Thread: International gang ties Summit in LA

http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/02/07/gang.s ... index.html

L.A. summit seeks to sever international gang ties
POSTED: 8:48 a.m. EST, February 7, 2007

LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- Los Angeles' pervasive and violent street gangs were once seen as a local problem and not part of an international criminal web, even though gangs such as MS-13 and 18th Street were oozing across borders into Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras.

A three-day summit beginning Wednesday in Los Angeles will reflect a new emphasis on international cooperation in fighting gangs. Top officials from several Central American and local U.S. police departments, along with the FBI, will focus on sharing information to stop gang members from bringing weapons, criminal plots, and rivalries across borders.

"Now it is most important to take advantage of technology, of our shared economic interests and of our information to find new ways to make sure these violent gangs don't continue to find ways of staying in the dark," said Rodrigo Avila Avilez, director general of El Salvador's national police.

He said Tuesday that the U.S. once regularly deported convicted gang members to their home countries in Central America without tipping off local police of their criminal past.

Earlier this week in El Salvador, U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez announced an initiative to improve anti-gang cooperation between the two countries.

Avila Avilez estimated there were as many as 15,000 gang members in El Salvador, a country of about 6.8 million. There are about 6,000 gang members in Guatemala, a country of 12.3 million, said Ervin Johann Sperisen Vernon, director general of Guatemala's national police.

By comparison, police estimate Los Angeles County has about 40,000 gang members.

The spread of Los Angeles-style gangs to Central America is in part the result of mass deportations of young men indoctrinated in the city's violent streets after fleeing their home countries during the civil wars of the 1970s and '80s. In many cases, gang members raised in Los Angeles have more in common culturally with the city than their home countries, police officials said.

"In El Salvador, they speak Spanglish, or Spanish with a Mexican accent," Avila Avilez said. "It gives them a privileged status among fellow gang members."

Robert B. Loosle, who oversees the FBI's gang investigations in Los Angeles, said crimes committed by gangs in Central America serve as a bellwether for potential criminal enterprises in the U.S.

Particularly noteworthy, Loosle said, was a spike in extortion rackets committed by gangs in El Salvador. Armed members of MS-13 regularly shake down neighborhoods for protection money and demand taxes from bus and truck drivers passing through their turf.

"Since members of gangs travel freely across borders, we need to pay attention to new trends they bring with them," Loosle said.

Sperisen Vernon said gangs in Guatemala are increasingly recruiting young children to deal drugs, stash dirty money and even kill rivals.

"It's much more complicated to jail minors," he said.

He and Avila Avilez both mentioned another disturbing trend: the spread of gang recruitment from the disillusioned poor to children from good homes who are too afraid to remain unaffiliated.

"There is a saying in some El Salvador neighborhoods," Avila Avilez said. "It is, 'If you're not in a gang, then you're against gangs."

"There is a saying in some El Salvador neighborhoods," Avila Avilez said. "It is, 'If you're not in a gang, then you're against gangs."

I have a saying too...Capitol Punishment.

http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2007/02 ... 2_7_07.txt

Last modified Wednesday, February 7, 2007 3:13 PM PST




Law officials meet to discuss combating cross-border street gangs

By: ART MARROQUIN - North County Times wire services

UNIVERSAL CITY - Law enforcement officials from the United States, Canada and Latin America began meeting Wednesday in Universal City to discuss ways and means of combating cross-border street gangs.

The three-day international summit is expected to help authorities improve information-sharing and find ways to strengthen laws against gang members who cross international borders to smuggle drugs and illegal weapons.

"I don't think we need to focus on where it started, whether it's from Latin America or from the United States," Los Angeles police Chief William Bratton said during the summit's keynote address.

"Our focus is on what to do now and to recognize that violent gang crime is a gathering storm," he said. "We need to focus our energy on preventing it from growing any further."

Augustino Del Pino, deputy attorney general for Chiapas, Mexico, said that gang members deported from the United States -- particularly those from the Los Angeles-based 18th Street and Mara Salvatrucha street gangs -- bring violence, vandalism and other threatening acts back to their home countries.

"The 18th Street gang and MS-13 are spreading into Mexico, but they aren't that strong yet," Del Pino said. "But we do see them harassing the citizens and fighting against each other."

Del Pino said the United States should have more social programs to combat gangs.

"It's not only a police fight, it's a social fight," he said.

El Salvador, with a population of 6.8 million people, saw an average of 10 homicides a day in 2006, about 70 percent of which were committed by gang members, according to the FBI.

However, no homicides were reported in 61 of the country's 262 municipalities, according to Rodrigo Avila, director general of El Salvador's national police force.

"That's because there isn't a gang presence in those municipalities," he said. "The places where you see the high homicide rates are the places where you have more of a gang presence, so there's a very strong correlation there."

Avila said his police department is strengthening its investigations to determine whether crimes are committed by gang members.

Earlier this week, U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez and Salvadoran President Elias Antonio Saca announced a joint cross-border effort effort to combat MS-13 and other gangs.

"We cannot ask the United States not to send back these people who are from El Salvador, so we have to work together to find out more about who they are," Avila said. "If we share information, we can build up strong cases and prosecute these people, no matter where they are."

Cross-border gang members who are wanted in the United States and in their home countries sometimes travel north to hide in Canada, where gang crimes are just beginning to emerge, according to Detective Constable Ken Stolarchuk of the Vancouver Police Department's Intelligence Division.

Gang members hiding out in Canada typically vandalize buildings and fight with each other near major transportation hubs, Stolarchuk said.

"Wanted gang members who want to continue getting away with their illegal activities while in a safe haven come up to Canada," said Stolarchuk. "We want to make it known that we don't want these individuals coming to Canada."

The summit comes just one day before Bratton and Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa are scheduled to release a citywide anti-gang effort in response to a sweeping report that calls for heightened intervention, prevention and enforcement programs. The city's new strategy to fight the city's 40,000 gang members will involve coordination with state and federal law enforcement agencies.

Gang violence in Los Angeles has increased by 14 percent in 2006, despite a citywide decrease in crime for the last five years.

"We have got to send a message that we intend to enforce our laws," Villaraigosa said. "We will hold you accountable if you break the law, engage in violence or drug activity or prey on the neighborhoods in our city or across our borders."