As crime rises in Los Angeles, police, community take action

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As crime rises in Los Angeles, police, community take action
By AMANDA LEE MYERS

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Eduardo Rebolledo had just gotten into his pickup truck after work, eager to head home to his two children when a gang dispute erupted 30 yards behind him on a Los Angeles street. The 38-year-old ducked right into the path of a bullet that hit him in the head, killing him instantly.

"He was completely innocent. The guy's never even had a parking ticket," said Detective Dave Peteque with the Los Angeles Police Department. "He's just a working Joe, a family man trying to support his kids."

In a split second, Rebolledo joined the growing list of victims in the nation's second-largest city, where murders are up 12 percent this year and shooting victims have increased 20 percent. The city is also on the cusp of recording its 1,000th shooting victim of the year.

After an especially violent weekend in late September, LAPD Chief Charlie Beck expressed his frustration about the bloodshed, particularly among gangs. "This is not Dodge City," Beck said, referring to 19 shootings in one weekend, 13 of which were gang-related.

The increases come as redevelopment of the city's downtown and nearby neighborhoods has attracted trendy new bars and restaurants, thousands of new residents and megaprojects that include a $1 billion mixed-use hotel tower that will be the tallest in the West.

In response to the rising numbers, the LAPD has deployed hundreds of elite officers to crime hot spots, increased the number of officers walking the streets versus patrolling in cars, and created a community relationship division dedicated to building the public's trust in police officers.

But Beck said his department can't solve the problem alone.

"A lot of it is public will," he said. "A will of everyone in the city of Los Angeles to say, 'Enough is enough.'"

Members of the community say they stepped up their own efforts when the crime numbers started going up.

Rebolledo's death, for instance, inspired a "peace movement" in the neighborhood where he was killed, said Michelle Miranda, founder of Alliance for Community Empowerment, a nonprofit that provides services to disadvantaged young people, including gang intervention.

Young people involved with Miranda's organization decided to hold a peace march on a recent Saturday in response to Rebolledo's death. More than 250 people took to the streets wearing white shirts, carrying signs that included: "We protest our right to live in peace."

"These are young people that know drugs in the community and gang activity, and they're tired of it," Miranda said.

Miranda said the same youths who organized the march are working on more plans to continue the peace movement.

At Good News Baptist Church in South Los Angeles, the Rev. Winford Bell began a program through his nonprofit group to train members of the community how to counsel family and friends of people who've been murdered.

The idea for the so-called "life comforters" is to provide a safe outlet to vent anger and sorrow, and wherever possible, attempt to prevent retaliatory violence common among gangs.

"Don't get me wrong, hardcore gang members are not going to hear me. Them we can't do nothing with," Bell said. "The other ones who aren't so hard, who aren't dedicated to being gang members ... If they come, we can do a lot of work."

Los Angeles is among a number of major cities across the U.S. seeing rises in violent crime this year, including Baltimore, Washington, D.C., Chicago, Cleveland and Houston. Other California cities also have seen increases, including Sacramento, Oakland and Long Beach.

Though the numbers are up, those cities are far safer than they were in the early 1990s during the crack cocaine epidemic. In Los Angeles, for example, murders peaked in 1992 at 1,092 people killed.

So far this year, there have been 251 homicides, compared to 225 during the same time period last year.

Still, the LAPD is taking this year's uptick seriously.

"We're not panicking," said Capt. Jeff Bert, commanding officer of the department's strategic planning group. "But we are in the business of driving down crime so when a crime spike goes up, we're all over it. It is a concern."

It's still too early to pinpoint what's driving the increased violence across the country and in Los Angeles, said Charis Kubrin, a criminologist at the University of California at Irvine who analyzes crime in Southern California.

She said there could be a number of contributing factors, including easier access to guns, the poverty rate, a new state law that reduced penalties for certain crimes, and a growing distrust of police, which can contribute to retaliatory violence.

"If you don't see the police as a viable option when you have a problem, then you handle things on your own," Kubrin said.

The LAPD, all the way to the chief, acknowledges that community trust in police is wavering.

Restoring it will be the No. 1 way to turn the crime numbers around, Bert said.

"We make or break our success based on our relationships, based on people's willingness to talk about to police and based on police's ability to get out of their car and talk to people," Bert said. "We can't arrest our way out of this."


-- (c) Associated Press 2015-11-23

[toloman]

LA is and always has been a very dangerous place to live thanks to the rising numbers of gangs and the related damage they cause. From 1978-1981 I worked in a school district in south San Antonio Texas that was developing similar problems. There was a barrio named Villa Coronado that was particularly bad. Many of the students in our rural school were Mexican migrant workers' kids I worked in intervention through the school and liased with the juvenile authorities and courts and police. Sixty of the students were on probation for various offenses including truancy and I was tasked with making sure they were in school. The local judge even came to visit the school in his judicial robes. During the three year I was there I was stabbed in the upper arm, had the back of my leg calf ripped by a dog sicked on me by a gang member, suffered a punctured eardrum and had a double barrel shotgun thrust under the bridge of my nose and when I was at a school board meeting had a volley of shots fired through the window in a driveby incident that caused all of us present at the time to hit the floor to keep from being shot. Three of the kids I worked with ended up with life without parole (they were all under 18 at the time of their heinous crimes but were convicted as adults since each case was murder committed during armed robberies of convenience stores. If they had been over 18years of age at the time of their crime they could have received the death penalty. As a result, years later I did some more than 1,000 hours of major research of juvenile gangs and related criminal activity. Both the San Antonio Police Department and the LAPD gang task forces provided me with a tremendous amount of information which was supplemented by numerous newspaper articles. I ended up writing the novel The Mean Streets of LA: Taking Out the Trash (Amazon, June 2010) which focused on a number of violent Los Angeles Hispanic gangs affiliated with the Mara Salvatrucha MS13's. There is no solution that has been able to reduce the gang influences. Now awaiting word on whether the book will be used to make a movie.

[Usernames]

Yah, LA looks more and more like Mexico City. Didn't use to be that way. Wonder why it is now?

[Nowisee]

Why is it, that when these nut jobs go on these shooting sprees they kill good innocent people and don't go into the gang-thug cesspool neighborhoods and light them all up?

[elgordo38]

Why is it, that when these nut jobs go on these shooting sprees they kill good innocent people and don't go into the gang-thug cesspool neighborhoods and light them all up?

After Trump becomes president he will clean them out and send them back to Mexico well maybe. After people attain high office they seem to go through a personality change. I really think the men in black appear to the president right after he is elected and tell him to get with his financial backers program. They tell him what crumbs he can feed to the poor to keep them docile. I know Trump is saying he is funding his own campaign but if things turn in his favor next year his loyalty will be up for grabs. He will need outside money in the final stretch besides no smart business man keeps spending their own money when people are standing in the wings with carpet bags stuffed full of cash. They are just waiting to see if he is leading the race when it gets close to the finish line. They all like a sure thing.

[Smithson]

How much of the crime is drug related? Are gangs fighting for turf?

[Nowisee]

Good question.

I read FBI indicates over 75%, others stats confirm about 75-80%.

Not sure how to post a screen shot, but here is the link: https://www.nationalgangcenter.gov/survey-analysis/gang-related-offenses

1st order of business. Decriminalize drugs. You will get rid of street level criminal revenue. You will also reduce street level criminal thefts.

How much of the crime is drug related? Are gangs fighting for turf?

Edited November 23, 2015 by Nowisee

[squarethecircle]

How much of the crime is drug related? Are gangs fighting for turf?

Friend who works in homicide division in a large midwest metro said that 90% of his cases are turf-related or "crimes of passion," don't have the statistics on hand but I read most US homicides are gangs fighting for drug turf.

[arjunadawn]

Yes, fighting bullets with peace brigades has always worked in the past. Good deal LA, out there on the leading edge applying liberal policies to liberal disasters. What could go wrong?

[MyFriend You]

Why is it, that when these nut jobs go on these shooting sprees they kill good innocent people and don't go into the gang-thug cesspool neighborhoods and light them all up?

After Trump becomes president he will clean them out and send them back to Mexico well maybe. After people attain high office they seem to go through a personality change. I really think the men in black appear to the president right after he is elected and tell him to get with his financial backers program. They tell him what crumbs he can feed to the poor to keep them docile. I know Trump is saying he is funding his own campaign but if things turn in his favor next year his loyalty will be up for grabs. He will need outside money in the final stretch besides no smart business man keeps spending their own money when people are standing in the wings with carpet bags stuffed full of cash. They are just waiting to see if he is leading the race when it gets close to the finish line. They all like a sure thing.

To Dinald Trump: Sir when you are elected President of the nited States, don't drink the Koolaid they offer you after the inaugeration, stick with the Club Soda you opened yourself.

[spidermike007]

Why is it, that when these nut jobs go on these shooting sprees they kill good innocent people and don't go into the gang-thug cesspool neighborhoods and light them all up?

After Trump becomes president he will clean them out and send them back to Mexico well maybe. After people attain high office they seem to go through a personality change. I really think the men in black appear to the president right after he is elected and tell him to get with his financial backers program. They tell him what crumbs he can feed to the poor to keep them docile. I know Trump is saying he is funding his own campaign but if things turn in his favor next year his loyalty will be up for grabs. He will need outside money in the final stretch besides no smart business man keeps spending their own money when people are standing in the wings with carpet bags stuffed full of cash. They are just waiting to see if he is leading the race when it gets close to the finish line. They all like a sure thing.

Trump is an empty suit. No substance at all. He would not follow through on a single promise. Of that you can be sure. Look at all of the promises he has broken in his career. Look at the billions he has stolen through four massive bankruptcies. He has no character. He is incapable of fulfilling on that which he promises. He is absolute gutter trash.

[spidermike007]

Yah, LA looks more and more like Mexico City. Didn't use to be that way. Wonder why it is now?

Quite a number of reasons that simpletons like Trump are not discussing. For the of all he could not operate any of his casinos without a substantially Latin staff. Same goes for many businesses in LA and California. Most white people will not work for $7 an hour. That is the plain and simple truth. They will not wash dishes, do landscaping or construction of under $10 per hour. So, we need them. Stop deluding yourself into thinking otherwise.

Also, Latins, Blacks, Asians, and other give LA alot of flavor. They improve the place in my opinion. The diversity is great. White people can be very stiff and devoid of personality in LA.

[spidermike007]

Crime across the US is rising. My guess, is that a lot of it has to do with the false unemployment numbers Blundering Barry and his Hobbit friends in Middle Earth have been publishing. The real numbers are staggering. Some reports suggest up to 93 million people are not working, who are of working age. Many have given up trying to find a job. That would put the unemployment rate at well over 30%.

More than 30 other cities have also reported increases in violence from a year ago. In New Orleans, 120 people had been killed by late August, compared with 98 during the same period a year earlier. In Baltimore, homicides had hit 215, up from 138 at the same point in 2014. In Washington, the toll was 105, compared with 73 people a year ago. And in St. Louis, 136 people had been killed this year, a 60 percent rise from the 85 murders the city had by the same time last year.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/01/us/murder-rates-rising-sharply-in-many-us-cities.html?_r=0