This book review covers Policing Gangs in America by Charles Katz and Vincent Webb. Charles Katz has a Ph.D. in Criminal Justice, while Vincent Webb has a Ph.D. in Sociology, making both qualified to conduct and discuss research on gangs. Research for Policing Gangs in America was gathered in four cities across the American Southwest; Inglewood, California, Albuquerque, New Mexico, Las Vegas, Nevada, and Phoenix, Arizona. This review will summarize and discuss the main points of each chapter, then cover the relationship between the literature and class discussions in Introduction to Policing and finally it will note the strengths and weaknesses of book. The first chapter of Policing Gangs in America is entitled, “Studying the Police Response to Gangs.” The primary purpose of the chapter is to establish how police agencies; Inglewood, Las Vegas, Albuquerque and Phoenix in specific, respond to gang problems in their respective areas. This chapter served as an introduction, giving a brief history of gang-related policing, how the public and media see the gang problem, research studies done regarding gangs and the recent declaration to shift away from suppression-oriented strategies as a result of overly aggressive actions toward citizens. Examples of this misconduct are given in the forms of gang units from Las Vegas, Chicago and Houston. The second chapter is titled, “Setting and Methods” and sets out to make clear to the reader the specific methods and research conducted during the study. This study is the primary purpose of the book, and as with all research studies, how one conducts their research is incredibly important, especially if the study plans to be replicated at any point in time. The topics included in this cha... ... middle of paper ... ...g measures out there. The reader is given plenty of background information on gangs allowing someone with little knowledge of the subject or the cities’ history to jump right in. Statistics, interviews, surveys and personal observations of the authors during ride-alongs make up much of the source material. The book’s strengths lie in the amount of research contained within it, as well as an insider look at the gang unit and what it takes to be an officer in that specialization. However, if it is not being used to supplement another research paper or study, the book comes off as a difficult and boring read, making a reader likely to put it down otherwise. Works Cited Katz, C. M., & Webb, V. J. (2006). Policing Gangs in America. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Walker, S., & Katz, C. (2011). The Police in America: An Introduction. New York: McGraw-Hill.
A Climate of Fear “The Gang Crackdown”, provided by PBS, communicates the everyday struggles that the communities of Nassau County face every day. The video’s focus revolves around the homicidal and violent crimes that have been provided by the “MS-13” and the details of cracking down on their development. The Latin American gang from El Salvador is known for their audacity to target the young population of Long Island and their homicidal tendencies. They have targeted children and teenagers at their workplace, their home, and their school. These gang members have left the community defenseless and struck fear into the hearts of many parents along with the government itself.
Schmidt, L. M., & O'Reilly, J. T. (2007). Gangs and Law Enforcement: A Guide for Dealing with Gang-Related Violence. Springfield: Charles C Thomas Publisher, LTD.
In response to a growing gang problem in specific communities, the OJJDP has refined the Comprehensive Gang Model to better fit the issues related to today’s gangs. The GRP incorporates several new aspects into the pre-existing Comprehensive Gang Model. The revamped program was tested in four communities: East Los Angeles, CA; Milwaukee, W...
Gangs have been a point of concern for states and societies around the world for centuries. Youth gangs are not exempt from that same categorization and have operated for the same amount of time worldwide. Over the last century however, a proliferation of youth gangs has been witnessed, especially among Hispanic youths immigrating into the United States. Researchers and scholars have offered multiple theories as to why youths, and Hispanics youths in particular integrate themselves into gang organizations. Three schools of thought arise when conducting gang integration research. Rational Economics Theory1 proposes that youths, and all individuals, join gangs for financial and material benefit. Cultural Deviance Theory considers youth gang members as exposed to a lower class subculture that rationalizes and even promotes crime, delinquency and gang membership, contrasting to the “normal” set of prescribed values and culture in more civilized society. Acculturation Theory argues that youths join gangs as a means to be acculturated by ethnically or compositionally similar peers, whether as a response to ethnic marginalization by members of the host country or inability to acculturate to their new home.
This paper will cover issues that young minorities encounter in the movies; Crips and Bloods: Made in America (2008), Gran Torino (2008), A Better Life (2011). Movies will be summarize, and compare and contrast youths experienced. Criminological theories shall be utilized to further elaborate issues. Finally steps and theories will be utilized towards solving issues, also possible methods to correct the issues will be addressed in the end.
Gang involvement has been quite higher than past years. The 2008 National Youth Gang Survey estimates that about 32.4 percent of all cities, suburban areas, towns, and rural counties had a gang problem (Egley et al., 2010). This represented a 15 percent increase from the year 2002. The total number of gangs has also increased by 28 percent and total gang members have increased by 6 percent (Egley et al., 2010). This shows how relevant gang related activity is in today’s society. More locations are beginning to experience gang activity for the first time. Gang crime has also been on the rise in the past...
According to the 2015 National Gang Report (NGR) from the National Gang Intelligence Center (NGIC) almost half of law enforcement juristictions across the United States reported a rise in street gang membership and street gang activitiy. My communitty is no exception.
The presence of gang violence has been a long lasting problem in Philadelphia. Since the American Revolution, gangs have been overpopulating the streets of Philadelphia (Johnson, Muhlhausen, 2005). Most gangs in history have been of lower class members of society, and they often are immigrants into the U.S (Teen Gangs, 1996). Gangs provided lower class teens to have an opportunity to bond with other lower class teens. However over time, the original motive of being in a gang has changed. In the past, gangs used to provide an escape for teens to express themselves, let out aggression, and to socialize with their peers. It was also an opportunity for teens to control their territory and fit in (Johnson, Muhlhausen, 2005). In the past, authorities would only focus on symptoms of gang violence and not the root. They would focus on arresting crime members instead of preventing gang violence. Gangs are beginning to expand from inner-city blo...
Tobin, Kimberly. Gangs: An Individual and Group Perspective. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson/Prentice Hall, 2008. Print.
The main source of drug dealers is gangs and how the police come up with strategies that can stop these gangs from trafficking these narcotics. Among the most urgent and oppressive aspects of the current drug problem is the violence of gangs engaged in street-level drug distribution. Gangs are held responsible for the increase in homicide rates in the cities where they have their production is happening. They use violence not only to discipline their own employees and to intimidate and rob their competitors but also to intimidate individual citizens and groups of citizens who resist their intrusion. Exactly how the police can best deal with this aspect of the drug problem remains uncertain. One approach is to view drug gangs as similar to the youth gangs of the past and to use the same strategies that proved effective in the past. That older strategy was designed primarily to reduce inter gang violen...
For these reasons, it is easy why gangs impact prisons and why they require special attention. With the abundance of gangs, prisons have been forced to implement a number of programs. The first program used to combat gangs is the “gang intelligence program” (Management, n. d, p. 6). This is considered the most commonly used program. Which, intel’s “shakedowns, correspondence checks, and informants, provide important information concerning gangs in a correctional system” (Management, n. d, p. 6). Following this, the information “must be evaluated, systematized, and made readily retrievable” (Management, n. d, p. 6). Otherwise the gang intelligence programs will not be as effective in addressing gang problems. Overtime, prisons realized that they had to increase their effects if they were going to stay on top of these sophisticated gangs.
Until the 1970s ‘the term gang was synonymous with the large urban centres of New York, Chicago, Philadelphia and LA’ (Fagan 1996: 40). However, since then, gang research has identified that there has been a rapid increase in the number of gangs in the U.S and across the globe (Klein 1995; Decker and Weerman 2005). ' Heterogeneity between and within gangs has been evident in gang research for over 75 years' (Fagan 1996: 42), yet evidence suggests that gangs have probably been even more diverse than previously portrayed; scholarly attention is uncovering increased diversity along more dimensions than has been suggested by earlier studies (Huff 1996). The U.S is more ethnically and racially diverse than previously and gangs today reflect this. Findings suggest that alongside the emergence of Asian gangs, white gangs have been declining (except in smaller cities in the U.S) and gang members are now mainly of African-American or Hispanic lineage (Sanders 1994; Klein 1995; Spergel
Hallswort, S. And Young, T. (2004) Getting Real About Gang. Criminal Justice Matters [online]. 55. (1), pp 12-13 [Accessed 10 December 2013]
As a police officer patrolling the area, I have observed several gang features in the community.If this problem isn’t taken care of, it can affect the community.As I approach the impending problems of dealing with these gangs, I would,accordingly, apply the the three distinctive styles of policing (Schmalleger ,172)to deter the gang crimes and activities in our community.
This paper will examine and evaluate a qualitative study conducted by Beare and Hogg named “Listening In...to Gang Culture.” It will discuss the purpose of the study and evaluate the methodological designs. The study looks into the problem of street gangs and sought to understand how gang members behave. The authors used police transcripts of wiretaps as their primary source of data and analyzed it for further review. Findings show that social programs will have to be targeted towards younger gang members to dissuade them from the gang lifestyle.