Amanda Hein

11/28/17

Criminal Justice 1010

Bart Woolley

Gang-Related Homicides in Chicago

That's a 14% decline from this point last year when there had been 710 homicides. But while

the number of killings may be down this from last, this year's 609 homicides already total well above

most annual tallies in Chicago for the past decade. It's important to keep in mind these numbers aren't

a spike of the football by any means, but an indication progress is being made, Johnson said. (CNN

news) Still Johnson and community activists acknowledged that current crime level still sow fear in

neighborhoods. Chicago also has been a frequent target of critcism for President Donald Trump, who

has talked and tweeted about rampant crime and the failure to fight gun violence there.

The Chicago Tribune, which tracks homicides in the city, has slightly higher count for 2017

than the police department: 624, as of Friday. The Chicago Police Department uses slightly different

criteria when compiling its tally. For example, CPD does not include killings that occurred on area

highways, or those where police are involved and it is determined to be a justifiable homicide. Johnson

said Certain investments, including technology, have helped police tackle crime this year. That

includes putting Strategic decision support centers in neighborhoods that have struggled with

violence, he said.

Those centers use predictive crime software that police commanders decide where to deploy

officers. They also provide additional cameras, gunshot detection systems, and moblie phones to

officers in the field who receive real-time notifications and intelligence data at their fingertips,

Chicago police say on their website. The centers are staffed by officers and analysts with the University
of Chicago's crime lab. Officers who ussed to randomly are now moree focused on where to be, said

Kim Smith, a crime lab research manager. Being in the right place at the right time is crucial,

especially somewhere like Chicago, where there are ever-changing gang conflicts....We're trying to use

data to shed some light where your resources are the most effective.

The high-tech centers are currently in place in six of the city's 22 police districts, Smith said.

Those six district last year accounted for more than half of city's shootings but only 25% of the

population. I cannot say with 100% certainly that the (support centers) are leading to all the reductions

we're seeing, she said. The department also is in the midst of a hiring spree that will see the roster

grow by 1,000 officers, Johnson said. (CNN News) Indeed, mistrust in the police has been a major

factor in the city's soaring crime rate, University of Chicago law professor Craig Futterman said. The

biggest things that I've seen in my work that drive violence in Chicago are the absence of hope,

opportunity, job, and the lack of police accountability, Futterman added. Jobs, hope, and opportunity

are not within the control of the police department.

Homicides were down 44% in the city's impoverished and notoriously deadly Englewood

neighborhood-- the first police district to use the new support-center technology, police said. Greater

community outreach also contributed to the decline in crime, Kenneth Johnson, the district commander,

told CNN. I want the community...to see us in a new light. We've been on the past year of making sure

the community knows us, that they trust us and believe in us. Dr. Gary Slutkin, founder and executive

director of the organization Cure Violence said his organization and others have violence interrupters

on the streets of the roughest neighborhoods to intervene in gang conflicts before they escalate. The

outreach workers, some of them former gang members, stay in touch with friends and relatives of

shooting victims in an attempt to prevent retaliation.

Social media can be used for good reasons and bad reasons. The internet can be dangerous place

for all youth included gang members and young kids. Many young people don't use all forms of social

media and some do. People join gangs for many reasons: one to avoid being jumped in their own
neighborhoods, and another is because of poverty. Educating young people starting at a young gang

about gangs and the dangers they can cause can help stop them from joining gangs and risk dying.

Being a member of a gang is also hazardous to young peoples health. If there weren't so many

young kids roaming the streets afterschool there wouldn't be as many young gang members, because

people wouldn't be fighting over turf or be selling drugs to people. Having jobs for teens and

afterschool programs for kids would be benefical to keeping young people from joining gangs. A

Chicago gang called the Vice Lords have a strict code about shooting children or bystanders. They are a

branching west side gang, with 2,000 members on the street and behind bars. There are many other

gangs and each gang has a rival gang that they get in to wars with over turf and drug sells.

Today many of the gangs that used to be huge have lost their leaders after law enforcment have

arrested them causing gangs to splinter and become small groups or crews. Chicago has 25 squads

which is Small than the 1,000 gang members. There are 59 turfs, 625 factions totaling 125,000

members. Chicago's population is 9.4 million innocent people that are at risk of being killed in gang-

related shootings. Gangs have parties in local neighborhoods and the party gets out of control enough

that the police are called to break it up and even with all the squad cars they can't stop it.

If I lived in Chicago I would never leave my house even for school or work, because I would be

to afraid of getting shot or attacked just sitting at a stop light or getting out of my car. The many

senseless gang killings needs to stop it is absolutely out of control and extemely ridiculous. The so

called accidental shootings are killing many innocent bystanders that are just sitting in their front yards

or walking in their neighborhoods. Some people in gangs have no choice and end up dying over

something as stupid as turf or a drug deal. It's so ridiculous that people are dying over the stupidous

things.

Everyone has the right to live, but gangs are not being given that right. The many so called

accidental shootings that are happening are not accidental. If you fire a gun in a neighborhood you

should assume it may hit someone other than the intended victim and if it does then your responsible
for shooting an innocent person. So many unsympathetic people in the world.

All the senseless violence is absolutely stupid and needs to end because it doesn't just affect the

gangs, or their families, it is affecting the community and the city. Chicago is loosing men, women and

children that are and could be honest lawabiding citizens that own businesses and raise families. You

don't see people in Salt Lake City walking up to each other and shooting each other for no reason.

According to Chicago police, gangs on the west side exist to sell drugs.

Massive gangs like Gangster Disciples and the Black Disciples used to operate with a corporate-

like hierarchy and business planning, but aggressive federal prosecutions and the teardown of public

housing splintered and scuttered the gangs. Gang violence these days in the west and south sides, goes

back to the 1960s. The early 1990s had over 900 annual murders. For many kids joining a group of

boys is the first step toward gang life.

Gang members have to check with a leader before shooting a rival, so as not to endanger profit

margins. Gang leaders would organize fistfights between two gang members to avoid bringing police

attention to the neighborhood. A study done at Northwestern University in 2009 found that ceasefire

decreased both overall shooting and retaliation killings among gang members. The percentage of

murders that are gang-motivated through June of this year is 53%. Gang-related shootings and murders

would be closer to 80 percent.

Chicago has paid $642 million in police misconduct payouts over 12 years. The gang war that

the kids have inherited and were vicously continuing was helping unravel parts of this city, where the

years midpoint 323 people have died in chicago violence. One more homicide than a year earlier. The

city is on course at that pace to top 700 homicides for a second consecutive year, a mark that had

otherwisenot been reached in two decades. The first two homicides of 2017 happened on New Years

day.

CPD intended to hire roughly 500 new officers in 2017. Chicago tallied nearly 900 murders in

the past 15 months March 31, 2017. Chicago now has the highest number of homicides among cities
with populations of more than 1 million. Chicago has 59 official gangs. Black males between the ages

of 17-25 with prior arrest history are most likely to be murder victims and to be accused of murder. In

2016 Chicago had more than 700 murders since 1998 which is more than New York and Los Angeles

combined. 509 people died in Chicago in 2008. 90% of gun violence flows from gangs. These numbers

are extremely high and out of control, I just can't believe how out of control it is and how dangerous

Chicago is.

I'd hate to be living in fear hiding in my house and not able to go out for fear of being killed or

shot by a member of a gang that passes by. There have been many homicides not to far apart from each

other but on different side of the city. Homicides hurt many people not just the victim and their families

but everyone around the world. Killing is not necessary to benefit the order of life or the running of the

world. Murders destroy peoples spirits and their will to live.

Gang shootings don't just happen on ordinary days and during ordinary weekends, but they also

happen on holiday weekends like Thanksgiving, Christmas and many others. Even while shootings

have fallen from last year's numbers, murder statistics in the city remain. There were 82 murders in

June of this year, compared to the 74 murders in June 2016 and and 47 in June 2015.

This is all to much to process and hard to believe that there is this much violence in a U.S. City.

I think we all need to take a break and really think about our lives and the things we're doing with

them, before we really hurt people. All gangs need to break-up and stop the violence, so that the U.S

can get back to the happy place that it once use to be. The police need to patrol the streets better and do

more raids to catch gang members and put them in prison where they can't harm innocent people. We as

citizens need to feel safe in our own neighborhoods and in our own towns.

In Closing Gangs and gang violence in Chicago is way out of control and needs to be ended as

soon as possible in the safest way possible. The Citizens of Chicago need to feel safe letting their kids

set foot outside in their backyards to play without fearing that they'll be shot from some far away gang

battle.
 Work Cited
http://www.cnn.com/2017/12/01/us/chicago-homicide-shooting-statistics/index.html