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A vast network of armed drug-trafficking gangs – led by adults and served to a
considerable extent by juveniles – whose turf domination in New Jersey’s communities
has exploded in recent years, ensures that illegal drugs get from wholesale distribution
points to the users in our cities, suburbs, and even rural locales. Today, these gangs
sustain, and are sustained by, a lucrative, drug-based underground economy. Like the
precursors of La Cosa Nostra during the 1920s liquor Prohibition Era, these groups have
consolidated power through organization and violence. However, their evolution into
cartels and super gangs has elevated their adverse impact on society to the extent that it
now exceeds that of La Cosa Nostra during its heyday.
At the Commission’s public hearing, NDIC Director Horn named some of the major retail narcotics distributors in New Jersey: Street gangs such as Bloods, Crips, Latin Kings and Neta are the dominant retail-level distributors of South American heroin in New Jersey. West African criminal groups distribute retail quantities of Southeast Asian heroin, while Lebanese, Pakistani and other criminal groups distribute retail quantities of Southwest Asia heroin. Outlaw motorcycle gangs and teenagers and young adults are the dominant retail-level MDMA and methamphetamine distributors in New Jersey. So-called “super gangs,” those with relatively rigid leadership hierarchies and hundreds or even thousands of members in several states, operate in New Jersey. They have grown in importance here since the Commission first catalogued the gang problem in its November 1993 Criminal Street Gangs report. They include chapters or emulators of the rival Los Angeles-based Bloods and Crips, the Chicago-based Latin Kings (known formally as the Almighty Latin King/Queen Nation) and the Neta Association. A major concern in some areas of the state is the violent nature and activities of numerous Mexican gangs and a gang comprised mostly of Salvadorians known as Mara Salvatrucha or MS-13. Many of the members of these gangs are undocumented aliens, bringing with them a host of potential security problems. Some of the Salvadorian gang members, for example, are former members of military or guerilla units in El Salvador and have a proclivity for violence. Paterson Police Chief Lawrence G. Spagnola recounted at the public hearing how juveniles, some as young as nine or ten years old, often occupy the bottom rungs of the typical gang’s membership ladder, serving as runners, lookouts, stash holders and even gun carriers. They communicate constantly via cell phones with others in the organization. At the next level, dealers sell the product. Street supervisors control different corners or “sets.” Above all is the gang’s leader, who sometimes shares power with others. Money generated by drug sales pays for lawyers, guns and more drugs. Sometimes turf envy, grudges or insults erupt into bloody violence, but more often truces prevail between the gangs, because, as Chief Spagnola pointed out, “they know if they fight with each other, it’s bad for business.” Roland Holvey, Principal Investigator with the Special Investigations Division of the New Jersey Department of Corrections (DOC), testified at the public hearing that the DOC “started identifying gangs and gang members in January of 1994.” He described how this led to creation of one of the best databases on the subject in the state and a program to slow down gang proliferation in state prisons: …[W]e’ve identified right now over 6,500 gang members since 1994 that have been incarcerated and are currently incarcerated. We’ve identified a little over 200 different gangs. Included in those 200 … are … quite a few of the super gangs. And we have some fairly large gangs. Latin Kings, we’ve identified a little over a thousand members. Bloods, we've identified a little over a thousand members. Crips, right now we’ve identified a little over a hundred members. And several other gangs making up that 6,500. …[W]e saw a drastic escalation of violence about the prisons between 1994 and 1997. And we … had to do something to manage these gangs. … The old theory of transferring these guys from one prison to another to try to eliminate the problem and take away their power base wasn’t effective for us any longer, because of these large gangs that were all working together. They had a central leadership, and all the prisons fell under one leader. So you see the problems that that creates. …[W]e came up with an idea. Again, we didn’t reinvent the wheel. We looked to … the State of Connecticut[, which] had a gang management unit. We modeled ours after theirs. We opened that up in March of 1998. And the key to the gang management unit that we opened up, … at Northern State Prison, is that it's a program … designed to try to assist these individuals in getting out of the gang. Now, that may sound strange, but it works. Now, I’m not going to blow smoke at you and tell you that we’ve gotten all these guys out of the gangs. You know, traditionally, inmates will … try to manipulate the system and manipulate us into thinking that they are ex-gang members. We realize that a lot of the individuals we put into our gang unit have gone through the motions, and [we] just … modified their behavior and brought the level of violence down significantly in our prisons. But we have … put … right now about 500 inmates through our gang management program. And I would estimate approximately 20 percent of those 500 are ex-gang members now. So it's worked 20 percent of the time. The other 80 percent, we’ve modified their behavior, and our prisons are much safer and less violent places. So in that sense, it works inside the institutions. And what we got out of that was a 44 percent drop in assaults on staff statewide and an 82 percent drop in organized violent behavior statewide because of the existence of this gang management unit. So it has worked for us. As far as the national perspective on gangs, New Jersey and Corrections … are in the forefront nationally because of this unit. There’s only one other like it in the country. And from that, we developed another program called the Gang Awareness and Prevention Program [GAPP]. We utilize some inmates that have completed this gang management program. They’re still incarcerated, and we take them out to schools to talk to kids, to churches, to community events to try to do some gang prevention. … Our Commissioner is behind these programs a hundred and fifty percent, and they work. It’s, you know, I’m very proud to be part of the Department of Corrections and these initiatives that we’ve taken. And we found ourselves to be in the forefront. … [W]e do have a very inclusive database that we’ve developed. Unfortunately, it’s not networked [electronically]. It’s networked manually. I get calls from Paterson [Police Department], from the State Police Street Gang Unit, from several municipalities, several prosecutors offices all over the state, and we provide the information to them manually. It’s a stand-alone database. Unfortunately, the funds aren’t there. But it will be incorporated into the State Police database, so we will have access to that. We will input our data into that, and we’ll be part of that. So I’m very excited about that. State Police Sergeant First Class Keith F. Bevacqui, Assistant Leader and Operations Officer of the State Police Gangs Unit, testified that in 2000-01 the State Police surveyed representatives of the 195 municipalities that had sent law enforcement officers to a five-day advanced gang awareness, recognition and training program. Prosecutors’ offices and jails in the state’s 21 counties and the New Jersey Department of Corrections also provided data for the survey. He summarized the results: … [W]e identified 135 distinct gangs operating in the State of New Jersey. And that comes from a limited survey. Only 195 municipal agencies responded. From that also, we identified over 10,000 documented street gang members in the State of New Jersey. 3,200 of them were Latin King members. And that’s grown in size. Interstate connections and the unintentional expansion of access to information concerning the existence and significance of the super gangs through media and Internet exposure enable them to endure longer than localized gangs, despite periodically intense law enforcement crackdowns. Sergeant First Class Bevacqui described at the public hearing how Chicago members of the Latin Kings came to New Jersey several times to help its membership rebound and reorganize after state-court convictions in March 2000 of five core leaders of the group. The convictions resulted from the brutal July 1998 murders of two brothers, both Latin Kings members, in Newark’s Branch Brook Park. Sergeant Bevacqui further related that when Operation Catapult, conducted by the State Police and the Division of Criminal Justice, resulted in October 30, 2002 indictments of several more New Jersey Latin Kings, the Chicago Latin Kings were in control: Their manifestos, or their … operating procedures, came out of Chicago, and that’s what New Jersey followed. They had contact with the Latin Kings in Chicago via Internet access as well, e-mail system, [and] by telephone. Law enforcement officials have identified Latin Kings chapters in Camden, Hoboken, Elizabeth, Jersey City, Newark, Passaic, Paterson, Perth Amboy, Trenton and Toms River. Their presence or activity has been noticed in Asbury Park, Bayonne, Fort Lee, Dover Township, Lakewood, Linden, Long Branch, Plainfield, Teaneck, Vineland and West New York. Their total membership amounts to several thousand in New Jersey. “Rey” (Spanish for “King”), a former Latin King member testified at the public hearing with a disguise and under stringent security. When he was incarcerated in New Jersey after committing a serious crime, his involvement with the Latin Kings increased because the gang actually was more organized in prison than out on the streets. Rey told how the Latin Kings originated in Chicago in 1940, professing to want to help Hispanics to better themselves. Their influence led to control of much of the underground drug commerce in prisons and beyond. Rey testified that Latin Kings earn money by extortion and selling drugs and guns. They readily obtain the guns in southern states with lax firearm controls. Rey provided an example of gang extortion: … [E]specially in prison, what they do is this: Let’s say, for example, some kid that’s never been incarcerated ends up in prison, and he don’t know what he's getting into. So he’s looking for protection. So you have a mother and a father that [are] very concerned for this kid; they will do anything. So [the gang members] … use this for their advantage. They manipulate it. They … get on the phone, they speak, or they write letters, “Listen, if you send us this, we make sure nothing happens to your son.” … [T]hey use it like that. According to Rey, Latin King members do not all speak Spanish, nor do they all have the same Hispanic or Latino background. He testified, “[T]hey could be Cubans, Colombians, Mexicans, from any Hispanic culture.” He added that they even have a few African-American members in New Jersey. Rey claimed that the Latin Kings did not practice so-called “beat downs” against aspiring gang members but required them to learn intricate “lessons” and, in some cases, required an initiate to TOS (terminate on sight), that is, kill someone. Short of death, according to Rey, this “work” includes “tak[ing] somebody down, shoot[ing] somebody, stab[bing] somebody or cut[ting] somebody’s face in some occasions.” Rey described the extreme pressure to join the gang brought to bear upon youths living in neighborhoods controlled by the Latin Kings: It’s very strong, because [of] the manipulation, … the peer pressure. … [T]hey tell the kids … it’s for the cause, it's for the good things, … it’s for our people, it's to educate our people. But once they get in, it's like pure hell. They don't know what they got themselves into. ... They make a choice to join the gang. Then [the gang] comes up with this, “In order for you to get out, you’ve got to die.”… And … you can’t do nothing else. They be scared. … [Y]ou’ve got young kids out there; they’re scared; they don’t know what to do. Rey testified that the Latin Kings are extremely well organized with an Inca, elected by the local chapters, in overall control. Chapters are led by a First Crown (President), Second Crown (Vice President), Third Crown (Warlord), Fourth Crown (Sergeant of Arms in charge of all the weapons), Fifth Crown ( Captain Crown Advisor, who investigates all enemies in a prison or neighborhood and ensures that all members know their lessons). Members put money into a “box” every month to sustain the leadership and members in need. Members who fail to do so “suffer some consequences.” Rey noted that members frequently violate some rules, such as the one against “shooting dope,” because even the leaders do not abide by them. Others, like not being homosexual, are strictly enforced, with dire consequences for the violator. He said the Latin Kings’ attitude towards the police was that “they was a piece of crap.” Latin Kings did not fear the police because “they had guns, too.” He added that gang members discussed possible assaults on police officers “many times,” and he was aware of assaults on officers taking place. * * * Law enforcement officials have identified Neta Association chapters in Camden, Elizabeth, Hoboken, Jersey City, Newark, Perth Amboy and Trenton. Members have been present or active in Asbury Park, Fort Lee, New Brunswick, Paterson, Plainfield, Teaneck and West New York. Carlos Torres Iriarte, an inmate of the Puerto Rico prison system, founded the Neta Association during the 1970s. The group allegedly was started to protect the rights of inmates from the injustices perpetrated by the prison administration and by stronger, more organized inmates. Although members of a rival prison gang murdered Iriarte on March 30, 1981, the Neta Association spread to 17 Puerto Rican correctional facilities by 1997. It continues to expand its influence within the penal system and on the streets. It has spread to correctional institutions in New Jersey and is one of six prison gangs classified as a Security Threat Group by the state Department of Corrections. Since its inception, Neta has been a predominantly Hispanic male gang; however, in recent years it has accepted members with various ethnic backgrounds. As is the case with the Latin Kings, the Netas have a hierarchical leadership structure. The two groups occasionally form alliances. * * * The Bloods originated in the Compton section of South Central Los Angeles in the late 1960s in opposition to a rival gang called the Crips. It is a predominantly African-American gang with both male and female members but has been known to recruit Hispanic members. Chapters are loosely organized without a clear hierarchical structure, although law enforcement authorities indicate that in furtherance of key criminal activities, particularly involving the drug trade, these gang units have begun to adopt an organizational framework in which individual members are assigned discrete tasks. The Bloods operate in sub-groups known as “sets” and has a large nationwide membership. Blood sets are located mostly in urban areas, including several in New Jersey. Each set consists of a group of individuals involved in criminal activities, mainly drug distribution, in certain geographical areas. The Bloods have become notorious for their method of gang initiation. Males usually are “beaten in” with 31 seconds of violence inflicted by three to five gang members. Female members, known as Bloodettes, are either beaten in or “sexed in,” that is, required to engage in sex with multiple gang members. Members also are “blooded in” or “burned in.” A cigarette or AA battery is use to inflict three circles, called a “dawg paw,” usually on the upper arms of males and on the calves or shoulder blades of females. Law enforcement has begun to focus heavily on Bloods because it is one of the fastest growing street gangs in New Jersey. Their most significant criminal activities have taken place in urban areas of northern New Jersey, including East Orange, Irvington, Newark and Paterson. Several hundred members of the Bloods are believed to be involved in drug distribution and related crimes in the City of East Orange. They are divided into several different sets that operate independently from one another. Heroin is presently the drug of choice, but crack cocaine also is sold in certain areas of the city. The majority of the drug sales are made via open-air drug markets on street corners controlled by the various Bloods sets. Monikers applied to the sets in East Orange include Double II, Gutter Rats, Steel Click, North Side Killer Gang (NSKG), Down the Hill (DTH) and Hit Squad Mob. Law enforcement officials estimate that as many as 25 Bloods sets, with well over 100 members, operate in Irvington. They have been involved in the usual gang-related activity: drug distribution, assault, robbery, auto theft, weapon possession and homicide. Most of the sets are loosely organized with no identifiable leader. Many Bloods members are believed to have been recruited from local African-American street gangs in Irvington, and some members reportedly are affiliated with the Baxter Terrace Posse, a major Newark street gang. New members also are recruited from local high schools. Members of Bloods sets sometimes will fight among themselves, and violent friction also occurs between sets. Recently, a female member of a Bloods set in East Orange was severely slashed by female members of an Irvington set simply because she belonged to the set in East Orange. In addition to competition among its sets, Bloods members also compete with 15 to 20 other street gangs operating in Irvington, including the Crips. The number of Bloods sets operating in the City of Newark has increased dramatically during the past two to three years. The Newark Police Department has identified more than 800 members of the Bloods and estimates that more than 1000 members and associates are actively involved in criminal activities in Newark and surrounding areas. In their operations throughout those venues, the Bloods have been described by law enforcement officials as a semi-organized criminal group involved primarily in the distribution of drugs. They are also involved in shootings, turf disputes and assaults. Many new members are recruited at local high schools, and a number of individuals who were previously members of the Five Percenters gang have become members of the Bloods. Also, members of the Baxter Terrace Posse, as well as members of other established street gangs in Newark, are known to have joined forces with the Bloods. Bloods have been at the center of gang violence in Newark. On November 26, 2000, five alleged Bloods members, three females and two males, brutally tortured and killed one of their own, possibly in retaliation for his attempt to withdraw from the gang. Meanwhile, a state task force has had some success in countering the Bloods in Newark and other venues through various means, including effective use of electronic surveillance. Among those convicted – and, in his case, sentenced to life in prison for murder – was David Allen, a Bloods leader who had plotted to murder the judge and others involved in his murder trial in January 2001. More recently, in February 2004, a joint federal/county undercover task force arrested a reputed leader of a major Bloods set based in Jersey City. Also that month, federal DEA agents working in concert with local police in Orange arrested 31 individuals alleged to be members of the Bloods. The investigation revealed that factions of the gang from different locales had organized crews in an effort to control the heroin and cocaine trade within the community. In Newark, the Bloods operate mainly in the southern and western areas of the city and have been involved in numerous shooting incidents in the past two to three years. Members of Bloods sets located in the neighboring communities of East Orange and Irvington have been known to move into Newark, forcibly taking over drug corners. These actions have caused additional shooting incidents and have resulted in a number of homicides. Criminal activities involving Bloods members have increased significantly in the City of Paterson in just the past year. Law enforcement officials estimate that more than 1,000 Bloods members, male and female, are active in that city. Many are members of the following sets: Sex, Money, Murder (also known as 252), Gangster Killer Bloods, and 10th Avenue and 26th Street. Bloods sets in Paterson also are loosely organized and often have no identifiable leader. Members sometimes fight among themselves, as well as with members of other sets. They also sometimes fight with rival gangs, including the Crips, Latin Kings, Netas and homegrown gangs. Many Bloods members in Paterson are recruited from local high schools, and some members were formerly affiliated with the Five Percenters. Because the Bloods are so disorganized in Paterson, law enforcement officials are concerned that individuals affiliated with the gang members in New York City may come to Paterson in a bid to organize and provide leadership to local sets. Meanwhile, outbursts of violence are a constant threat to the community. In one heavily publicized incident that occurred at the Alexander Hamilton Project in Paterson on October 31, 2000, Claude “Earl” Wiggens, Jr., was shot to death in gang and drug- related violence. Wiggens, who was awaiting trial on drug charges when he was gunned down, reportedly was a member of the Bloods, and the housing project is in a location frequented by members of the Bloods as well as members of the Crips. During the funeral for Wiggens, many young men and women mourners walked past a dog paw- shaped floral arrangement, and tossed red bandanas into the open casket. * * * The gang known as the Crips was formed in California during the 1960s and has proliferated throughout the country. Though predominantly an African-American gang with both male and female members, it is known to accept members from other ethnic backgrounds. The Crips, like its rival Bloods, are loosely organized and not known to have a fixed hierarchical structure. It operates in sets as well and is associated with the color blue. In New Jersey, the largest concentration of Crips is believed to be located in Newark, where more than 250 members have been identified. They have a reputation for extreme violence and are involved in the distribution of cocaine and heroin. The gang also has been involved in shootings, robberies and assaults and operates primarily from the Hyatt Court and Pennington Court housing projects located on the East Side of the city. The Crips also are active in Irvington and reportedly have increased their membership there to more than 60 by absorbing several members of local street gangs and drug trafficking groups. In addition, Crips are competing with Bloods sets operating in Irvington and have been involved in shootings, robberies and assaults. Members of the Crips also are suspected of involvement in some of the gang-related homicides that have occurred in Irvington during the past year. Crips also are involved in drug distribution and related crimes in Paterson, where there is an ongoing rivalry with members of the Bloods. Paterson police officials estimate that approximately 200 members of the Crips are active in their city. Members of both gangs are involved in drug distribution and other criminal activities at the Alexander Hamilton Housing Project, where a number of drug and gang-related shootings have taken place. Members of the Crips also operate in Asbury Park, East Orange, Englewood, Hoboken, Jersey City, Orange, Phillipsburg, Teaneck and Trenton. * * * The Mara Salvatrucha, also known as “MS,” “MSX3” and “MSXIII” but more commonly referred to by law enforcement officials in New Jersey as “MS-13,” (the number 13 indicates a Southern California Hispanic gang) was originally formed in Los Angeles in the early 1980s. The gang was established by a small criminal element among more than one million El Salvadoran nationals (both legal and illegal) who fled El Salvador as a result of political turmoil and civil war. Faced with high unemployment and a lack of skills, these immigrants fled their homeland in search of peace and economic opportunity. Some are former members of the military or rebel guerilla units, and they have a proclivity for violence. The majority of those who fled the chaos in El Salvador settled in southern California and the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area. The southern California area has the highest concentration of El Salvadorans outside of their native country. Some immigrants with direct ties to La Mara, one of El Salvador’s original violent street gangs, settled in the Rampart section of Los Angeles. Upon their arrival, they experienced cultural bias, especially from other Latino criminal groups. To defend themselves, they banded together and established the Mara Salvatrucha gang. Subsequently, they recruited additional members and enforced their own laws. Although membership initially consisted of El Salvadoran immigrants, it has expanded to include Mexicans, Guatemalans, Hondurans and African-Americans. Many of the gang’s members are former members of the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN), a leftist guerrilla organization that was involved in a civil war against the Salvadoran government in the 1980s. These individuals were trained in the use of firearms, explosives and booby traps. Mara Salvatrucha members quickly asserted themselves as an organized gang known for indulging in extreme violence. Gang members are known to be involved in drug trafficking, weapons smuggling, armed robberies, drive-by shootings, extortion, vehicle theft and assault. In addition to its propensity for violence, MS-13 also has been described as a highly organized and sophisticated street gang that is known to be antigovernment. Gang members also maintain a relationship with current and former members of the Salvadoran military. In recent years, the realm of MS-13 has greatly expanded from its origins in southern California and the Washington, D.C., areas. Factions of MS-13 can be found in several states across the country, including New Jersey. A significant difference between MS-13 and traditional street gangs in the U. S. is that MS-13 members have international connections. Members here maintain constant contact with members in El Salvador. To the dismay of U.S. authorities, these alliances provide MS-13 members with access to military arms and the wherewithal to traffic them to this country. Also, the tendency of MS-13 members to react with violence is significantly higher than that of most members of other gangs. MS-13 gang members’ lack of fear and their disrespect for anyone, including law enforcement officers, are unique characteristics that distinguish them from members of other Latino gangs. Many police officers have experienced confrontations with elements of this gang, and gang members have been responsible for the shootings and murders of numerous law enforcement officers across the U.S. MS-13 members are actively involved in the manufacture of anti-personnel grenades, hand-crafted from 12-gauge “00” buck shotgun shells and intended for use against law enforcement officers during raids on gang residences and drug stash houses. The gang operates in small groups known as “cliques.” Leadership in each clique consists of one or two individuals known as Veteranos. These are usually older members who have the overall responsibility of organizing meetings, directing criminal activity, regulating behavior and maintaining cohesion among members. The number of members in each clique varies. Individuals seeking membership in MS-13 are subject to various forms of initiation. Some candidates are “jumped in.” This ritual consists of a candidate being beaten by gang members for a period of 13 seconds. In some cliques, participation in felonious activity may be required. There have also been instances where individuals actually have been required to assault a police officer in order to gain full membership. To signify gang allegiance, members are expected to receive a tattoo once accepted into the organization. The proliferation of Mara Salvatrucha and other Latin American street gangs in New Jersey and other parts of the country poses a serious threat. Some law enforcement intelligence information indicates that many Latino gangs are uniting in a more organized manner under the banner of Mara Salvatrucha. In the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area, several of the largest Hispanic gangs have joined forces with the MS-13 street gang. If this trend continues, the MS-13 gang could become one of the largest street gangs in the country. MS-13 members are known to be active or residing in the New Jersey communities of Elizabeth, Englewood, Jersey City, Long Branch, New Brunswick, Passaic, Paterson, Plainfield, Red Bank, Union City, and West New York. * * * FBI Supervisory Special Agent Ronald N. Nolan pointed out at the Commission’s public hearing that certain local gangs may be as dangerous, or more so, than chapters of these super gangs. He described one particularly volatile Camden gang: In 1992, when I was working out of the Philadelphia FBI, I was assigned to the Camden [Resident FBI Office to deal with] … a local impact group call[ing] themselves the Sons of Malcolm X. They had no national exposure, but inside the City of Camden they were causing chaos … . One of the ways that they would recruit people was to go out and kill three people. That was part of your initiation into the group. That's just as bad as anything [encountered] on the national [or] international level. They did that to show that they had strength inside that city. Their organization was structured to the point where they had lookouts on the corners [with] earphone sets. When the police would come, they would notify [each other,] and everybody would go inside the house. They had structure, where you knew who was the boss. They had an Hispanic set and an African-American set. … [T]o me, when we took them down in, I believe, October of 1992, they were very structured. They were just like any super group, … just on a smaller scale. However, lacking supportive connections elsewhere in the country, localized gangs such as the Sons of Malcolm X may be less likely to rebound from law enforcement crackdowns. While drug trafficking is the lifeblood of criminal street gangs, it by no means represents the totality of their menace. New Jersey Attorney General Peter C. Harvey testified at the public hearing that the peril extends beyond merely satiating demand for illegal drugs: Now, to understand how these groups work, the objective here is to control territories in cities and in suburban areas. The way these groups finance themselves is through the sale of narcotics. They enforce turf. They enforce protection through the acquisition of guns, heavy firepower, and they engage in violence against rival gang members, and sometimes against their own members. … [T]hey also enforce their trade with the most random and vicious violence you can imagine. They buy guns in quantity. They do not hesitate to use them. And they do not hesitate to get into gun battles with police officers, as well as themselves, to avoid detection. Criminal Justice Director Vaughn McKoy addressed the danger and recklessness characteristic of the super gangs: [T]hey recruit so young. You’re talking about kids in grade school, nine, ten, eleven years old, who are looking up to individuals who are in their twenties or in their thirties, who have the “badge of honor” in that they have gone through the criminal justice system once or twice; they’ve done time in prison. And these kids in these communities look up to these individuals; and they’re so susceptible to do whatever these older individuals are telling them to do; and they do it out in the open; and they have no fear. Based upon my experiences with La Cosa Nostra and what I’ve seen and heard, there was a certain set code of conduct, and you couldn’t do certain things unless you got the approval of other individuals within the organization. That’s not so true with these super gangs. They act on their own; a lot of them act independently, and they do it out in the open. And so I think, now more than ever, we really should be concerned about the emergence of these super gangs, particularly in our communities, because we’ve seen instances where they’re taking over neighborhoods. They’re taking over apartment buildings, and they’ve basically held citizens in fear, captive in their own neighborhoods. Paterson Police Chief Spagnola described what drug-dealing gangs do to the neighborhoods of a city: What the gangs do to a community is unbelievable. They take over a community. I mean, there’s no law, there’s no order. They do their business. We lock them up. They come back out. We lock them up. They come back out. What it does is it actually eats at the fabric of this country where there's no accountability for what you do. And then what happens, through generation, through mind-set, through kids growing up in the neighborhood, they emulate what they see. And then you have generation after generation continuing that cycle. So what we have to do is, I don’t know how we're going to do it, just find a way to step in there and be a buffer and have them emulate what is right. Because if they don't know what is right, then how are they going to do it? All they see is what they grow up in. And that’s what they do, they actually take over a community. We have people, senior citizens that are prisoners in their own homes. They haven’t been out of their houses in years. And they lose their children; they lose their grandchildren to the streets. I think they deserve better. FBI Supervisory Special Agent Nolan testified that his experiences in Camden as far back as 1992 opened his eyes to the intractability of the problem. He said he saw a city rife with poverty, without a movie theater or adequate recreation programs, and lacking jobs for its youth. They could make money selling drugs for adults, even to the point of “making more money than their parents … .” He recounted the arrest of a youth about 13- or 14-years-old: I went to see his grandmother and told her, “I have your grandson under arrest for selling narcotics, and he shouldn’t be doing that.” And she said, “Well, when my check runs out at the end of the month and I need money to get through the last couple of days, he brings me money. Are you going to replace that money that my grandson is not [bringing in]?” … That’s the mind-set that some of the people in the neighborhood had. Mr. Nolan described how drug dealers persist under such conditions. He noted that even impressive drug arrests just provide an opportunity for another group of dealers to move in. Even the original traffickers eventually “come back into that neighborhood and take over,” according to Mr. Nolan. Learning from the experience and adding the training and advice they obtain in prison, “they know what to look out for, and it’s going to make our job twice as hard to do it the second time around, the third time around, so forth and so on.” Chief Spagnola called the problem a form of “domestic terrorism” that seriously jeopardizes the security of communities. He displayed fearsome, but relatively inexpensive, semi-automatic firearms found in drug dealers’ homes during search warrants. With unofficial names such as “street sweeper” because of their rapid rates of fire, these weapons are readily available in New Jersey, despite tough state laws governing firearm sales. On September 17, 2003, the United States Attorney’s Office in New Jersey released a federal indictment charging an East Orange man with illegally selling 86 handguns – many winding up in the hands of gang members in New Jersey. This individual allegedly bought the guns legally in Colorado in 2000 and profited by at least $100 on each gun in his illicit sales. Super gangs’ criminal functions have become compartmentalized to the point where some members specialize in obtaining firepower for other members of their gangs. These specialists travel to states with lax gun laws to buy semi-automatic handguns and other formidable weapons. Such activity mocks New Jersey’s carefully crafted gun control laws. Mr. Nolan testified about the attitude that accompanies the weaponry. He said in some neighborhoods in cities such as Camden and Newark residents are afraid to leave their houses because armed drug traffickers “don’t care about life anymore. They will shoot you and say, ‘Hey, he had it coming.’” The appalling level of gang and drug-related violence is reflected in homicide data for Essex and Union counties during the past three years. The Essex County Prosecutor’s Office, as of August 27, 2003, had conducted 98 homicide investigations during 2003. At that time, nine of the 98 homicides had been classified as gang and/or drug-related. Numerous other homicides among the 98 committed were suspected of being gang and/or drug-related but had not been officially classified as such because of a lack of evidence. During 2002, the Prosecutor’s Office investigated a total of 113 homicides of which 34 were classified as gang and/or drug-related. A total of 130 homicide investigations were conducted during the year 2001. Twenty-three of the homicides were classified as gang and/or drug-related. The majority of the homicides classified as gang and/or drug-related during the past three years involved members of the Bloods or Crips. Compared to the 57 homicides classified as gang and/or drug-related during the years 2001 and 2002, an official in the Prosecutor’s Office could recall only one homicide involving traditional organized crime figures that occurred in Essex County during the same time period. The victim in that homicide was identified as a well-known gambling figure in Newark, and was found shot to death on a Newark street in July 2002, and reportedly had been heavily indebted to loan sharks. As of November 10, 2003, the Union County Prosecutor’s Office had conducted 22 homicide investigations during 2003. Eleven were classified as gang and/or drug- related. During the year 2002, eight of the fifteen homicide investigations conducted that year were believed to involve members of gangs and/or drug-trafficking groups, and during 2001, three of the nineteen homicide investigations conducted were classified as gang and/or drug-related. Meanwhile, no homicides classified as involving traditional organized crime occurred in Union County during the same period. A devastating aspect of violence associated with drug-trafficking street gangs is the victimization of people who are not involved in any criminal conduct but get caught in the cross-fire, either as innocent bystanders or as heroic Samaritans trying to preserve the lives of others. Innocent women and children have been among the victims. There would be a great societal outcry if such consequences resulted from the activity of traditional organized crime. The blight caused by gangs of drug traffickers in urban and inner-suburban communities undermines the major policy goal of restoring dignity and serenity to older urban neighborhoods. If drug trafficking is not halted in old neighborhoods, the middle class will not return, except to limited enclaves dominated by gates, video cameras and security forces. Absent curtailment of drug trafficking, those who yearn to revitalize old neighborhoods rather than succumb and contribute to suburban sprawl must be willing to live under siege-like conditions. * * * Law enforcement authorities have found that drug-trafficking gangs use the latest high-technology gadgets in their operations, including computers, pagers with instant messaging and difficult-to-track disposable cell phones. FBI Special Agent-in-Charge Allen pointed out that they even share information in glossy magazines catering to those interested in the gang life about how to thwart undercover investigative techniques – techniques learned ironically from information in testimony that often must be revealed in open court in order to obtain criminal convictions. The active participation of juveniles helps insulate adult leaders from the criminal justice system. Sgt. Bevacqui described why laws that punish adults for employing juveniles in drug distribution operations fail to deter both juvenile and adult gang members: … [I]t’s quick profits for [juveniles]. They don’t have to work at Burger King making minimum wage. They can make hundreds of dollars a day [selling drugs]. The adults that are supervising these activities … know that if the juvenile gets arrested and he doesn’t cooperate, he’s going to get a slap on the wrist in the juvenile system. [Police] know that. The drug dealers in the gang, the adult gang members know this as well. So that’s one issue we have to address too: the constant recidivism with juveniles. They’re constantly getting arrested, and they’re not being incarcerated.
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