Gang: A Factor Contribute to the Overcrowding Prisons

Overpopulated prisons are a huge concern among many taxpaying Americans. Since the United States declared the war on drug forty something years ago, the numbers of inmates increased rapidly. That increasing numbers has causes Americans taxpayers millions of dollars each year to maintain their prisons. As mentions by the Associate Press, there are more than 1.5 million inmates in the states and federal prisons and by the end of 2011, that numbers of inmates is expected to rise to 1.7 millions, a 13 percent increased (Chlemacher, 2007). So why are our prisons populations keep raising? And what are the reasons to it?  

According to law enforcement officers, one reasons for the rising in our prison populations is due to the growing numbers of gangs members within the community. USATODAY mentions that the recent increases in violent offenses is causes by a rise in gang memberships, the spread of highly addictive methamphetamine and the numbers of crimes committed by young people ages eighteen to twenty-four ( Johnson, 2006). This is true because the majority of violent crimes are committed by young adult ages eighteen and twenty-fours, but most importantly those young adult who are in gang. The reasons these young adults commit criminal activities are because they are naïve and need money to support their gang and drugs addiction. In addition, many of these young adults lived in poverty community where there are a huge percent of gangs and drugs influences among them. 

For example, in the county of Los Angeles, there are more than 1,300 street gangs with over 150,000 members and within the City of Los Angeles alone, there are over 400 separate street gangs and an estimated of 39,000 members (VPC, 2007). With this many gangs’ members, the causes of crimes will surly rise. Nevertheless, the National Drug Intelligence Center states that “Criminal gangs commit as much as eighty percent of the crimes in many communities” (NDIC, 2009). Eighty percent of the crimes committed by gang members are a lot of crimes and that is why many gang members are in prison. However, the majority of gang members who are in prison are in there for non-violence crimes such as the illegal possession of drugs and other contraband. So how is gang tide to the issues of prison overpopulating?

         In year’s end 2009, there are a total of 1,613,740 inmates in Federal and States Prisons (BJS, 2011). Out of those 1,613,740 inmates, more than 147,000 are well known documented gangs members (NGIC, 2009). Although this figures only showed a small portion of the gang inmates populations, don’t let that deceive you as there are more members who are unaccounted for. The 147,000s are only those who confess to being a gang member and the real numbers are still unknown. Also, most gang members who are arrested and convicted of a crime do not provide law enforcement officers and judges of their gang status. Most of the times they hide it, but surely if we were to look at the inmates prison group populations, we could easily express that there are more gang inmates than what the statistic are showing. Overall, in general, gang does contribute a higher numbers in increasing our prisons population and making our prison system to be overflowed.

Bibliography

BJS (2011, September). Prison Population count 2009. Bureau of Justice Statistics.             http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/index.cfm?ty=tp&tid=131

 

Chlemacher, Stephen (2007, February). Study: Prison Population on the Rise. The associate Press 2007. http://www.commondreams.org/headlines07/0214-07.htm

 

Johnson, Kevin (2006, September). Violence crimes rise after years of falling. USATODAY 2007.             http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2006-09-18-violent-crimes_x.htm

 

NDIC (2009, January). National Gang Threat Assessment 2009. National Drug Intelligence Center. http://www.justice.gov/ndic/pubs32/32146/index.htm

NGIC (2009, January) Gang Proliferation. National gang Intelligence Center. http://www.justice.gov/ndic/pubs32/32146/gangs.htm

 

VPC (2007, June). Violence Prevention Coalition of Greater Los Angeles.             http://www.ph.ucla.edu/sciprc/pdf/GANG_VIOLENCE.pdf

Prison and Street Gangs

One of the issues that many people in the United States are facing is gangs. Gangs have been a problem that many lawmakers and taxpayers have been trying to deal with for the past few decades. The problems with gangs are the numbers of violence these groups brought to its communities. Violence such as the increasing of drug using within young adults, the fighting among different groups of gangs claiming for ownership of territory, the levels of injuries/deaths causes by stabbing and shooting and the influences on youths being drop out of school to commits criminal acts.  Gang in general is a broad topic; however, there are two particular types of gang that I would like to shared, “street gang” and “prison gang.”  

 Street gangs and prison gangs are two separate forms of gangs that are very similar in terms of structures and organizations. Street gangs are groups of people who form allegiances for a common purposes, who engage in criminal activity, and who conform to one or more of the following traits: share a common group name, share common symbols, tattoos, or graffiti, share a common style of dress, Frequently congregate upon, or lay claim to a geographic location and Associate together on a regular or continuous basis (Walker, 2011).

 Prison gangs also known as Security Threat Group (STG) are defined as a group of inmates, designated by the Commissioner, who may gather together regularly and informally. The gang members possess common characteristics, interests and goals distinguishing them from other inmates groups. And the group as a discrete entity poses a threat to the safety of the prison staff, other inmates, and the community. They also interrupt the safe, secure and orderly operation of the correctional facilities (US Legal, 2011).

 Street gangs are more dangerous than prison gangs in the act of violence against the communities. According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) “Street gangs operate throughout most of the country are a significant threat because they are the largest and control the greatest geographical areas (FBI, 2009). The reasons street gangs are more of a threat to its community is because they have more freedom within the community. In this case, they canfreely discussed gang related activity with fewer restrictions on them. Also, street gangs have a larger population inside and outside their community. They are more mobility to operate from one location to another and have more access to drugs, alcohols, weapons and money which makes them more of a threat to society. 

 However, although street gangs are views as more of a threat to society, the real threat still remains inside our prison walls. Prison gangs are more notorious and dangerous compare to street gangs because of their highs levels of influences over both gangs. “Members typically return to their home communities and resume their former street gang affiliations, acting as representatives of their prison gang to recruit street gang members who perform criminal acts on behalf of the prison gang” (FBI, 2009). These members will resume their roles when they returned to the outside world. Sometimes they become more notorious than before because of their experiences and interactions with their elderly gang members or leaders duringincarcerations.

 Another reason prison gangs are more dangerous is because most of them are hardcore members from the outside street gangs. While incarcerated, hardcore members formed together to become more organized and violence’s toward other. They become smarter and organize better in prison to influence their gangs on both the inside and outside communities. Not only do prison gangs have the most hardcore members, but they also controlled the drugs trade within prisons and their gang community. According to the National Gang Threat Assessment of 2009, “Prison gangs often control drug distribution within correctional facilities and heavily influence street-level distribution in some communities. (FBI, 2009). These prisons gangs are influencing the drugs and violence that goes on outside the prison system. In most cases, prison gangs also have controlled over the street gangs because some of them are leaders to both sides. Nevertheless, prison and street gangs are an interesting issue that can affected every person across America.

Bibliography

FBI (2009, January). National Gang threat Assessment 2009. Federal Bureau of Investigation. http://www.fbi.gov/stats-services/publications/national-gang-threat-assessment-2009-pdf

US Legal. (2011, September). Security Threat Group (STG) Law & legal Definition. http://definitions.uslegal.com/s/security-threat-group-stg/

Walker’s, Robert (2011, September). Definition of gangs: what is a criminal street gang? Gangs Or Us. http://www.gangsorus.com/definition.html