Iranian Neo-Nazi political party. It was founded by former members of the Pan-Iranist Party who left that group due to their racialist beliefs. Their stated goal is, "To return to Iran and her Aryan people their pride & glorious legacy of six thousand years past...
, an alliance between the Aryan Brotherhood
Aryan Brotherhood
The Aryan Brotherhood, also known as The Brand, the AB, or the One-Two, is a white supremacist prison gang and organized crime syndicate in the United States with about 20,000 members in and out of prison...
and Public Enemy No.1, formed. The sub-gangs (in collaboration with their wives and girlfriends who take jobs at banks, mortgage companies, and motor vehicle departments) work together in identity theft schemes. Money from the identity theft operations is used to fund the gangs' methamphetamine business. A gang hit list discovered in the Buena Park investigation has police worried that the gangs are using stolen credit information to learn the addresses of police and their families.
Once out of prison, gang members tend to regroup on the outside and often cross gang lines to further their criminal careers. One example of this is David Lind, an Aryan Brotherhood member, who joined the Wonderland Gang
Wonderland Gang
The Wonderland Gang was a group of drug dealers involved in the Los Angeles cocaine trade during the late 1970s and early 1980s; their homebase was located on Wonderland Avenue in the Laurel Canyon area. On July 1, 1981 four members of the gang died in the Wonderland murders...
with several non-AB fellow prison inmates in 1981. Post prison gang activities can be brutal, as evidenced by the ruthless quadruple murder of the Wonderland gang (see "Wonderland Murders
Wonderland Murders
The Wonderland murders, also known as Four on the Floor or Laurel Canyon Murders, occurred in Los Angeles in 1981, when four people were killed in a drug-related scenario involving porn star John Holmes and was allegedly masterminded by Los Angeles businessman and drug dealer Eddie Nash.-Robbery...
") which Lind narrowly escaped.
There has been a long running racial tension between African American
African American
African Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have at least partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa and are the direct descendants of enslaved Africans within the boundaries of the present United States...
and Mexican American
Mexican American
Mexican Americans are Americans of Mexican descent. As of July 2009, Mexican Americans make up 10.3% of the United States' population with over 31,689,000 Americans listed as of Mexican ancestry. Mexican Americans comprise 66% of all Hispanics and Latinos in the United States...
prison gang
Prison gang
Prison gang is a term used to denote any type of gang activity in prisons and correctional facilities. Prison officials and others in law enforcement use the term security threat group or STG...
s and significant race riot
Race riot
A race riot or racial riot is an outbreak of violent civil disorder in which race is a key factor. A phenomenon frequently confused with the concept of 'race riot' is sectarian violence, which involves public mass violence or conflict over non-racial factors.-United States:The term had entered the...
s in California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
prisons where Mexican inmates and African Americans have targeted each other particularly, based on racial reasons.
Illegal immigration
One of the concerns of increased illegal immigrationIllegal immigration to the United States
An illegal immigrant in the United States is an alien who has entered the United States without government permission or stayed beyond the termination date of a visa....
is gang related activity - as proved by programs such as Operation Community Shield, which has detained over fourteen hundred illegal immigrant gang members. Mara Salvatrucha
Mara Salvatrucha
Mara Salvatrucha is a transnational criminal gang that originated in Los Angeles and has spread to other parts of the United States, Canada, Mexico, and Central America. The majority of the gang is ethnically composed of Central Americans and active in urban and suburban areas...
publicly declared that it targets the Minutemen
Minuteman Civil Defense Corps
The Minuteman Civil Defense Corps is a volunteer group headed by Chris Simcox and dedicated to preventing illegal crossings of the United States border. Arguing that the government is insufficiently concerned with securing the U.S. border, they have organized several state chapters, with the...
, an anti-illegal immigration group who take it upon themselves to control the border, to "teach them a lesson", possibly due to their smuggling of various Central/South Americans (mostly other gang members), drugs, and weapons across the border. A confidential California Department of Justice
California Department of Justice
The California Department of Justice is the department in the California executive branch under the leadership of the California Attorney General.-Description:It has 5344 employees and a budget of $791 million...
study reported in 1995 that 60 percent of the twenty thousand members of the 18th Street Gang
18th Street gang
18th Street gang is considered to be the largest transnational criminal gang in Los Angeles, California. It is estimated that there are thousands of members in Los Angeles County alone...
in California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
are illegal immigrates.
External links
- "Youth Gangs: An Overview" - Texas Youth CommissionTexas Youth CommissionThe Texas Youth Commission is a Texas state agency which operates juvenile corrections facilities in the state. The commission is headquartered in the Brown-Heatly Building in Austin...
- National Gang Threat Assessment report by the Federal Bureau of InvestigationFederal Bureau of InvestigationThe Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency . The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...