- Jul 25, 2002
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Move against Urban Gang Violence ?
This in the inner cities, along with things like Home Invasions are true terrorism, domestic variety.
It presents more of a threat to all Americans on a daily basis, and takes more lives each year that all outside threats combined.
Rumsfeld even makes comments about how Los Angeles, or Washington D.C., or New York streets are more dangerous
that what our forces are facing in Iraq - Why don't we deal with this activity as the Terrorist Threat that is really is ?
Washington Post - Clip:
Violent, highly structured gangs are spreading across metropolitan Washington in a steady arc, law enforcement officials say, recruiting young members in urban and suburban neighborhoods and leaving graffiti-scrawled signs in a demonstration of their growing presence.
The rise of these gangs, which are finding a place alongside the region's neighborhood-based, drug-dealing crews, presents a troubling picture on the streets and a worrisome projection for the future, officials say.
The estimated number of gang members in the region has risen to more than 3,000, officials say, with much of the growth driven by gangs with formal rules of membership and specific tattoos, hand signs, bandannas or colors that display loyalties. These groups emphasize Latino pride or machismo, roots to El Salvador, or connections to more established gangs that dominate the barrios and poorer neighborhoods in Los Angeles, federal officials say.
The region's police forces have expanded their gang units, created a burgeoning database to share information and obtained a $500,000 federal grant to combat the problem. But day by day, the newer gangs' handiwork is beginning to leave a splotchy imprint of violence across the area.
Prosecutors say Samantha Benavides, a 19-year-old Peruvian immigrant, was beaten and drowned in the C&O Canal last December by gang members in Montgomery County. Since 1999, a gang in Northern Virginia has been linked to at least five killings in Fairfax and Arlington counties and Alexandria, along with numerous shootings, machete attacks and baseball bat beatings.
In the District, four killings this summer were attributed by police to gang-related violence. Eight young men who police say are members of a group known as Vatos Locos are facing trial in two other gang-related killings, plus a spate of shootings and beatings.
Gang activity has increased slightly across the country, said Grant Ashley, assistant director of the FBI in charge of criminal investigations, one of several law enforcement officials who testified about gang violence yesterday before the Senate Judiciary Committee.
"Nationally, we're seeing gangs involved in property crimes, crimes of violence, drug trafficking, shakedowns, extortion -- they can almost control neighborhoods at times," Ashley said in an interview after the hearing. "D.C. is getting a lot of attention, and we've increased our resources in the greater Washington area."
Although Los Angeles and Chicago remain the nation's epicenters of gang-related violence, MS-13, an international criminal enterprise with roots in El Salvador's civil war, has established a foothold in Northern Virginia, Montgomery and Prince George's counties and predominantly Latino neighborhoods in the District, police say. Federal investigators count hundreds of members of Mara Salvatrucha, as the gang is formally known, some facing charges of murder, assault and -- the group's principal enterprise -- auto theft.
There are smaller such gangs in the region with similar histories. Gangs that rely on Asian heritage or cultural ties have been in Northern Virginia for years, police say, and motorcycle gangs such as the Hells Angels, dominated by white members, rumble through Calvert and Charles counties with a penchant for brawling in turf wars. Southern Maryland authorities cite biker conflict as a troubling prospect.
Still, the District's neighborhood crews are by far the most deadly groups in the area.
In the past three years, members of just three groups -- dubbed the 1-5 Mob, the K Street Crew and Murder Inc. by prosecutors -- have been convicted of 57 murders and dozens of violent assaults, capping investigations that stretched across a decade.
Figures for 2002 compiled by the National Youth Gang Center, a research agency funded by the U.S. Department of Justice, will show that police counted more than 21,500 gangs across the United States, with more than 731,000 members, said John Moore, the agency's director. Those numbers had been steadily decreasing until last year. But in this report, more than 40 percent of the 3,000 police agencies surveyed said gang activity in their jurisdictions was "getting worse" -- compared with 27 percent who said so in 2001, Moore said.
Strong Ethnic Ties
Defining "gangs," and differentiating them from other cliques of young men, has always been a controversial issue, particularly between minorities and police. Generally, police define a gang as a group of three or more people whose binding reason for being is repeated criminal activity.
Organizational levels differ widely, but members usually share strong racial or ethnic ties.
Motorcycle gangs, such as the Hells Angels and the Pagans, are overwhelmingly white, wear distinct leather jackets and have officially sanctioned chapters. Latino gangs are also highly organized and use specific graffiti, hand signs and colors.
There are gangs of African Americans across the country -- the Black Gangster Disciples in Chicago, for example -- but most in the Washington region are neighborhood-based associations of lifelong friends. They are so loosely knit that police and prosecutors often refer to them as "crews." They use no flashy names or symbols, rarely bother with graffiti and exist primarily to sell drugs and make money, police say.
For now, Latino-based gangs are growing fastest, police say, as these groups work to increase membership and clout. Recruitment drives are common at high schools and middle schools, with "skip parties" used to draw youths cutting school from a wide area. The "parties" often include drugs and alcohol and sometimes lead to sexual assaults.
"They contact people by cell phone. They pick people up in a van," said a teenage girl who recently graduated from High Point High School in Prince George's. She said she resisted recruitment efforts by MS-13. "I've seen my friends get in the van," said the girl, who spoke on condition she not be identified, citing fears of retribution from the gang. "They've asked me to go. I said no."
Local gangs focus on young immigrants, many of whom have followed their families here from El Salvador, often from the states of San Miguel, La Union and Usulutan, and more particularly from the cities of Intipuca and Chirilagua, the areas from which immigration to the Washington area has been most common, officials say. These teenagers, with limited English skills, families bearing the hardship of recent immigration and parents often working two jobs, are susceptible to the gangs' sense of community.
"A lot of young Latinos, Salvadorans in particular, are brought to the U.S. at the beginning of their teenage years, after their parents have left them with grandparents or families back home," said Maria Alvarenga-Watkins, a Salvadoran immigrant who retired as a D.C. police captain two years ago. "By the time they get to the U.S., there's no real bond to their parents, who are working all the time anyway, and the bonding never renews. The kids are raised by TV or what they're doing in school or on the street."
Successful Recruiting
At a quarter of 2 on a recent weeknight, a black car comes whipping by the El Salvadoreño bar in Northwest Washington, blowing down rain-soaked 14th Street as if it were an empty racetrack. The driver makes a gesture at a group of young men sitting across the street from the bar, drawing catcalls and curses. The club is a landmark for local gangs, police say. The young men across the street are members of a gang known as the Street Thug Criminals, and the driver of the car is trying to set something off.
Police officers in unmarked cars force the black Honda Civic to pull over a few blocks later. Then a red car swings by, stuffed with the six young men who had been outside the bar. They're yelling taunts. This sets off another chase and an arrest: It turns out that Jimmy, the driver of the red car, is wanted as a witness to a shooting.
"You guys [expletive] with Spanish people," he sneers at the officers once he is handcuffed, standing in the sickly orange glow of the streetlights. "I'll come back out crazier than ever."
Sitting on the curb, watching the arrest, is a young man in a white T-shirt and a knit cap, his short hair flipping out from under the edges. He says that his name is Ramon, that he is 16 and came from El Salvador three years ago to join his family here.
"I'm STC. Why should I lie?" he says, using the gang's initials. "My friend, he almost got shot by VL today. We were in the carryout line at the store, and my friend said, 'Look out, they're coming.' The dude pulled out a gun, pointed it at my friend."
Whether for protection from such incidents or for a rough-hewn sense of community, the gangs' recent recruitment has been strikingly successful.
On a recent morning, Frank Morgan, an intelligence research specialist with the U.S. attorney's office in the District, is tap-tap-tapping on his computer.
On the screen is a picture of a 22-year-old man known to be a member of La Mara R. He has arrests in the District and Maryland. Morgan types his charges into the D.C. database: carrying a pistol without a license, assault with a deadly weapon (a gun), assault with a bottle, auto theft, threats, theft, attempted theft, probation violation, more threats and another assault.
The database now lists 1,801 gang members, almost all of whom live in the District. Others just pass through. About 800 on the list are currently in prison.
A similar database kept by Montgomery police counts 72 gangs and 1,700 members, up from almost nothing a decade ago. The Washington/Baltimore High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, a federal program that helps coordinate local, regional and national law enforcement efforts, estimates that MS-13 might have 600 members in Fairfax County alone.
The gangs "know that Northern Virginia is prime real estate," said Lt. Greg Smith, head of Fairfax's gang unit. "No one gang has it claimed as its drug territory. One of the richest counties, tons of kids, tons of money. They call it 'a green area.' "
Still, there are signs of hope against the gangs' influence.
Christina Schoendorf, community outreach director for the Culmore Teen Center, in a predominantly Hispanic neighborhood in the Falls Church area, said she sees a willingness among local youths to seek alternatives to gang life.
"Kids are much more open about talking about day-to-day pressures," Schoendorf said. "We talk about it, more openly about not wanting it. 'How can I live here and get away, live in Culmore and not be in a gang?' "
Although police are loath to mention gang names publicly -- they say gang members get a charge out of seeing their names in print -- law enforcement officials agree that MS-13 is the most threatening organization.
The group operates in the United States but retains ties to drug and criminal cartels in Central America, according to the National Alliance of Gang Investigators Associations, a coalition of law enforcement officers. As it expands, the gang is no longer relying exclusively on ethnic Salvadorans.
In Montgomery, Benavides, the troubled teenager from Peru, liked to hang out with MS-13 members, authorities said. A dispute with three members left her dead in the C&0 Canal in December, strangled with a bandanna, beaten and then dumped in the water, still alive but helpless to save herself, police say. Three men, including a reputed MS-13 leader, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder.
In 2001, Fredy Reyes-Castillo, 22, was beaten so badly by four MS-13 members in Reston that he couldn't be identified for weeks. The same year, 24-year-old Diana Garcia was raped and killed behind her apartment in the Falls Church area, allegedly by a gang member. Last year, four MS-13 members in Prince William County faced a gang recruiting charge after a 17-year-old girl told police she was "sexed in" -- initiated by having sex with six members.
Jose Rodriguez, an MS-13 member, stabbed Mario Rubio-Martinez to death outside a shopping center in Fairfax County in July 2000. Now serving a 23-year prison sentence for murder, Rodriguez still proclaims his gang allegiance.
"It's like a second family," he said in a recent interview at Sussex I prison in Waverly, Va.
Suffering Families
The toll of this violence is not best measured in precincts and courtrooms, but in the living rooms and lives of families brutalized by the gangs' violence.
Jason Pinkett was walking to his car in the 2700 block of Langston Place SE on Aug. 5 when a man fired an assault rifle four dozen times at members of a group with whom he was feuding, police say.
Pinkett, 23, who was not involved in the dispute, was the only person killed.
Four weeks later, his bereaved father, Jesse J. Cheek Sr., died of a heart attack. "He grieved so bad about Jason, he just couldn't take any more," said Tiashia Pinkett, the slain man's sister.
At Shrine of the Sacred Heart Church in Northwest Washington, youth minister Carlos Aquino is troubled by what he sees on the streets around him. An immigrant from El Salvador, he knows the challenges facing insecure, impoverished young men.
"New gang members are moving into the Washington area all the time," he said. "We don't have the problem that Los Angeles does. But if we don't do something now, it may get worse".
This in the inner cities, along with things like Home Invasions are true terrorism, domestic variety.
It presents more of a threat to all Americans on a daily basis, and takes more lives each year that all outside threats combined.
Rumsfeld even makes comments about how Los Angeles, or Washington D.C., or New York streets are more dangerous
that what our forces are facing in Iraq - Why don't we deal with this activity as the Terrorist Threat that is really is ?
Washington Post - Clip:
Violent, highly structured gangs are spreading across metropolitan Washington in a steady arc, law enforcement officials say, recruiting young members in urban and suburban neighborhoods and leaving graffiti-scrawled signs in a demonstration of their growing presence.
The rise of these gangs, which are finding a place alongside the region's neighborhood-based, drug-dealing crews, presents a troubling picture on the streets and a worrisome projection for the future, officials say.
The estimated number of gang members in the region has risen to more than 3,000, officials say, with much of the growth driven by gangs with formal rules of membership and specific tattoos, hand signs, bandannas or colors that display loyalties. These groups emphasize Latino pride or machismo, roots to El Salvador, or connections to more established gangs that dominate the barrios and poorer neighborhoods in Los Angeles, federal officials say.
The region's police forces have expanded their gang units, created a burgeoning database to share information and obtained a $500,000 federal grant to combat the problem. But day by day, the newer gangs' handiwork is beginning to leave a splotchy imprint of violence across the area.
Prosecutors say Samantha Benavides, a 19-year-old Peruvian immigrant, was beaten and drowned in the C&O Canal last December by gang members in Montgomery County. Since 1999, a gang in Northern Virginia has been linked to at least five killings in Fairfax and Arlington counties and Alexandria, along with numerous shootings, machete attacks and baseball bat beatings.
In the District, four killings this summer were attributed by police to gang-related violence. Eight young men who police say are members of a group known as Vatos Locos are facing trial in two other gang-related killings, plus a spate of shootings and beatings.
Gang activity has increased slightly across the country, said Grant Ashley, assistant director of the FBI in charge of criminal investigations, one of several law enforcement officials who testified about gang violence yesterday before the Senate Judiciary Committee.
"Nationally, we're seeing gangs involved in property crimes, crimes of violence, drug trafficking, shakedowns, extortion -- they can almost control neighborhoods at times," Ashley said in an interview after the hearing. "D.C. is getting a lot of attention, and we've increased our resources in the greater Washington area."
Although Los Angeles and Chicago remain the nation's epicenters of gang-related violence, MS-13, an international criminal enterprise with roots in El Salvador's civil war, has established a foothold in Northern Virginia, Montgomery and Prince George's counties and predominantly Latino neighborhoods in the District, police say. Federal investigators count hundreds of members of Mara Salvatrucha, as the gang is formally known, some facing charges of murder, assault and -- the group's principal enterprise -- auto theft.
There are smaller such gangs in the region with similar histories. Gangs that rely on Asian heritage or cultural ties have been in Northern Virginia for years, police say, and motorcycle gangs such as the Hells Angels, dominated by white members, rumble through Calvert and Charles counties with a penchant for brawling in turf wars. Southern Maryland authorities cite biker conflict as a troubling prospect.
Still, the District's neighborhood crews are by far the most deadly groups in the area.
In the past three years, members of just three groups -- dubbed the 1-5 Mob, the K Street Crew and Murder Inc. by prosecutors -- have been convicted of 57 murders and dozens of violent assaults, capping investigations that stretched across a decade.
Figures for 2002 compiled by the National Youth Gang Center, a research agency funded by the U.S. Department of Justice, will show that police counted more than 21,500 gangs across the United States, with more than 731,000 members, said John Moore, the agency's director. Those numbers had been steadily decreasing until last year. But in this report, more than 40 percent of the 3,000 police agencies surveyed said gang activity in their jurisdictions was "getting worse" -- compared with 27 percent who said so in 2001, Moore said.
Strong Ethnic Ties
Defining "gangs," and differentiating them from other cliques of young men, has always been a controversial issue, particularly between minorities and police. Generally, police define a gang as a group of three or more people whose binding reason for being is repeated criminal activity.
Organizational levels differ widely, but members usually share strong racial or ethnic ties.
Motorcycle gangs, such as the Hells Angels and the Pagans, are overwhelmingly white, wear distinct leather jackets and have officially sanctioned chapters. Latino gangs are also highly organized and use specific graffiti, hand signs and colors.
There are gangs of African Americans across the country -- the Black Gangster Disciples in Chicago, for example -- but most in the Washington region are neighborhood-based associations of lifelong friends. They are so loosely knit that police and prosecutors often refer to them as "crews." They use no flashy names or symbols, rarely bother with graffiti and exist primarily to sell drugs and make money, police say.
For now, Latino-based gangs are growing fastest, police say, as these groups work to increase membership and clout. Recruitment drives are common at high schools and middle schools, with "skip parties" used to draw youths cutting school from a wide area. The "parties" often include drugs and alcohol and sometimes lead to sexual assaults.
"They contact people by cell phone. They pick people up in a van," said a teenage girl who recently graduated from High Point High School in Prince George's. She said she resisted recruitment efforts by MS-13. "I've seen my friends get in the van," said the girl, who spoke on condition she not be identified, citing fears of retribution from the gang. "They've asked me to go. I said no."
Local gangs focus on young immigrants, many of whom have followed their families here from El Salvador, often from the states of San Miguel, La Union and Usulutan, and more particularly from the cities of Intipuca and Chirilagua, the areas from which immigration to the Washington area has been most common, officials say. These teenagers, with limited English skills, families bearing the hardship of recent immigration and parents often working two jobs, are susceptible to the gangs' sense of community.
"A lot of young Latinos, Salvadorans in particular, are brought to the U.S. at the beginning of their teenage years, after their parents have left them with grandparents or families back home," said Maria Alvarenga-Watkins, a Salvadoran immigrant who retired as a D.C. police captain two years ago. "By the time they get to the U.S., there's no real bond to their parents, who are working all the time anyway, and the bonding never renews. The kids are raised by TV or what they're doing in school or on the street."
Successful Recruiting
At a quarter of 2 on a recent weeknight, a black car comes whipping by the El Salvadoreño bar in Northwest Washington, blowing down rain-soaked 14th Street as if it were an empty racetrack. The driver makes a gesture at a group of young men sitting across the street from the bar, drawing catcalls and curses. The club is a landmark for local gangs, police say. The young men across the street are members of a gang known as the Street Thug Criminals, and the driver of the car is trying to set something off.
Police officers in unmarked cars force the black Honda Civic to pull over a few blocks later. Then a red car swings by, stuffed with the six young men who had been outside the bar. They're yelling taunts. This sets off another chase and an arrest: It turns out that Jimmy, the driver of the red car, is wanted as a witness to a shooting.
"You guys [expletive] with Spanish people," he sneers at the officers once he is handcuffed, standing in the sickly orange glow of the streetlights. "I'll come back out crazier than ever."
Sitting on the curb, watching the arrest, is a young man in a white T-shirt and a knit cap, his short hair flipping out from under the edges. He says that his name is Ramon, that he is 16 and came from El Salvador three years ago to join his family here.
"I'm STC. Why should I lie?" he says, using the gang's initials. "My friend, he almost got shot by VL today. We were in the carryout line at the store, and my friend said, 'Look out, they're coming.' The dude pulled out a gun, pointed it at my friend."
Whether for protection from such incidents or for a rough-hewn sense of community, the gangs' recent recruitment has been strikingly successful.
On a recent morning, Frank Morgan, an intelligence research specialist with the U.S. attorney's office in the District, is tap-tap-tapping on his computer.
On the screen is a picture of a 22-year-old man known to be a member of La Mara R. He has arrests in the District and Maryland. Morgan types his charges into the D.C. database: carrying a pistol without a license, assault with a deadly weapon (a gun), assault with a bottle, auto theft, threats, theft, attempted theft, probation violation, more threats and another assault.
The database now lists 1,801 gang members, almost all of whom live in the District. Others just pass through. About 800 on the list are currently in prison.
A similar database kept by Montgomery police counts 72 gangs and 1,700 members, up from almost nothing a decade ago. The Washington/Baltimore High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, a federal program that helps coordinate local, regional and national law enforcement efforts, estimates that MS-13 might have 600 members in Fairfax County alone.
The gangs "know that Northern Virginia is prime real estate," said Lt. Greg Smith, head of Fairfax's gang unit. "No one gang has it claimed as its drug territory. One of the richest counties, tons of kids, tons of money. They call it 'a green area.' "
Still, there are signs of hope against the gangs' influence.
Christina Schoendorf, community outreach director for the Culmore Teen Center, in a predominantly Hispanic neighborhood in the Falls Church area, said she sees a willingness among local youths to seek alternatives to gang life.
"Kids are much more open about talking about day-to-day pressures," Schoendorf said. "We talk about it, more openly about not wanting it. 'How can I live here and get away, live in Culmore and not be in a gang?' "
Although police are loath to mention gang names publicly -- they say gang members get a charge out of seeing their names in print -- law enforcement officials agree that MS-13 is the most threatening organization.
The group operates in the United States but retains ties to drug and criminal cartels in Central America, according to the National Alliance of Gang Investigators Associations, a coalition of law enforcement officers. As it expands, the gang is no longer relying exclusively on ethnic Salvadorans.
In Montgomery, Benavides, the troubled teenager from Peru, liked to hang out with MS-13 members, authorities said. A dispute with three members left her dead in the C&0 Canal in December, strangled with a bandanna, beaten and then dumped in the water, still alive but helpless to save herself, police say. Three men, including a reputed MS-13 leader, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder.
In 2001, Fredy Reyes-Castillo, 22, was beaten so badly by four MS-13 members in Reston that he couldn't be identified for weeks. The same year, 24-year-old Diana Garcia was raped and killed behind her apartment in the Falls Church area, allegedly by a gang member. Last year, four MS-13 members in Prince William County faced a gang recruiting charge after a 17-year-old girl told police she was "sexed in" -- initiated by having sex with six members.
Jose Rodriguez, an MS-13 member, stabbed Mario Rubio-Martinez to death outside a shopping center in Fairfax County in July 2000. Now serving a 23-year prison sentence for murder, Rodriguez still proclaims his gang allegiance.
"It's like a second family," he said in a recent interview at Sussex I prison in Waverly, Va.
Suffering Families
The toll of this violence is not best measured in precincts and courtrooms, but in the living rooms and lives of families brutalized by the gangs' violence.
Jason Pinkett was walking to his car in the 2700 block of Langston Place SE on Aug. 5 when a man fired an assault rifle four dozen times at members of a group with whom he was feuding, police say.
Pinkett, 23, who was not involved in the dispute, was the only person killed.
Four weeks later, his bereaved father, Jesse J. Cheek Sr., died of a heart attack. "He grieved so bad about Jason, he just couldn't take any more," said Tiashia Pinkett, the slain man's sister.
At Shrine of the Sacred Heart Church in Northwest Washington, youth minister Carlos Aquino is troubled by what he sees on the streets around him. An immigrant from El Salvador, he knows the challenges facing insecure, impoverished young men.
"New gang members are moving into the Washington area all the time," he said. "We don't have the problem that Los Angeles does. But if we don't do something now, it may get worse".
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