My Fellowship July- August 2010 Donna Marsh on Gangs

eba
My Fellowship
July- August 2010
Donna Marsh on
Gangs
Funded by Winston
Churchill Memorial
Trust
My blog:
donnamarshongangs@blo
gspot.com
My email:
donna1906uk@yahoo.co.
uk
01/01/2011
Donna Marsh
This report is documentation of my Fellowship research
into gangs and how they operate in America which was
sponsored by the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust.
I travelled to New York, Miami and LA attempting to
understand more about gangs and how best to manage
the growing problem in order to bring back what I have
learnt to the UK.
Contents
Page 3
Acknowledgements
Page 4 - 5
About me
Page 6 - 7
The plans for my Fellowship
Page 8
What I hope to research
Page 9
Organisation I visited in London
Page 10
Leap
Page 11
Foundation 4 Life
Page 12
Adolescent Emergency Room
Page 13 - 14
Streets of Growth
Page 15 - 16
The UK gang problem
Page 17 - 20
What is being done in the UK to tackle gangs
Page 21 - 27
My Fellowship begins.... New York
Page 28 - 32
Miami
Page 33 - 37
Los Angeles- Bakersfield
Page 38 -44
The home of gangs in America- LA
Page 45
Reflection on my whole journey
Page 46
The next step......
Page 47 - 48
All my contacts
Page 49 – 50
References
2
Acknowledgements
I would like to take this opportuinity to say a BIG THANK YOU to the Winston Churchill
Memorial Trust for allowing me to follow my dream to complete my research into gangs and
how they operate in America. I would also like to thank everyone who has helped me along
the way in all three states that I visited as well as the organisations I visited in the UK before
I began my Fellowship. I appreciate all the help and support from each and every person in
every agency and organisation that i visited and wish them all every continued success in
the future.
For further information on the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust please go to
www.wcmt.org.uk
3
About me
I first became interested in the trend of youth gangs in the UK when I moved to London to
start my Mental Health Nurse training in 2004. I was living in Lewisham and then Elephant
and Castle and saw many young people hang around the estates in groups with nothing to
do and causing a nuisance to the neighbourhood and this sparked an interest for me. During
my training, at any opportunity I could get to work with young people and adolescents I
took it and this lead me to work in a Medium Secure Adolescent Unit. I wanted to find out
more about how young people operate and why they feel the need to join gangs.
About 6 months after qualifying as a nurse and working in a Medium Secure Adolescent Unit
for a number of years, a job came up on the outskirts of London working in a prison that
housed those who had committed a variety of different crimes from robbery to murder and
due to the location of the prison, it also housed many gang members from London,
Manchester and Birmingham. It sounded like the ideal job for me. I applied and was
successful.
At first I was working with all ages within the prison who were suffering from mental health
problems. After much discussion with my manager and with managers of the Young
Offenders area of the establishment, I was allowed to spend two days a week on the unit
working exclusively with those 18-25 as this was the youngest population within this
establishment. This worked very well for about 18 months and I was able to become
involved in various different projects such as being involved in the making of a DVD to raise
awareness of knife crime in the UK in conjunction with a local school. I was involved in
selecting the young offenders to participate in this film. The young offenders and the
adolescents from the school, who were between 16-18 wrote, starred in and filmed the DVD
themselves and after it was complete many dignitaries from the local area came in to watch
the film and presented them with awards for their performance which was a great
achievement for all involved. I also supported these young people emotionally as the topic
content was very sensitive.
4
Due to my great interest in this topic, I attended many courses about youth justice as well as
one particular course on how to deal with young offenders in prison. It was a very
interesting course and at the end the tutor told the class about an organisation called the
Winston Churchill Memorial Trust. This organisation has been running since 1965 and has
awarded thousands of grants to travel overseas. They sponsor individuals to travel to
another country to research into a topic that they are passionate about to then bring back
the knowledge that they have learnt and teach others in order to learn from their
experiences. The aim of this being to not only demonstrate a benefit to the United Kingdom
as a whole but also to provide the individual with an opportunity for personal development.
I decided to apply for a Travelling Fellowship through the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust
to travel to America to look at the Youth Justice System and how they work to try and deter
young people from joining gangs and using weapons such as knives and guns.
This year, I was one of the lucky 105 people to be chosen from over a thousand from all
ages, races and backgrounds that applied. These trips usually last between 4 and 12 weeks
and can be taken any time from April 2010-March 2011. I chose to travel between July and
August 2010.
Over the next few months I did a lot of research on the internet and contacted as many
organisations as I could in the areas I had chosen to visit in New York, Miami and Los
Angeles. I chose these areas of America because I knew that they had very high rates of
gang crime and involvement and I wanted to investigate how each of these three states
dealt with the problem.
5
The plan for my fellowship
In order for me to achieve my aim successfully I set about contacting as many agencies as I
could that work with gangs both in the UK and America and awaited a response. One of the
emails I sent was the New York Gang Investigators Association (NYGIA). They were planning
on running a conference about how gangs are managed in the state of New York. Due to this
I thought this would be a good place to start. I received a reply from the President of this
association to offer me a place on the conference as well as offering this at a discounted
rate which was brilliant. This is why I decided to plan my trip for July. I thought this
conference would be a great place for me to start my trip.
I posted an email on the Gang Info mailing list, which is part of the National Gang Centre in
America. This website is for professionals who work with gangs around the world to share
information and keep up to date with the new gang trends. I posted an email explaining my
plans for coming the America in July and the kind of organisation I wanted to visit and asked
those signed up to the mailing list if there was anyone who could help me in this quest in
any way. I receive many replies inviting me to come to their organisation to take a look. I
then set about the task of filtering these results to see which organisations would be
suitable and within the areas that I wished to visit. I then began email dialogues with many
of these people who I planned to visit, keeping in contact with them until I actually arrived
in July/August.
Through my email dialogue I managed to confirm at least 2 contacts in each state and kept
in email contact until I arrived in America.
6
My plan
My plan was to travel to New York, Miami and Los Angeles for 6 weeks spending two weeks
in each state. My rough plans are as follows:
9th July 2010
Fly to New York
12th July 2010
Travel to Syracuse for conference
16th July 2010
Return to Manhattan to visit organisations that I have previously
made contact with.
24th July 2010
Fly to Miami and visit organisations such as Miami-Dade County
Juvenile Services Department and PanZOu Project Inc
6th July 2010
Fly to Los Angeles
8th July 2010
Travel to Bakersfield to visit a contact who has lots of contacts and
visits he has arranged for me
11th July 2010
Travel back to Los Angeles to visit the rest of my contacts such as
Homeboys Institute and LA Gang Tours
20th July 2010
Fly back to the UK
7
What I hoped to research
I proposed to visit organisations and agencies and speak to individuals involved in working
with the following:
-
Children that are at risk of being involved in gang activity and live in areas with a high
rate of crime
-
First time offenders who are referred by the courts
-
Gang members who are currently carrying guns and live in high crime hot spots
-
Gang members who are currently in prison
-
Gang members that want to leave their gang safely, have their tattoos removed and
attend courses such as anger management and self esteem courses.
-
Gang members who are seeking an alternative to life as part of a gang
-
Ex gang members who want to help others not to follow a life of crime and want to
share their story (Scare tactics)
-
Parents of gang members
-
Family members of the victims of gang violence to share their story in a safe and
secure environment
-
Those who raise public awareness of youth violence in the community
I proposed to visit these places and interview young people as well as staff about their
experiences of the Youth Justice System, how well they feel it is working, and if they feel the
young people are adequately supported both in and out of prison to not return to crime
once released. It is hoped that this would give me a better understanding of how it feels to
be in the system as well as to work for it.
The aim of this being, to compare the current UK system to the way things are done in
America, to gain a greater understanding of the way this gangs and young offenders operate
order to support them in a more effective way, therefore reducing rates of re offending.
8
Organisations I visited in London
Prior to me to beginning my Fellowship, I visited a few organisations in the UK that I thought
would give me an idea of how gangs and young people involved in the criminal justice
system are managed in this country. I started with my own place of work and the links that
we have with outside agencies to help deal with young people in custody and those who are
on the verge of coming into prison.
I currently work with young offenders in a secure environment mainly aged between 18-25,
many of whom have mental health issues. I offer support to those young offenders that are
suffering from a severe and enduring mental health problem. I support these men as much
as possible by educating them on their condition and helping to develop coping strategies to
help them to deal with their symptoms in the most effective and structured way. I also refer
them to other agencies if needed so that they have a good level of support to help prevent
relapse.
I am also involved with running educational groups on the wing for outside agencies such as
psychology students from a local school who come into the prison to meet the prisoners
and talk to them about their experiences as part of their A Level course work. These
students are often involved in projects on the wing with the prisoners such as the recently
launched DVD highlighting the dangers of knife crime. This DVD was filmed and put together
by the prisoners and students. They wrote and filmed the whole film themselves and once it
was completed an awards ceremony was held at the prison and all involved in the making of
the film were invited as well as local Dignitaries to present the awards. The parents of the
young offenders and the students were invited and the whole day was a great success. It
was great to see how proud the parents of the prisoners were, one mother said to me that
she was so disappointed when her child came to prison but now that she can see that he is
doing something so worth she is so proud of him and has high hopes for him once he is
released.
I am also involved in working with a Schools Police Officer from the Metropolitan Police who
brings in groups of 15 and 16 year olds from the schools that he works with who are on the
verge of being expelled from school and those who are part of the Pupil Referral Unit as part
of the ‘Scared Straight’ programme. Many of the young people that he brings in are already
involved in the criminal justice system and are on the verge of being incarcerated. The idea
of organising these visits is to give the young people an idea of what their future will be like
if they continue with their current behaviour, they have a chance to have a look around the
prison as well as spending time with the young offenders in groups and a one to one basis to
get an idea of what it is really like to be in prison. This has been a very successful project and
the young people have given very good feedback and found it to be a very good way of
deterring young people from a life of crime when they see what it is like from the inside.
9
Leap- Confronting Conflict
My contact at Leap, Jessie Feinstein, who is the Action Research Manger in the London
branch of the organisation met me at her office and informed me about the company and
what they do to support young people in London. She explained to me how she had
participated in a similar project a few years ago when she visited America with her team to
research into gangs and how they are dealt with in LA and New York so she could use some
of the knowledge that she learnt in her work in England. Due to this she was able to give me
some of her contacts and places she recommended that I visit while in these areas which
was very helpful.
Leap is a national youth organisation which was formed in 1987 that offers specialist
training for those frontline professions working with young people between 11 -21 years
old. They are based in London but also have offices in Scotland and Yorkshire. They run
programmes for Working with Gangs, Conflict Resolution and Mediation that aim to
promote understanding of the causes and consequences of youth conflict and actively seek
to work with communities and schools suffering from youth conflict and crime. Their
techniques are participatory, involving young people in interactive engaged learning. Leap
also uses drama, role play, frozen image work, games, and small and large group
discussions. In 2009, they worked with 7,150 young people; trained 1,900 adults and added
value to 270 organisations which will in turn reach a further 40,000 young people (Leap
2010).
Website: www.leapconfrontingconflict.org.uk/
10
Foundation for Life
Foundation 4 Life first came to my attention when I saw the Founder, Gifford Sutherland, on
a programme he participated in with crime writer Martina Cole. Gifford is himself an ex
offender, decided he wanted to help young people in a similar position to himself. He and
his business partner decided to set up Foundation 4 Life. This is a ground breaking
consultancy organisation which specialises in the training, consultation and delivery of
Behaviour Modification Workshops, programmes for young people who are offending or
considered to be at risk of offending or re-offending. They offer various programmes such as
one to one behavioural therapy, peer mentoring groups as well as offering support for
parents of young people by offering mediation classes to help to open the lines of
communication between parent and young person.
During the meeting Gifford explained how his organisation works and stated that the reason
they are based in Croydon is because they have a growing problem with gangs and currently
has the most intense gang problem of any outer London area. He said that he has a group of
Consultants that visit various organisations to deliver programmes in order to help to
support young people who are involved in the gang lifestyle, those who are on the verge of
coming out of prison or those who are on the verge of receiving a custodial sentence if they
do not change their behaviour. Due to this Gifford introduced a new programme to me that
he is running with 8 females who are at the end of their sentence. His company are
providing a holistic package for them to help them back into employment once they are
released as well as providing training and mentoring to help to guide them back into life on
the outside as smoothly as possible. If this project is successful he plans to roll it out to
other prisons.
Website: www.foundation4life.co.uk
11
Emergency Adolescent Room
Emergency departments provide an excellent opportunity to engage with (potentially) gang
involved young people at a point of vulnerability: witnesses noted that trauma often leads
to questioning lifestyle choices. In some hospitals such as Kings College Hospital London,
youth workers are seconded to the A&E department for 10 hours a week to meet any young
people who are admitted to A &E following an assault. They also attend a weekly multidisciplinary meeting in which the cases are discussed and repeat admissions are highlighted.
Where a phone number has been provided, once the young person has left the hospital,
they will be contacted and offered support services. Letters are also sent offering services.
They are then offered a follow up appointment offering solution focused one to one
sessions and linked into other services such as connexions, YOT, schools, local GP’s and
other organisations. It will also be flagged up if this is a re-admission and the victim has
previously come to A and E seeking medical assistance following a violent attack.
I met John who is a youth worker within the team who works at the Adolescent Emergency
Room at Kings College Hospital where in 2006 over 9,500 12-19 year olds presented at
Accident and Emergency (Kings College Hospital 2006). He explained to me that he is only
there twice a week and he now has a colleague who also works there with him but due to
funding they cannot be there full time. I meet the Doctor who deals with many of the
adolescents that come to the department and are treated by the team. They both explained
that after the young person has been bought into the emergency room for treatment of
their gunshot, knife wound or for stitches or treatment due to an altercation on the street
they are treated by the medical team, then they are given the opportunity to speak to a
youth worker about issues relating to gang involvement or if they feel they need support.
Following this they are given a follow up appointment and their case is discussed at the
multi disciplinary meeting which is held once a week and a course of intervention is then
decided.
In the past 5 years, according to recent research there has been an 89% increase in the
number of under 16’s admitted to hospital with serious stab wounds and 75% increase
among older teenagers. In 2008 5,239 serious stabbings needed hospital treatment, 85% of
young people who report to have carried a knife claim to have done so for protection, just
4% have used it to threaten someone and 1% to injure someone (McShane 2010)
12
Streets of Growth
Streets of Growth is a front line community engagement organisation, specialising in youth
leadership development. They are based in one of the UK’s most deprived areas in the
London Borough of Tower Hamlets and have been operational for 10 years designing and
delivering community development with young adult communities aged between 13-22
years old to help to prevent, and move away from social, economic and educational
disaffection. They won an award in 2009 for Best ‘Grass Roots’ Community Organisation for
Contributing to Community Safely by Tower Hamlets Council.
The founder of this organisation is Darren Way and he is also a Winston Churchill Fellow
who embarked on a similar journey to me in 2000. I met Darren at Bromley by Bow station
and we travelled together to his organisation, which is currently in the middle of moving
premises and due to this did not have any young people there. We then went over to the
new warehouse that Darren had started to transform the area into a place for young people
to come and be involved in various activities such as Maths and English lessons,
employment training to gear young people up for the world of work and a specially kitted
out room for graffiti spraying. Darren told me about working with the Police in a project
called Recycle, where the Police give Darren’s organisation bikes that have been unclaimed
at the Police station. These bikes are then restored by the young people and sold on.
We then spent some time talking over his involvement with Streets of Growth the types of
interventions and models they used to engage this young people. The main model that is
used by this organisation is the Transition Out of Dependency Model (Cycle of Change). This
is where the young person is not at all thinking about changing their lifestyle (pre
contemplation), beings to think about it (contemplation), preparing to change their life,
taking action to change, maintaining their new lifestyle and relapse.
Streets of Growth believe that for a young person to succeed in the change in their lifestyle
the following areas have to be addressed as the Contexts of Engagement Model suggests:
o
o
o
o
13
Social situation
Career
Environment
Education
Darren works continues to work very closely with one of the organisations that he visited
whilst on his Fellowship called ROCA, which is based in Boston. Since his Fellowship ended in
2000 he has been back many times to visit ROCA and continue to brainstorm thoughts and
ideas regarding their joint working
One of the models of working that Darren uses that is used in ROCA is called DICE, in Boston
this is called (VIA):
o
o
o
o
Deep
Impact
Community
Engagement
This model works because it not only uses outreach programmes, partnership collaboration
and project participation to engage the young people it also uses street engagement and
recognise the need for further more intense support when the young person begins to
disengage.
There are 3 levels of intervention:
o Prevention:
People who have stopped or have never offended
o Intervention:
Engaging those who are actively in the gang including
those who engage but then within a short space of
time become involved with the gang again ( Cycle of
Change), but each time they come back to the
organisation their involvement with the gang becomes
less ( blow out relapse, the ‘not quite readies’).
o Suppression:
This is dealing with the problems of young people with
ASBO’s, Community Orders, Anti Social Behaviour
Contracts and prison instead of dealing with the
problem head on.
When working with young people Streets of Growth feel that there are 3 levels of
acknowledgement and this is; positive, negative or not all. They say that young people
would rather be negativity acknowledged than not acknowledged at all. Darren also stated
that he feels that when young people are bored or feel disadvantaged they measure risk
and consequences differently and will therefore engage in activities which otherwise you
would not do.
Website: http://www.streetsofgrowth.org
14
The UK gang problem
From my meetings with all of these different agencies in the UK, it opened my eyes to the
scale of the problem in London in particular and how more and more young people are
being caught up in this lifestyle. In a recent report conducted by the Government called
Dying to Belong, it was found that of the 50,000 gang members reported in the UK, the
highest number of gang members are reported to be in London, Manchester, Liverpool,
Birmingham and Glasgow. 98% of these were male and the age of gang membership ranges
from 12-25 according to the Metropolitan Police (Centre for Social Justice 2009).
In the UK, the definition that is used to describe a gang is a relatively durable,
predominately street based group of young people who:
 See themselves (and are seen by others) as a discernible group
 Engage in a range of criminal activity and violence
 Indentify with or lay down territory
 Have some form of identifying structural feature
 Are in conflict with similar gang.
(Centre for Social Justice 2009
After speaking with young people involved in the gang lifestyle in the UK, the main reasons
why they state they want to be part of the gang lifestyle is because of factors such as a
family breakdown, lack of a positive role model, educational failure, poverty,
unemployment and discrimination and stereotyping in society in the media.
Within the UK, only 2% of gang membership is represented by females. Their role within the
gang is very different to that of their male counterparts. Females are used to set up rival
gangs, carry, hold or hide drugs and weapons or as a mother figure to the male members.
However the most common role for females is a girlfriend or to perform sexual acts on the
male members and they are often shared between other members.
Within England the role of violence in the gang is usually triggered by a single, often minor
act of disrespect for example someone looking at the gang member the ‘wrong way’ and to
maintain his reputation and ‘save face’, the gang member feels that they must respond
normally through violence (Centre for Social Justice 2009). The other reason for a gang
member to become violent in the UK is territorial conflict. An example of this would be
someone from a rival postcode entering a gang’s territory. This is seen as an insult to the
gang’s power and reputation and hence to reinforce the ‘trespasser’ must be punished.
15
Violence within the gang also plays a part in the initiation into the gang as if someone wants
to join the gang they are often asked by current members to ‘prove themselves’ by
stabbing, shooting or beating someone up. Currently in London many gang members are
being initiated by setting people up by leaving a baby car seat on the side of the road
containing a doll that from a distance looks like a baby so that passing motorists, particularly
women, will see it and stop as they think a baby is inside. This is usually in a grassy or
wooded area where the gang will then pounce on the unsuspecting victim and attack them
in some cases raping the women and leaving them for dead. Another form of initiation
involves driving around at night with their car headlight out then when a fellow motorist
flashes then to alert them to the fact they attack them.
16
What is being done in the UK to tackle gangs?
Although there are no laws banning gangs or gang membership, there are laws to prevent
the criminal activity of gangs. These laws include the following:

in court, if an offender is part of a gang, it
could lead to a longer sentence

drugs like cannabis, cocaine and ecstasy are
illegal to have, or carry

it is illegal to carry or keep a gun without a
licence, including fake or replica guns of which
there is a minimum 5 year sentence for those
convicted of possession of a firearm

police and school staff can search young
people for weapons at school
(direct.gov.uk 2010)
The law is also very strict on knife possession. It is illegal to carry a knife in public without a
reasonable explanation. In the eyes of the law, a reasonable explanation does not include:



carrying a knife for someone else
carrying a knife for protection
carrying a knife with no intention of using it
(direct.gov.uk 2010)
It is estimated that knife crime costs the UK £125 billion a year. According to recent
Government statistics, in the first 3 months of 2009, 6,477 offences involved knives and of
these 1320 were given immediate custodial and 1599 cautioned the rest community
sentences. In order to tackle the rising knife crime in London in 2008 the Metropolitan
Police launched Operation Blunt, this operation was launched to tackle violent youth crime
and knifes being carried and used in London. As part of the operation the police stop and
searched 26,777 individuals over a 6 week period from May 19th-June 29th 2008. Over this
time 528 weapons were recovered and 1200 individuals arrested (Centre for Social Justice
2009).
17
Within the UK, there are many different specialist Police Agencies that are set up to target
gangs within the cities that they cover. Operation Trident based in London being an example
of this. Operation Trident was set up in March 1998 in an attempt to tackle black- on – black
gun crime after a string of shooting in Lambeth and Brent. In 2007 there were 3,459 crimes
in which a gun was used including 30 gun murders, of those 9 of the victims were under the
age of 18. Operation Trident now has around 300 officers (Time Out London 2008). Their
main function is to conduct investigations, help local police investigate shootings and collate
intelligence and works with customs and immigration officials.
Due to the growing problem with gangs in Manchester they have their own team that are
dedicated to tackling gangs in their area. The Manchester Multi- Agency Gang Strategy
(MMAGS) was launched in 2001 and is modelled in the Boston Gang Project in America. This
agency work to tackle street gangs in Manchester that are involved in firearms use. The aim
of this is to reduce the impact of gun and gang related activity, rehabilitate those convicted
of gun or gang related offences and offer young people education and employment
opportunities as alternatives to gun and gang crime (Manchester County Council 2011).
The project consists of a group of seconded staff from statutory agencies such as the police,
youth services, education and probation who ensure that a range of diversionary activities
are available for young people who are, or are likely to be involved in criminal gang activity.
They work with up to 75 individuals at any one time, mostly aged between 10 and 25. The
project is voluntary, however some individuals are given court orders to work with MMAGS
or it is a condition of their licence. The project has provided those who would not have been
involved in education, the opportunity to gain qualifications. In addition, the project also
does preventative work in schools and youth centres discussing issues such as gang culture,
firearm legislation and peer pressure. (University of Leicester 2006)
In Liverpool the Police have their own version of the Trident and MMAGS Operations which
is called Matrix. This targets gangs and focuses particular on gun crime, as well as those who
are identified as either being involved with or associating with people involved in firearms.
These are called Nominals by the police and are closely monitored by receiving home visits
from the police, the frequency depending on the level of their criminal involvement but can
be as often as daily in extreme cases and the police involve the whole family of that
individual in order to encourage them not to get caught up in firearms activity (Centre for
Social Justice 2009). If the individual does reframe from this they receive help and support
from the police and other agencies to get a job or receive training.
They also run a programme called Operation Stay Safe. This is operated by Merseyside
Police and Liverpool Councils Children’s Services and is aimed at intervening early to support
children who are at risk of being caught up in gang activity by tackling crime and anti social
behaviour in identified hotspot locations. They also work to educate children and young
people about the dangers of being involved in the gang culture.
18
The Stay Safe Officers patrol a particular area on an agreed day and remove children they
deem to be at risk on the street to a designated safe place such as a church hall. Social
workers are based at the safe place and will talk to the young person to determine why they
are out and what they were doing and contact their parents to come and pick them up. The
social worker then meets with the young person’s parents to ascertain why the child is out,
to offer support and advice and investigate whether further intervention is required. This
operation takes place around once every two months or irregular days plus targeted days
such as Halloween, bonfire night and during the school holidays. So far over 600 young
people have used the service so far with 10% of these receiving a social services assessment
(Centre for Social Justice 2009)
Birmingham’s gang problem is nothing new as they have two major gangs within the city
who are rivals the Burger Bar Boys and the Johnson Crew. There are also many smaller
gangs who are considered to be splinter groups and affiliated to them. Midlands Police
estimate there are approximately 450 known gang members across Birmingham with an
increase in the presents of Asian gang members (Reducing Gang Violence 2009). Due to the
amount of gang activity in the city the Birmingham Reducing Gang Violence partnership was
formed as part of the Community Safety Strategy 2005-2008. The aim of this Strategy is to
engage, coordinate and task particular organisations to deliver interventions to reduce gang
networks and gun related crime. They also work with local delivery groups to devise and
implement local plans to tackle hot spot locations, work to increase the resistance of young
people to gangs and the use of firearms, improve public reassurance as regards gun crime
across the city and improve the local and national image of Birmingham as a safe city
(Birmingham County Council 2009).
Glasgow currently reports to have 6 times as many gang members as London with 170 gangs
in the Strathclyde area alone (Violence Reduction Unit 2010). In order to tackle this problem
effectively the Violence Reduction Unit was launched in January 2005 as a £5 million plan to
tackle gangs in Glasgow’s East End. This plan took 18 months to plan and like Manchester
Multi Agency Gang Strategy, this approach is very much based on the gang initiatives in
Boston and Cincinnati. This Unit brings together partners from justice, government,
community safety services, housing, careers, education, social work, health and the
community to tackle gangs.
This initiative tackles gangs as a whole and not rather than the individuals within them. The
Unit gather intelligence on the gang members and they are then approached by a street
level worker from the Unit and offer them an alternative to the gang lifestyle. They are
invited to a self referral session where different groups of gangs can attend and have the
opportunity to attend a carefully orchestrated meeting which is attended by a senior police
officer, an A&E consultant, members of the community and the parent of a victim of gang
violence among others. This is an opportunity to give the gang members an insight into how
their behaviour has an impact on those around them as each person from the group has an
opportunity to explain how the gang violence has an impact on them from a professional or
personal point of view.
19
A free phone number is then given to the gang members that attend for a ‘one stop shop
much like the support that is offered at the A&E Adolescent Emergency Room at Kings
College Hospital. This gives the gang member an opportunity to access services such as
advice access to education, health services, careers advice and social services if they do
want to turn their lives around. Over 150 gang members have attended so far with 70
actually making positive steps to change their lives and behaviour (Violence Reduction Unit
2010).
Those mentioned are just a few of the many organisations and agencies who work with
young people in the UK to deter and prevent gang involvement and violent crime in the
gang hotspots of the country, all of which have different ways of tackling the problem.
Armed with all of this valuable information I boarded a plane to New York to begin my
Fellowship.....
20
My Fellowship begins....
New York
I first decided to travel to New York as I had been in contact with the President of the New
York Gang Investigators Associations, Andrew Garcia and Vice President Guilda Tavarez
pictures below, prior to my trip and they had invited to me to attend their annual
conference in July. This was an offer I could not resist as it was an opportunity to meet many
individuals working with gangs in various settings across New York and to get a good over
view of the extent of the gang problem within the state.
The New York Gang Investigators Association was established in 2006 by criminal justice
professionals who recognised the importance of sharing information with social services,
community based organisation and educational settings in an attempt to stop the spread of
gangs across the state. By bringing together those
who are actively involved in investigation,
prosecution, suppression intervention of criminal
street gangs, prison gangs, extremist groups and their
affiliations the Association assists in the collaboration
and communication across all disciplines (NYGIA
2011).
In order to achieve success in tackling issues
surrounding gangs and how best to manage them the
Association works closely with gang investigators, law
enforcement agencies, social services and schools
throughout the state of New York to develop anti
gang strategies in the areas of gang prevention,
intervention, enforcement and suppression as well as
gang member rehabilitation and support with re
entry into main stream society. They also run workshops, set up public forums and provide
training for professions around all aspects of gangs and how best to manage them as well as
working very closely with schools to help them to identify gang members (NYGIA 2011).
The conference that I attended was run by the Association and was held in Syracuse, New
York, attended by about 100 individuals from all over the State including Police, Correctional
Officers, Health Care Professionals and Probation Officers and Gang Specialists who all work
with gang members.
The content of the conference included providing information about notorious gangs such
as the Bloods and the Crips and the Latin Kings, information on how to manage gangs in
prison, a brief overview of gangs in general and how to identify a gang member.
21
Over the 4 days I spent there, there were guest speakers from all over New York talking
about their specialist area. Some of these included information about Motorcycle gangs and
how gangs recruit from social networking sites
which were very interesting.
On the last day of the conference we received
certificates of attendance and there was an
opportunity to complete a one day Basic Gang
Specialist Certification Course which I chose to
attend and passed. This now allows me to
attend and give evidence in gang trials in New
York.
Within the course there was alot of information
regarding gang members and their current
treads, initiations, dress codes and the types of
crimes that they are involved in. This picture
shows a Gang Recognition Checklist which was
shown as an example of what to look out for
when attempting to identify a gang member.
This identifies items that gang members wear to
identify themselves such as the way they wear their
belts, trousers, socks and shirts as well as what type
of hair stryle they have, what colour their bandana
is and which pocket it is hanging out of in their
trousers.
I found this very interesting as I was not aware of
the current trends of gang members in New York. I
also found it very shocking to find that there were
so many members would go to great levels of
violence for the name of their gang.
This picture shows an example of some of the gang
member’s bandanas that they wear to show their
affiliation to a particular gang. Blue bandanas are
general wore by Crips, Bloods wear red and Latin
Kings wear black and gold. These bandana are
usually wore hanging out of the back pocket of their
jeans like is shown on the picture. The Bloods ‘flag’ or wear their bandanas hanging out of
the left pocket, Crips to the right.
22
I met many individuals from all different areas of law enforcement that deal with violent
gang in New York from street gangs to motor cycle or racist gangs throughout the
conference. Some of their stories were very disturbing to me and I was shocked at the level
of violent that these groups of people go to. I also saw many videos and pictures of gang
members shooting and killing each other as well as many dead bodies. It has really bought
home this problem for me as to how bad this issue has got and how we have to do
something to change these young people’s way of thinking. Some of the young people I saw
in the presentations were as young as 5 and had obviously been born into the life style and
their parents had filmed them doing the ‘gang walk’, drinking and holding a gun at that
young age. This was probably one of the most disturbing images for me.
During the conference it was clear that New York has definitely been infiltrated by gang
activity and these gangs were taking hold across the state. In 2009, it was estimate that
there were roughly 900,000 active gang members across America, with 147,000 being
detained in jails and prisons and 30,000 gangs across the country with 65,000 gang
members residing in the state of New York. Most of these members are males with the
population of females only 6% (NYGIA conference 2010).
The membership of these gangs is spread across racial lines with 49% of members being
Hispanic, 34% African American, 10% Caucasian and 6% Asian. Some gangs allow members
from any racial background and others are only allow people from the same ethnic
background to join (Centre for Social Justice 2009)
Within New York as a whole the fastest growing gang is the Bloods. This gang was formed
Los Angeles in the early 1970’s which was initially to compete against the influence of the
biggest gang of the time the Crips. Bloods are also known as the United Blood Nation which
is the prison gang that was formed in Rikers Island prison New York in 1993. They wear red
to show they gang affiliation and can also be identified by their jewellery, clothing, hand
signs, language and gang symbols. They use the term ‘Blood’ and this stands for Brotherly
Love Overriding Oppression Depression of Society. Members of this gang refer to each other
as ‘dogs’ (Doing Only Gangster Shit) and often have paw prints tattooed on their arm which
they use the heated barrel of a gun to imprint. They refer to themselves as MoBs (Member
of Bloods) or CK’s (Crip Killer (NYGIA conference 2010)
In areas such as New York and other areas on the East Coast of America these gang
members also identify themselves using a 5 pointed star. Each point of the star represents
their 5 principles love, sacrifice, respect, honour and obedience. They use this as it shows
the affiliation with the People Nation which is a large coalition created to protect members
within the federal and state prisons. The Bloods main rivals are Crips and they use the 6
pointed star which is associated with the Folk Nation.
23
The ‘Bloods’ are made up of sub groups or sets and have their own leadership but at times
have been known to coordinate criminal activities across states with other blood sets. Much
of the criminal activity that these gangs are involved in involves drugs. They have also been
known to become involved in robbery, car theft, prostitution, murder, drive by shootings
and money laundering, with many of these crimes being part of the initiation process to join
the gang and is often referred to as ‘putting in work’. Other types of initiation include being
beat in by already established members of the gang, being forced to join through peer
pressure, being born in as their parents are already part of the gang or for the females being
‘sexed’ in which involves the female having sex with many members of the gang.
This gang allows members who are male or female and are mainly African American aged
between 16 and 24 although they have many members who are alot older than this. A
female member is called a ‘Bloodette’ and if they are pregnant with another Blood members
child the unborn baby is known as a ‘Blood Drip’. Blood members have rules and these
include not stealing from each other, no snitching to authorities, and not disrespecting
other members. They give their life for each other and each member therefore becomes a
soldier.
During the conference more or less every professional that had attended no matter what
area of law enforcement they worked in they had come across members of the Bloods gang.
There are many other gangs that very active in New York such as the Latin Kings and the 5%
who are also linked to the Bloods. On questioning them about why they felt that young
people choose this life style they stated that many of the gang members that they come
across have no family that care about them and therefore see the gang as a family. They
also see alot of generational gangs so as soon as a child is born into a family they
automatically become part of the gang as their parents and in some cases grandparents are
already caught up in this lifestyle.
After the conference I headed back to Brooklyn feeling very troubled by what I had
witnessed and wanted to find out what was being done in the community to help these
young people who were caught up in the gang life style.
Prior to arriving in New York I had contacted an organisation called Council For Unity who
work with gang members both in and outside the correctional facilities across New York. Its
founder Mr Bob De Sena had agreed to meet with me to explain about what the
organisation do and how they help gang members to get out of the cycle of gangs and
violence. Unfortunately on the day I had arranged to meet Mr De Sena, he had to attend an
important meeting so I met with one of the other members of his team, Mr Sean Johnston
who himself had been incarcerated for a number of years and had been very involved in the
gang lifestyle.
24
Council For Unity was founded as a small anti gang group in 1975 by Mr De Sena who
himself is an ex gang member. He started the organisation when he was a teacher at a high
school in Brooklyn and got 6 gang leaders at the school to commit an entire year to halting
the violence to see if they can come up with a solution to the gang violence.
This organisation is a non profit organisation that specialises in reducing violence in schools
and communities. They do this by empowering young people, individuals and groups with
the skills necessary to promote unity, safety and achievement in schools and communities.
They use models to teach young people essential interpersonal life skills such as leadership,
self expression, mediation, conflict resolution and advocacy skills to resolve and reduce gang
fights and personal conflict among other things.
The Council now has 48 chapters around the country in more than 40 schools with more
than 100,000 young people enrolled annually in New York, Milwaukee, San Francisco and
Vermont aged between 8-20 years of age and representing 20 ethnic groups (Council for
Unity 2010). They work in schools as well as correctional facilities to support these young
people and provide ongoing support even after they leave school, college or prison for as
long as is needed. To see some of their work please visit http://www.vimeo.com/8204808.
On speaking with Mr Johnston, he explained to me that at the he had been in and out of
prison since the age of 15 and with his longest stretch being for 15 years. On the 7th year of
his sentence, the prison that he was in was visited by Mr De Sena and the Council for Unity
and talked to the inmates about how they can change their lives around and become
positive role models for others. After attending this session, Mr Johnston decided that it was
time to change his life and became involved in the programme that was offered within the
prison. After a number of years his involvement within the course had grown and he was
now not involved in the gang lifestyle within the prison but instead was helping others to
get out of it. Due to this once leaving prison he came to work for the organisation. He is now
involved in running classes within prisons such as Sing Sing, supporting the young people
with their educational needs, becoming a mentor for them and helping them build on their
interpersonal skills.
On asking Mr Johnston why he thought young people join gangs or why he himself had been
caught up in the lifestyle he stated that ‘no one has said they needed them before and that
is want they want to feel, the sense of being wanted, needed, loved, respected and the
ultimate sense of belonging. The basic human feeling that many people take for granted’.
On the way back to Brooklyn from my meeting I came across some graffiti on the walls of
Brooklyn that was very obviously gang related. During the conference I learnt that gangs use
graffiti to mark their territory, disrespect rival gangs, and send a message to the gang or in
the memory of a dead member among other things. Gangs also do what is called a ‘Roll Call’
with graffiti which is when all of the members of their gangs name are written in a list.
25
This shows some Crip graffiti that they have
used to mark their territory. They usually write
their graffiti in blue as it is their colour of
choice. Crips usually cross out or put an X
through the letters B and P as a sign of
disrespect towards the Blood and Piru sets.
Another way to identify Crip graffiti is when
the letter BK or B/K which stands for Blood
Killer.
Blood graffiti is often written in red. Bloods will often replace the letter C in a word with the
letter B. For example the city of Compton would be spelt Bompton. They do this to show
how much the Bloods hate the Crips and that the Bloods are more important and rule.
Graffiti is monitored closely by the Police and is usually one of the first signs that gangs are
in the area. When they see any new graffiti in
the area they make sure they take a picture of it
then analyse it to identify which gang it belongs
to and then they document the colours used and
the gang tag. Afterwards they organise for the
graffiti to be removed through the Graffiti
Removal Programme.
Whilst I was taking these pictures I saw a Police
Officer walking by. I stopped him and ask him
about the gang problems in the area. He
explained to me that New York currently has a
major gang problem and recently they have had
15 shootings in the past 11 days! He explained
that due to this the Police have heightened their
presence on the streets and have put up Police
towers with cameras and in so areas they have
24 hour Policing cover in areas to monitor what
is happening.
He also stated that the main types of gang initiations that they have in the area of Brooklyn
are mainly, jump ins and committing crimes such as robbery. They also, according to the
Police Officer I spoke to, do not ‘flag’ in this area, instead they wear beads with colours
representing their gang instead of bandanas.
26
This Police officer explained to me that there are 3 local gangs in the area, the Rock Stars,
Sutter Garden and the Very Crispy Gangsters who are all based in East New York. These
gangs have been responsible for 25 shootings in the area which has claimed 4 lives since
2009. The Very Crispy Gangsters based in the Florentino housing project and was formed
three years ago and have about 80 members between the ages of 12 and 20; Rock Star
gangsters, based in the Unity Plaza housing projects, have about 50 supporters, while the
Sutter Garden Crips total about 20.
After talking to the police officers I was lucky enough to speak to some young people in the
area about their experience of life in Brooklyn and the gang lifestyle. There were about 10
young people aged between 18 and 21 who lived in the local projects, most of whom
attended college but had some connections to local street gangs but were not active
members. They had agreed to talk to be because they were ex pupils of the school that my
Aunt teachers at and they had been introduced to me. Having said this they were still on
their guard and skeptical about my motives.
These young men stated that most of their
friends are in gangs and the reason they feel
that they are part of this life style is because
of having nothing to do and they are bored.
They also stated that many of their friends
do not have family at home and due to this
see the gang as their family. They said that
the gang situation in the area is very bad at
the moment and at times especially at night
they do not feel safe walking in the street
due to the level of violence in the area. These
young men also showed me the Blood and
Crip hand shake and said that many of the
gang members greet each other with this
hand shake and this how they identify which
gang they belong too.
During my time in New York I feel that I have
learnt a lot and gathered much information
relating to the severity of the problem of
gangs in New York and how Law
Enforcement as well as other grass roots organisations are dealing with these issues and
how successful they are. All involved appear to be singing from the same hymn sheet and
agree that the problem is growing. The reason that these young people are joining these
gangs is due to them feeling the need to ‘belong’ as they do not get that from their family so
they seek alternatives and that more needs to be done in the community to bring people
together to try and help and support these young people to change their way of thinking
and give them options so they don’t feel that the gang life is the only way to go.
27
Miami
Prior to arriving in Miami I had again contacted a few organisations to set up some visits.
One of these and the first organisation I visited during my stay in Miami was Miami- Dade
County Juvenile Assessment Centre. I wanted to get a better idea of what help and support
is available for young offenders who are arrested and are on the verge of getting caught up
in the cycle of crime. A few weeks before my trip the Special Projects Administrator Ms
Wanda Finnie, had sent me a very impressive agenda setting out my plans for the day and
all of the different people and parts of the organisation that I would be visiting. She had
arranged for me to spend the whole day at the Juvenile Assessment Centre, spending time
with the Director, counsellors and those who are part of the Civil Citation Programme
among other people.
The Juvenile Assessment Centre or JAC is based in Miami- Dade which is the largest state in
Florida with a population of 2.3 million. 20% of these being Black/ African American and
81% Hispanic. The juvenile population is roughly 416,924, and since its opening in 1999 the
JAC has processed around 145,000 juvenile arrests. (Juvenile Justice Model 2008) The JAC is
open 24 hours a day 7 days a week and is a processing facility for arrested young people in
the area and this is where every young person who is arrested in the County comes to be
booked in and assessed and then they are either released from the facility or taken to a
Juvenile Detention Centre depending on what crime they have committed.
When I arrived the Acting Director showed me around the facility from intake were the
juveniles are bought into the facility and booked in, finger prints and photographs taken and
all the assessments are carried out. These include asking questions relating to their mental
health, housing issues, family life and substance abuse then depending on the outcome of
these assessments they are referred to the appropriate agencies. He showed me that all
juveniles are sat in the same waiting area no matter what crime they have been accused of
committing but male and female juveniles are sat together slightly separated. He also
explained to me that when the young person is bought into the facility they are assessed to
see firstly if they are mentally fit to be there. If they are seriously unwell or have mental
health problems or are actively suicidal that are taken to the local hospital for treatment
and only bought back to the JAC when they have been medically cleared.
Following booking in, fingerprinting, mug shots, checks on the most wanted and other
databases for outstanding arrest warrants they could be on, the young person may then
have the option to undertake Civil Citation instead of going to jail. It has to be a first time
offence, none serious and none violent to be able to do it. Civil citation is a service offered
to 8-17 year olds who have committed minor crimes and allows these young people to
address the cause of their offending, help to strengthen their family unit and allows them to
get this support without getting a criminal record. The programmes lasts 90 days and
includes community service, completing written assignments and in some cases counselling
with regular supervision by a name worker.
28
If they are not eligible for this programme and are not eligible for release to the care of a
parent or guardian, they are sent to the detention centre to await a court date.
There are also programmes offered that are targeted at certain groups of people such as the
Youth Offender Process (YOP) which is specially designed for those who are under 11 who
are becoming involved in the criminal justice system and the Intensive Delinquent Diversion
Services (IDDS) which provides intensive family focused services to juveniles who are at high
risk of becoming serious or chronic offenders. Another is VIP (Violence Intervention Project)
which targets young people caught up in violence on the streets of Miami. It aims to reach
out to these young people to help them to change their behaviour to help reduce youth
violence in the county.
I was then spoken to by various people within the organisation to get a perspective on what
they were doing there. These include talking about the models that they use to support
these young people through the system and the assessment tools that they use. They also
appear to have very strong links to many community projects that they refer the young
people on to and set up monthly meetings with these organisations to speak about how
they are getting on and how well the young people are getting on those programmes. They
also ask the young people themselves how the programmes are working for them and if
they feel they are benefiting from it.
The way this organisation operates appears to be very successful as they are very supportive
to first time offenders. They involve everyone in that young person’s life from parents to
school teachers to support them and enrol them in programmes based on the needs of that
young person. The aim of this is to try and support them as much as possible at the earliest
stage to try and break the cycle of re offending and so far this has been a great success.
They also link in with agencies that support the families of these young people especially
siblings so that they do not follow in their brother or sisters footsteps.
As a result of my trip on to the JAC, I
was able to able to set up a couple
more visits as the Director at the
Juvenile Assessment Centre had a
several contacts and forwarded them
to me which was really helpful. I
contacted them and was able to
organise a visit to Turner Guilford and
Knight Correctional Facility so that I
could attend a group that is run there
by a lady called Barbara Wade and her
student.
29
She is very active in working with gang members
both inside and outside prison and has done since
the 1960’s starting with the gangs in Chicago and
working on the President’s Task Force for Gangs.
She now attends the Prison twice a week to run this
course. It is called RESPECT and is for young boys
from 14-17 to learn life skills.
It was a very interesting experience as the prison is
very different to the one in which I am working and
the client group is much younger. All of the young
people that I spoke to were on remand and had
been at the facility for a considerable length of
time, some of them up to a couple of years.
The group consisted of 12 young people and at the beginning of the session everyone stood
up and repeated a verse about respecting each other and having a positive attitude to
centre the group and focus on the session. Afterwards everyone sat in a circle and we
introduced ourselves and introduced the topic for the session: gangs and we talked about
what it was like for young people living in this type of life style. It became quite apparent to
me that many of these young people, prior to coming to prison had never left their
neighbourhoods and they said that many of them had very unstable family life's with absent
parents, drug issues and younger siblings to look after. Due to this many of them no longer
attended school and gravitated towards the gang lifestyle as they were looking for
somewhere to belong, someone to care for and love them and were searching for that
feeling of being wanted and needed. It was a very interesting discussion and was good to
hear it from the young people themselves. They were very welcoming to me and when it
came to asking me questions, many of them did not know anything about England and
where abouts in the world it was. For many of them it was the first time they had heard a
British accent and some struggled to understand what I said. It was sad to see to, as their
world prior now had only consisted of a few square miles of their neighbourhood.
I then went on to visit an organisation that I had been in contact with prior to my trip called
Panzou Project. This is an organisation that works with at risk youth, young adults and their
families targeting those who are gang involved or at high risk of being involved in gangs.
Many of the individuals who are involved in the programme are from Haitian decent. This
organisation is based in a predominately Haitian area of Miami and help it members to get
help and support for issue relating to education, job skills and training, conflict resolution
and family support. They use a multidisciplinary approach to their work with individuals
from schools, mental health, faith-based organisations, probation and other justice agencies
involved in the project. Many of the referrals they receive come from these various
agencies.
30
All programmes in both English and Creole so that
the maximum amount of people can utilise the
services. They also employ ex gang members to
help in the organisation. One such member runs
the Screen Printing. He makes t-shirts for the
organisation as well as for local business and this
is becoming quite a successful part of the
organisation. Panzou are also hoping to rent
another office next to where they are already
based and turn it into a music studio which would
be a real asset to the community as many of the
young people that use that organisation enjoy
making music but do not currently have anywhere to use this talent.
While I was at the Panzou Project I also met with a man who works in the Youth Gang
Resource Centre (in the far left of this
picture). Although I didn’t get the
chance to visit his organisation due to
time restrictions I did speak to him
about his organisation. The Youth Gang
Resource works with Law Enforcement,
the local community and families to
help young people to avoid gang
involvement and crime. They do this by
providing resource information, and
links to other agencies to help the
young person and their family with
education, tattoo removal, counselling,
housing and jobs among other things. Due to his involvement with Law Enforcement and
partnership working Mr Camacho organised for me to visit the Miami Dade Police Head
Quarters.
At the Miami Dade Police Head Quarters I met one of the Lieutenants of the Gang Unit. He
has a task force of 6 officers, a Sergeant and a Lieutenant that work in the county to identify
and combat the gang issues in Miami. It was very interesting to meet up with him and talk
about all the different areas in Miami that are affected by gangs and gang violence. The
Lieutenant explained to me that there are around 50-54 active gangs in Miami and around
1500 documented members. He explained to me that one of the main things that fuel the
problem of gangs in the area is drugs as members cross enemy lines and this causes major
issues with the gangs and protecting their territory. He stated that there had already been
26 gang related murders in the county and it was only the beginning of August.
31
I was then fortunate enough to be able to go on a Ride Along with one of the detectives in
the Gang Task Force. We went all over Miami Dade and he showed me where all the gang
members hang out and where they make their deals of guns and drugs. When we were
driving down the street even though we were in an unmarked vehicle they knew the car and
were shouting 'PO PO' as we drove down the street to warn others that police were in the
area. It was fascinating!! It was also very sad to see the level of poverty in some of these
areas and it was easy to see why some of the young people who live in these areas felt that
they had no way out.
One of the main gangs that the Police identified to me and who are very active in the area
were called Zoe Pound. Zoe Pound is one of the most powerful gangs in Miami and is a
secretive gang that operates mainly around the Little Haiti area of Miami which is 3 miles
from South Beach. This area is nicknamed by the neighbourhood as ‘Little Vietnam due to
the level of violence. This gang was formed in 1990 and has now become a very dangerous
gang notorious for home invasions, murder, torture and drugs, with their primary goal to
make money with whatever means they can (Wikipedia 2010). Their weapon of choice is an
AK-47. Most members will not admit to being part of a criminal gang and instead say that
they are part of a heroic movement promoting Haitian pride. The gang has no gang signs or
colour only flag they fly is the Haitian flag however they wear the colour black to identify
themselves. They also do not have any initiation. The gang also use voodoo to show their
power, they believe that calling to the powers of Kazzie Bizze the Haitian Voodoo Devil God,
this will grant the gang super natural powers an help to ‘take out’ their rivals.
Many of the members of this gang are from Haitian descent but they do have members
from other black origins. They also work alongside many black gangs including the Crips and
Bloods. Their enemies include many non black gangs such Latin gangs for example Venice 13
and Santa Monica 13, MS13, 18th Street and Aryan Brotherhood. Due to this they often cross
out the number 13 in many of their writings. They will often call themselves 13 Killers and
cross out the letter M as it is the 13th letter of the alphabet. Female members of the gang
are called Zoettes and they make up 45% of the gang as a whole standing at 40,000
(Wikipedia 2010).
On my last day in Miami I went back to the Juvenile Assessment Centre for a Gang
Awareness Training session and to meet others in the field of gangs in Miami. It was great to
meet other members of the Gang Unit Task Force and hear their point of view on the
subject. It appears to me that Miami does have a gang problem but it is not like the
problems experienced in New York, LA and Chicago. Here they are very much on top of the
situation and do alot of undercover work and make good links with informants who provide
them with alot of useful information. This Task Force have regular meetings to discuss the
current trends and who the main guys to keep an eye out for are so they are aware of the
risks when they are approaching a situation and know what types of weapons these
individuals are carrying, as guns here are very easy to come by.
32
Los Angeles
Whilst I was first looking into places to visit in America to look into gangs and why young
people join gangs, the one place I had to visit was gang capital of the world: LA. Each year,
LA gang wars claim 3000 victims who are wither wounded or killed, in 2007, there was a
gang related murder every other day. In 1975 in LA there were 13,000 gang members and
now there are 80,000 with the youngest members being between 7 and 8 (Centre for Social
Justice 2009).
Bakersfield
My time in LA was split into two parts as I spent the first week mainly in Bakersfield which is
two hours north of LA and the rest of my time in LA. Prior to my trip I had made a contact
called George Anderson. George works in Juvenile Justice as a Probation Officer. He said he
had arranged various meetings for me in some of the organisations that they have here to
deal with young people who are coming into prison for the first time as well as those who
are involved in gang activity. On my first night in the area I met him for the first time and he
took me to his house to have dinner with his family which was absolutely lovely, they were
so welcoming. I thoroughly enjoyed myself and it was a great ice breaker.
Bright and early the next morning George had arranged for one of his colleagues to pick me
up and show me around some of the organisations that they have. We visited many places
in the first day; it was such an eye opener. I visited organisation such as the Gang
Intervention and Suppression Team who deal with the most active and violent gang
members in the area, most of whom are black gangs such as the Country Boys and Hispanic
gangs such as Oakie Bakers and Southside Bakers. The probation officers who run this task
force, usual have a caseload of around 100 cases each but due to the intensity of each case
they only have around 35 that are active at any one time. They provide intensive supervision
to these gang members and they are usually seen around twice a month but in the mean
time if they need any further support they can contact the department. They stated to me
that the reason that the gang members who they deal with are so violent is because they
feel they need to protect their turf, to control the drugs in the area and to show other gangs
that they will not be ‘disrespected’.
Whist there I spoke to one of the gang members who is actively involved with the Bloods in
Bakersfield, of which there are around 60-70 members in his gang. He spoke to me about his
involvement in the gang and why he had become involved in it in the first place. He
explained to me that he is currently 18 but has been involved in the gang lifestyle since the
age of 14. He said that his father was a very active gang member in the area and he first
joined because his dad was part of the gang and he thought this would be the only way to
get close to him and thought it made him look ‘cool’. Over the last few years he has spent
time in Juvenile Hall for possession of a gun but at the time he felt that he had to carry a gun
for his own protection, as some areas where out of bounds due to the gang territory and the
boundaries that are not allowed to be crossed.
33
After losing a number of close friends to gang violence he has now decided that he wants to
succeed in his life and does not feel that a life and crime and the activities are helping him
so he has opted to distance himself from his gang and try and leave that lifestyle behind
him. This has also meant that he has reduced contact with his father which he also struggles
with but is finding other members of his family a good form of positive support.
Some of the services that are provided in Bakersfield to support gang members and show
them an alternative to the life of the gang are quite varied and many of them are faith
based but they all have the same goal: to support young people and to stop them for being
caught up in the cycle of crime and gang activity. One of the faith based organisations I
visited was called Stay Focused Ministries. This is an organisation that was originally set up
by a former gang member and works with young people between the ages of 6 and 19, of
which they have around 600 on their books currently. Some of their work involves running
education groups, making films, offering mentoring sessions and training to the young
people and visiting schools in the area where they highlight issues such as gangs and drug
and alcohol misuse.
While I was visiting an organisation called the Bridges Programme I was able to interview a
gang member that is currently enrolled in the programme. This programme is for young
men and women who are not able to attend mainstream school due to their behaviour,
some of whom, have ADHD. They support young people aged between 16.5-18 years of age,
offering counselling, one to one support and small education classes so that they can get the
help that they need to get the education that they need to succeed. They also have a
therapist who provides one to one support, recovery specialists, teachers and transitional
counsellors who help to support these young people. They currently have 40 attendees, 6 of
whom are female.
Whilst I was there I interviewed a young man, I will call Travee, who was an active gang
member and had many gang related tattoos on his face and arms which were relating to his
gang such as the letters BKS on his hands and face and the number 13. He had been a gang
member for a number of years. He stated to me that he was raised in Chicago in his early
years by his mother who was heavily into drugs, but when she went to prison when he was
two his Aunt took over his care. His mother then came out of prison when he was 8 but by
this time he was already spending alot of time out on the streets with very little supervision
from his family and due to this he became involved in the gang lifestyle as the older
members took him under their wing and as he grew older he became involved in stealing
cars and getting into trouble with the police. As he grew older, Travee became more heavily
involved in his gang named Suro 13 and made a name for himself on the streets as well as
the few times he has been incarcerated in Juvenile Hall as a fighter. He then moved to
California but remained a very active gang member and joined a set in California. Not long
after his family settled in California he was involved in a high speed police chase and fled to
his native Mexico for 3 months to avoid his arrest. Upon his return Travee was arrest and
sent to Juvenile Hall for 6 months.
34
Even though he expressed that his time there was not pleasant, this did not deter him from
being part of the gang lifestyle and although he didn’t like it, he was not afraid of returning
to Juvenile Hall. Travee explained to me that he has lost at least 7 friends to gang related
incidents and one of which he was present at when a close friend of his was shot in the
head. He explained that the main reason that he joined his gang in the first place was
because he had no discipline at home and was left to his own devises for much of the time.
Now 4 years on, at the age of 17, he has made the decision that he wants to leave the gang
lifestyle behind him and is attempting to get help from this service to do this. He was quite a
high ranking member of the gang of which there are roughly 26 active member’s altogether.
He appeared to be making good progress and since he had been attending the programme
he has applied to have his tattoos removed so that he can get a job and not been seen as a
gang member which are all positive steps to help change his life.
I then visited a Juvenile Hall called
Crossroads which was run very much
in a military style. The inmates, of
whom there were roughly 158 under
18s have to march and chant various
messages and wear a uniform with
the name sewn onto it. They look very
smart as they walk around the
campus, hands behind their back.
Their beds and cells are also
extremely tidy as they are inspected
every day and have to be perfect
otherwise there were consequences.
I was shocked at the level of discipline in the facilities. All of the young men that I met were
so polite and very well mannered. It was sad to see some of the young men were still
children at aged 13, they looked so young! At the facilities I visited the young people
attended education daily and were allowed to do jobs around the facility such as sweeping
the yard and cutting the grass. In one of the facilities they also had a separate area for
females that provided them with specific counselling sessions and support for those who
have been involved in abuse from a young age.
35
Whilst I was in Bakersfield, George had
organised for me to visit Wasco State
Prison, I visited with him and his team.
The facility is massive! All the inmates
walk around in bright orange jump
suits and are there for a variety of
crimes. They are there mainly for a
short term before they are moved
onto other establishments after they
have been classified as to their level of
danger relating to their crime, to serve
their sentence. I was surprised to see
that when the inmates come into the
facility they really do have to do the ‘squat and cough’ to check them for contraband and it
is in front of all the other inmates! I also saw the very evident racial segregation on the yard;
they really do keep to their own race. They group together on the yard with their own race
and do not associate with others. The alarm went off while we were there to because there
was a medical emergency and all of the inmates had to lie on the ground arms out
stretched.
We walked around a few of the wings to see where the prisoners are housed and I was
shocked at the lay out as it is so different from the facility in which I work. Due to lack of
space in the facility some of the areas have been made into dorm areas, that is 200
prisoners in one area with the freedom to walk around if they want to even though they are
not supposed to and one officer to watch them! I couldn’t believe that! It looked like such a
dangerous situation but the officers said that they do not have many problems in those
areas. If they do though and a fight breaks out they have a number of officers that can
attend and the inmates are then taken to spend time in the segregation area where they
stand in mental cages for 4 hours at a time.
Within this prison they have their own gang unit and they deal with all the gang issues
within the prison. They attempt to keep gang violence down in this facility by asking
individuals when they first enter the establishment is they belong to a gang and if they do
they ensure that they are not housed with rivals. They also have a colour coding system on
the board in the main office of each cell block which identifies each member of the wing and
which gang they belong to so they are then more aware of any tensions or issues that are
going on between the gangs and they can quickly identify the gangs that are involved.
36
One of the most interesting places that I visited whilst in Bakersfield was the Mock Call In
that I was invited too. A call in is meeting that is help gang members and members of the
local community. The aim of this meeting is to get the gang members to stop the violence.
This is based on the Boston Model of Operation Ceasefire. These meetings target gang
leaders or those who have most influence in the most active gangs. The reason why this was
being held in Bakersfield is because in the last 12 months there has been 47 gang related
shootings and 15 murders.
For some of the gang members that are chosen to attend this meeting they are ordered to
attend as part of their probation and if they decide not to attend they can be violated and
sent back to prison. They receive a hand written letter that is signed by the Mayor
requesting their presents on that day. The people from the community that attend are
usually up to 40 people who try to offer some alternatives to the gang lifestyle by offering
this young men and women jobs.
There are then various speakers from backgrounds such as Law Enforcement, Local Gang
Officer, Nurse, ex offenders, community leaders, faith leaders and US and District Attorney,
to explain to the gang members how their behaviour effects the parts of the community
that they represent.
On that night none of the gang members were there it was a meeting for all professionals
involved to decide the proceedings for the evening and for the speakers from the various
different areas of the community to practice their speech. This was very interesting and I
was very moved by some of the speakers and how the described how the gang violence had
effected them and the part of the community that they represented.
Running alongside this Call in there was a Parenting Class that I also attended. This was a 10
week class to help parents to manage their child’s behaviour in a positive and constructive
way. Many of the parents who attend this course is because they have been ordered by the
court because their child is not going to school. The course teaches these parents how to
discipline their child in an effective but positive way. All of the parents, of which there are
around 20, both male, female and couples, share their experiences with each other and give
support to each other. Running alongside this course is another course for the children of
these parents to help them themselves to manage their own emotions and behaviour.
My time in Bakersfield was extremely busy but very informative and I saw and experienced
many different agencies and was able to speak to and interview both gang members and
the professionals that work with them. I then returned back to LA for the last part of my
journey into America’s gangs and youth justice system.
37
Los Angeles
LA is gang capital of the world, with Compton being the murder capital of the USA, with
there being 68 active gangs in the area. According to recent research, 1 in 3 Latino and black
men have been or are in prison in Compton and 7 in 10 children grow up without a father in
Compton. In LA the medium age of victims of gang related violence is 21 years old, with 95%
of the gang related killings in the area involving firearms, and AK47 being the weapon of
choice.
I returned to LA from Bakersfield and went to meet with one of my contacts at the Boys and
Girls Club in Long Beach. This is a prevention programme that works with children from 618, providing a safe and secure environment for them to come and participate in various
self esteem and confidence building programmes. This
club also runs after school programmes to help
children with their homework as well as running other
education based programmes to teach the young
people about various computer programmes, gender
specific issues around safe sex, drug and alcohol
misuse and health and fitness programmes. They also
cover programmes around education, career
development, health and life, character and
leadership, athletic, arts and culture
Unfortunately I was not able to see one of these
programmes in action due to the fact that it is the
summer holidays and these classes are normally run in
term time but it was very interesting to speak with the
leaders of some of these programmes as they said
that many of the young people that attend their
classes are involved in gang activity and have very
difficult often abusive home lives so coming into such
a programme gives them a safe and secure
environment for them to be able to gain skills for the future. As California has the largest
amount of people in prison across the country and it costs around $241 a day to keep a
young person in prison and roughly $88,000 a year, there is a very high risk that without
programmes like these children who are often surrounded by older gang members, drug
dealers and parents who do not have time to spend with their children would end up
following in their footsteps.
38
On my return from Long Beach I decided that I would make contact with the local Police
Department like I did in Miami and ask them if I could go for a ride-along with them. I spend
some time with the Hollywood Division of the LAPD (Los Angeles Police Department). This
was very interesting, I went on a ride-along with them for a few hours with the Gang Unit
and I was shown where most of the gang
activity in Hollywood takes place and which
gangs occupy which areas. It was fascinating to
me because I had always thought of Hollywood
as very glitzy and full of celebrities but I was
shown a very different poverty stricken side of it
that day and it was a very eye opening
experience.
The police in this unit explained to me that their
station can hold up to 100 arrestees and the
main gangs that they see in their area of
Hollywood is MS13, White Fence and 18th
Street. They also told me of another gang called
the Magicians Club who originated in LA and of
whom I saw much graffiti.
However the most active gang they described to
me is MS13 the very dangerous Mexican gang
who have been involved in many gang related murders in the area. Having said this, the
police officers explained to me that gang crime in the area was down and they said that this
was because of the police having a very aggressive approach to gangs and the fact that
there is now a Gang Injunction in the area. This injunction has been around for a number of
years and is operation in areas with the worst gang problems that the courts have ordered.
There are currently 37 active injunctions in the city involving 57 gangs. A gang injunction is a
restraining order against a group. It involves seeking a court order that declares that the
gang are causing a nuisance and it asks for special rules which are directed towards their
activity. The aim of these injunctions is to address the neighbourhood’s gang problem
before any serious crimes are committed (LAPD 2010)
Evidence shows that these injunctions have a positive effect on the neighbourhoods that
they are enforced in. In the smaller areas that are affected by gang activity, this can be
permanently removed and in the larger areas where gangs have been active for many years,
this injunction can reduce their activity, making it much more manageable for Law
Enforment to deal with. The first gang injunction in this area was on the 18th Street gang.
39
During my time with the Gang Unit we stopped off at the Summer Night Lights Programme
in Lemon Grove Park. This is a programme that started 3 years ago throughout the summer
holidays to bring the community together. It runs from 6pm until midnight and is a place for
all that live in the community to come and hang out together, the children place sports and
there is music and entertainment laid on. It has a really good atmosphere and appears to be
very successful. There are around 400-600 people that attend per night and this programme
runs in around 24 different parks across the county.
Whilst I was at Lemon Groove Park I met with 3 Gang Activists who are themselves ex gang
members that attend on a nightly basis to speak to gang members and try and help them
out of the life violence and gang activity. I
had the chance to speak to these men and
they said that each one of them have been
gang members for a number of years they
themselves found it very hard to leave that
lifestyle behind them and stated that even
though they are no longer ‘banging, you can
never fully get out of the gang’ because they
still have close friends and family who are
still actively involved. They now work with
young people in an attempt to try and break
the cycle of the gang violence.
Prior to my arrival in LA I had heard of a tour called LA Gang tours which was a tour of South
Central LA’S worse gang areas. I felt that this would be the safest way for me to see these
sights as I was aware of how dangerous places like Compton could be. We were given a tour
of South Central LA by 5 ex gang members who have come together to raise awareness of
the growing gang problem in these areas. We went all around the area to Watts, The Watts
Towers, LA County Jail, Florence Avenue and Firestone Sheriff Station all being historical
places relating to gang involvement including the riots in the early 1990’s and the Rampart
scandal.
40
It was an extremely interesting day and very interesting to hear from the ex gang members
some of whom had done up to 24 years in prison. All of the individuals who ran the tour
were from different gangs who would ordinarily be warring. They said that have been
involved in gangs from a young age and in some cases their fathers have also been involved
in gang activity and been involved in the murder of rival gang members. They all grew up
around violence and with parents who showed them no boundaries which one of the ex
gang members stated later is one of the reason why he was able to join the gang at a young
age and his parents did nothing to stop it.
After many jail terms, witnessing the deaths of loved ones and brushes with death
themselves, these men have now decided to turn their lives around and visit schools and
other areas to try and educate young people on what the gang lifestyle is really like and tells
them the grim reality of if they continue with the life style that they are leading it can only
end two ways: jail time or death!! These men also get involved in the Summer Night Lights
programme that I previously mentioned and have made a very impressive music video for
the tour showing some of the places that it visits and involving some of the children that
these men have helped along the way, there message being to promote peace and reduce
violence. (This can be viewed at
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JbMhczkc40Y&playnext=1&list=PL1E6953CD15CE9C2C
&index=32)
The final part of the tour
involved visiting The Graff
Lab where young people
from all over LA and at times
the world come and graffiti
on the walls of a disused
area that has now been
purpose designed and
cleared by the County so
that they can graffiti without
any repercussions. Cleaning
up graffiti in LA costs on
average $25 million a year
and costs the state of
California $125 million a
year so the young people
who visit this Lab are grateful to have some where to go to express themselves. These
young people are told before they enter the Lab that any type of gang violence or
involvement will not be tolerated.
41
The graffiti at the Lab stays
up for up to a week and
then it is painted over by
another artist. The
organises of the place are
now attempting to expand
and build a music lab too so
that young people can
come and perform there
too. While I was visiting,
there were people rapping
and street dancing there, it
was amazing to watch.
I then visited the very well known Homeboy Industries. This was an organisation set up by
Father Boyle who helps to ‘assist at risk and formally active gang involved young people to
become positive and contributing members of society through job placements, training and
education. So far over the past few years this project has helped over half the regions 1,000
known gangs to exit gang life safely.
At Homeboy, they recruit ex gang members to work there and have a bakery, restaurant
and merchandise shop. It was a fascinating place where they provide so many services from
legal advice, counselling, educational support, parenting classes, mental health support to
tattoo removal, all free of charge. They even have and did have while I was visiting, a group
of young people from the boot camp in LA that come still hand cuffed and shackled to get
their gang tattoos removed! This service is provided free of charge by local Doctors who
over their services and remove the gang tattoos of members in order to help them on their
way to seeking employment in the future. They provide over 4,000 treatments a year. I also
met and had a brief chat with Father Boyle who started the programme 23 years ago, he has
now written two books about his journey one of which I bought and he signed while I was
there which was great (Homeboy 2010).
Altogether Homeboy run 5 different businesses alongside the bakery and café including a
maintenance company which provides landscaping services, they produce merchandise,
write a magazine called Homeboy Press and run a silk screen and embroidery business. All
of which are very successful and provide transitional employment to over 500 former gang
members and serve over 1800 local businesses. There motto is ‘jobs not jail’ and they pull
out all the stops to get all those that they can to get into employment instead of jail.
42
I visited another Police Precinct in LA that I had been told would be able to give me a more
in-depth look at gangs in South Central LA, this was the 77th Precinct Gang Unit. The area
that this Gang Unit covers is one of the worse in LA, such as Athens Park, Chesterfield
Square, Crenshaw, Gramercy Park, Hyde Park, South Park- 51st and Menlo, Vermont Knolls,
Vermont Park, View Heights where so far this year that had had 30 murders in their
jurisdiction with 19 being gang related from the 30 different gangs that operate in this area.
According to the LAPD, there are more than 250 active gangs in the City of Los Angeles
comprising of over 26,000 members. Over the last 5 years they have been around 23,000
violent gang relates crimes in LA including 784 murders, 12,000 assaults, 10,000 robberies
and approximately 500 rapes (LAPD 2010). Due to this level of violence and dealing with
such an entrenched problem I wanted to see for myself how these gangs were being
managed in this area.
I got to spend the whole shift with the team and went everywhere they went. We had a
debrief first to see what was going on and the officers in charge explained that 3 raids would
be taking place and told each person what their role would be then at the end went through
what to do if shots were fired, dogs are shot and the directions to the nearest hospital. We
went out to the car, on the way, the sergeant explained that if shots are fired at the car I
had to get down in the car in the area that was bullet proof! We then got into the cars in a
convey of 6 squad cars and first parked around the corner to get ready then drove to the
scene, when we arrived at the first house the first Police officer got into position at the front
and is known as ‘the point’ who has the big gun then everyone is in close behind him in a
‘train’ as they enter the property, each with their own gun pointed at the door. They all fan
out once inside the building to secure the area and search for people first to make sure no
one is hiding including any loft space. All occupance were then taken out of the building and
handcuffed. They waited outside until the people search is complete then are lead into the
house for the before pictures to see what the place looks like before the search has taken
place then again afterwards. It was at this point that I was allowed to enter the property,
with the Sergeant, as the property was now secure and observed how they take the
pictures.
The same was done in all 3 properties but at the third property, because it was a house the
officers were leaning on the car pointing their hand guns at the property until the
occupancies came out. They arrested one man that they were looking for and he had ‘187
murder, shaved into the back of his head and he was taken to the station for questioning.
187 is the LAPD code for murder.
After all 3 raids we went back to the office for a debrief where the offices talked through
how they felt the raids had gone and what could have been done better. I then went out
with the sergeant and he explained where all the gangs hang out and which area is
controlled by which gang. We also attended a couple of emergencies, one involving a man
who had been assaulted with a deadly weapon and another who had been beaten up by 4
guys in a car and was bleeding, the ambulance came and took him to hospital.
43
I then got to speak to a couple of gang members who
were in the area. This gang member called himself ‘half
dead’ and has been in his gang for a number of years
following him being left to his own devises at home as
he was raised by him mother until he was 10 when she
died of breast cancer and he was then bought up by his
cousin.
He is loyal to his gang and has lots of gang tattoos
across his chest and even on his eye lids to show
people which gang he belongs too. He says that he will
never get them removed because they were done by a
close friend who has recently died so he will keep his
tattoos as a mark of respect even though he knows
that it will limit his job opportunities in the future.
After my ride-along the
sergeant took me to the LA
County jail for a look
around, it was 11 pm and
we just turned up and they
gave us a tour. There were
some inmates called
‘trustees’ who were still
out of their cell and were
doing painting or other jibs
around the jail. This people
were inmates who were in
for non- violent crimes and
could be trusted to be out
on their own with skeleton
staff.
This facility holds around 5000 inmates within the prison that is also attached another
prison for mental ill prisoners holding around 1500. I was able to go onto one of the wings
and see the inmates in the cells and as I walked by the cell that holds 3-4 inmates each I
could see straight through into the cell, some of the inmates were on the toilet, in bed or
just at the bars trying to talk to me. It was very obvious that many of these men were part of
gangs as they were mostly heavily tattooed with gang tattoos. There was another area of
the facility that I visited that housed around 200 non-violent inmates and consisted of one
room with bunk beds in and the inmates were free to roam around the room as they
pleased. This area was patrolled by one officer who was behind a glass panel so could watch
from a safe distance what was happening in the pod and could call for assists if needed.
44
Reflection on my whole journey
What a journey my time in America has have been not to mention all the time leading up to
this with all the planning and preparation that had to take place. I thoroughly enjoyed every
minute of my travels and am so grateful to the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust for
allowing me to fulfil my dream of taking on this research. I have had some ups and down
along the way but the majority of time was plane sailing! I managed to achieve most of the
goals that I set out to accomplish and visited such a variety of different organisations and
facilities to get a wide range of different perspectives on the magnitude of the gang
problems in the states that I visited. Everyone I spoke to was so willing to help and show me
their organisation and in many cases had contacts with others that I attempted to visit but
unfortunately I did not have time to see them all.
It amazed me to see that in many areas that I visited the gang problems were generational
and many of the young people’s mothers, fathers and in some cases grandparents were
gang members. These young people are often the hardest to reach as it is so much a way of
life for the whole family and there is no positive role model in their life to show them a
different path that does not involve violence, drugs and guns. This is where many of the
agencies I visited stepped in to be that positive influence to help to guide and support the
young person and show them that they have the potential to achieve whatever they want to
if they put their mind to it.
All the states I visited had different gangs that were the most active in their area for
example in New York it was both Black and Mexican gangs, Miami were mainly Haitian and
Mexican and in LA it was mainly Black gangs. However more or less everyone who I have
met has said the same thing about why these young people get involved in gangs in the first
place: it starts in the home!! Your surroundings, the way you are bought up and education
play a major role in shaping your future. Many of these young people have been bought up
in violent, abuse homes with absent parents who are working too hard to notice what their
child is doing, are involved themselves or on drugs then they are unable to provide the child
with the right guidance and discipline as they get older and the child then looks for another
role model and finds it in a gang and so the cycle begins...more needs to be done to educate
this parents into the signs to watch out for in the child so that they can spot if the child is
involved in gang activity as it is surprising how many parents have no idea! They also need
to be guided in how to spent quality constructive time with their children as many of the
gang members who I have spoken to whose parents are involved in this world said that the
only time that that parent had to spend with their child was when they were out on the
streets so they in turn became and gang member in order to get closer and feel that love
from their parents.
45
The next step....
It has been a fascinating journey but one that I have learnt much from, not just about gangs,
how they operate and why the young people join in the first place, but about myself. This
for me has also been a journey of self discovery and I feel that I have learnt much about
myself along the way such as being comfortable to talk and hold my own in a crowd of
people I have never met before, feeling confident in meeting and speaking with gang
members and professions and often talking about quite sensitive issues. I am also much
more independent now and my confidence has grown over the time I have undertaken this
research as I am now much more confident to go into unknown situations and ask question.
I have also learnt that I can actually read a map and navigate myself from place to place; I
don’t know what I would have done without Google map!!! I was very sad to say goodbye to
America but have the feeling it won’t be long before I return again....
Since my return to the UK I have been even more determined to continue my work with
gang members in the UK but am hoping to return to America soon as I have kept in contact
with many of the contacts that I made during my trip and am hoping to return for a follow
up visit in the near future and visit some of the areas that I did not have a chance to visit the
first time.
Once I had read through all the information I had collected I went on to put together a Press
Release for the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust website. I also sent this off to various
news papers and journals and am lucky enough to have an article that will be published in
the Nursing Standard Journal in the early part of 2011.
Now that I have returned to the UK I have told many people about my trip and a couple of
my friends are now thinking of applying for the Fellowship next year. I have also made
contact with some previous Fellows who researched similar topics to me to compare the
results that we both found. I now plan on continuing my work with gangs and in talks with
various Police and other agencies regarding possible job opportunities. I feel that having this
opportunity has definitely opened doors for me and I thank the Winston Churchill Memorial
Trust greatly for all of their help and support for me to follow my dream
A BIG THANK YOU again to everyone who has made my dream possible.
46
All the organisations I visited
New York

New York Gang Investigation Association

Council for Unity

New York police officer in Brooklyn

Gang involved young people in Brooklyn
Miami

Violence Intervention Programme (VIP)

Miami-Dade County Juvenile Services Department (JAC)

Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Facility

PanZOu Project Inc

Youth Gang Resource Centre

Miami Dade Police Department, Street Gang Section

Miami Dade Gang Task force
Bakersfield
Kern Probation Department

GIST (Gang Intervention and Suppression Team)

Bridges

Reporting Centre

Stay Focused Ministries

Garden Pathways

New Life Construction

Crossroads

Juvenile Hall

Call In

Wasco State Prison
47
Los Angeles

Boys & Girls Clubs of Long Beach

Gang unit Hollywood

LA Gang Tours

Homeboys Institute

77th Precinct

LA County Jail

Summer Night Lights

Meetings with various current gang members
48
References
 Birmingham Council Council (2009) Reducing Gang Violence [Online].
Available: www.birmingham.gov.uk [Last accessed 04/01/11]
 Council for Unity (2010) About Us [Online]. Available:
http://www.councilforunity.org/scope.php [Last accessed 04/01/11]
 Direct Government (2011) Gangs and Gang Crime Facts [Online].
Available: http://www.direct.gov.uk/ [Last accessed 04/01/11]
 Homeboy Industries (2011) Overview [Online]. Available:
http://www.homeboy-industries.org [Last accessed 04/01/11]
 Leap Confronting Conflict (2010) Who are We [Online]. Available:
http://www.leapconfrontingconflict.org.uk/who-we-are [Last accessed
04/01/11]
 Los Angeles Police Department (2011) Gangs [Online]. Available:
http://www.lapdonline.org [Last accessed 04/01/11]
 Miami- Dade County Juvenile Services Department (2008) Juvenile
Justice Model. Miami: Miami- Dade County Juvenile Services Department
 New York Gang Investigators Associations (2010) Mission Statement
[Online]. Available: http://www.nygia.org/HOME/tabid/36/Default.aspx
[Last accessed 04/01/11]
49
 Kings College Hospital (2006) UK’s First Emergency Adolescent Service at
Kings [Online]. Available:
http://www.kch.nhs.uk/news/archive/2006/emergency-adolescentservice/ [Last accessed 04/01/11]
 Manchester County Council (2010) Manchester Multi Agency Gang
Strategy [Online]. Available:
http://www.manchester.gov.uk/a_to_z/service/1930/manchester_multi
-agency_gang_strategy_mmags. [Last accessed 04/01/11]
 McShane J (2010) Underworld UK- Knife Crime, Law of the Blade.
Glasgow: Ellipsis Books Limited
 The Centre for Social Justice (2009) Dying to Belong- An In-depth Review
of Street Gangs In Britain. London: The Centre for Social Justice
 Time Out London (2008) Ten Years of Operation Trident [Online].
Available: http://www.timeout.com/london/bigsmoke/features/4285/Ten_years_of_Operation_Trident.html [Last
accessed 04/01/11]
 University of Leicester (2006) Gang Culture [Online]. Available:
http://www2.le.ac.uk/ebulletin/features/20002009/2006/08/nparticle.2006-08-03.2020148239 [Last Accessed
04/01/11]
 Violence Reduction Unit (2010) CIRV Gang Intervention Launched
[Online]. Available:
http://www.actiononviolence.com/CIRV-launched [Last Accessed
04/01/11]
 Wikipedia (2010) Zoe Pound Gang [Online]. Available:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoe_Pound_Gang [Last accessed 04/01/11]
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