How to reduce violence in the big cities...

[spin]

Major police raid targets L.A's notorious Avenues gang

Hundreds of police officers and federal law enforcement agents launched a major assault on the Avenues gang this morning, hoping to deal a blow to an elusive group they say is responsible for some of Los Angeles' most notorious street crime.

Under the cover of darkness around 3 a.m., roughly 1,200 heavily armed officers from the Los Angeles Police Department, the Drug Enforcement Administration and several other agencies dispersed from a command post near the LAPD’s training academy in Elysian Park.

Warrants in hand, they descended on dozens of homes in search of 53 alleged members or associates of the Avenues gang wanted on an array of federal charges related to extensive drug dealing, unsolved murders and other crimes.

***snip***

The Avenues came under scrutiny in the wake of the August 2008 slaying of Juan Abel Escalante, a Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy. Escalante, 27, was gunned down outside of his parents’ Cypress Park home early in the morning as he headed to work as a guard at the Men’s Central Jail.

***snip***

Over the course of the investigation, cases were built against Avenues members for their alleged roles in six other unsolved murders and four attempted murders, said a top LAPD gang detective involved in the operation. He requested that his name not be used because of concerns over retaliation by Avenues members.
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2009/09/huge-la-police-raid-targets-notorious-avenues-gang--2.html

Arresting gang members is far more effective than passing "feel good" gun control laws.

[dhpgetsit]

1. Reduce the level of desperation would be my answer. nt

[spin]

7. That's another approach which also would help reduce violence...

but it's not cheap or easy to improve education and create job opportunity in minority neighborhoods.

I feel that we need to move our educational system into the current century by starting a serious effort to supplement teachers with computers.

I visualize a class room where the students learn history by engaging in a interactive game similar to World of War Craft. Blackboards and chalk need to be rarely used. Students need to be able to move at their own rate and not held back by slower students. The teacher can devote time helping these students.

Discipline needs to be enforced. Those students who seriously disrupt classes need to be moved to a different class or school where their individual problems can be dealt with by specially trained teachers.

Education without meaningful jobs is useless. Again the effort to create jobs is difficult and may involve tax breaks for new businesses rather than tax increases which may stifle job creation.

[dhpgetsit]

14. And why not pay students for achieving goals?

[spin]

15. This idea has worked in some areas and when I mentioned this to my ...

grandsons who are in middle and high school, they were all for it.

Of course the pay has to be large enough to be attractive.

[TheWraith]

20. The problem is the public's attention span.

A 10 year program to increase education and reduce poverty isn't nearly sexy enough for prosecutors trying to become DAs, DAs trying to become mayors, and mayors trying to become governors. They need a big, flashy news story to reassure people something is being done. So what if it doesn't work? In two years they'll either be out of there, or have a new flashy story, and nobody will remember the last one.

[Speck Tater]

2. Build a wall around the city and call it a prison.

"Snake Pliskin? I heard you was dead."

[JonQ]

3. Do away with counterproductive drug laws

and then crack down hard on any gangs that are left.

[spin]

8. That's a damn good plan...

we have lost the war on drugs. We need to legalize many of the currently illegal drugs and concentrate on the truly dangerous drugs and those who deal them.

[JonQ]

11. I'd be happy with making pot

essentially the same (legally) as tobacco.

And for the harder drugs, designate certain areas of town where they are legal to use and sell, heavily patrol that area to make sure no other crimes are being committed and to remove anyone who starts getting out of line or requires medical care and then really penalize anyone using those drugs outside of this area.

Get them isolated so they can't harm anyone else then let them go.

[spin]

18. Marijuana should have never been illegal...

In the early 1900s, the western states developed significant tensions regarding the influx of Mexican-Americans. The revolution in Mexico in 1910 spilled over the border, with General Pershing’s army clashing with bandit Pancho Villa. Later in that decade, bad feelings developed between the small farmer and the large farms that used cheaper Mexican labor. Then, the depression came and increased tensions, as jobs and welfare resources became scarce.

One of the “differences” seized upon during this time was the fact that many Mexicans smoked marijuana and had brought the plant with them, and it was through this that California apparently passed the first state marijuana law, outlawing “preparations of hemp, or loco weed.”

However, one of the first state laws outlawing marijuana may have been influenced, not just by Mexicans using the drug, but, oddly enough, because of Mormons using it. Mormons who traveled to Mexico in 1910 came back to Salt Lake City with marijuana. The church’s reaction to this may have contributed to the state’s marijuana law. (Note: the source for this speculation is from articles by Charles Whitebread, Professor of Law at USC Law School in a paper for the Virginia Law Review, and a speech to the California Judges Association (sourced below). Mormon blogger Ardis Parshall disputes this.)

Other states quickly followed suit with marijuana prohibition laws, including Wyoming (1915), Texas (1919), Iowa (1923), Nevada (1923), Oregon (1923), Washington (1923), Arkansas (1923), and Nebraska (1927). These laws tended to be specifically targeted against the Mexican-American population.

When Montana outlawed marijuana in 1927, the Butte Montana Standard reported a legislator’s comment: “When some beet field peon takes a few traces of this stuff… he thinks he has just been elected president of Mexico, so he starts out to execute all his political enemies.” In Texas, a senator said on the floor of the Senate: “All Mexicans are crazy, and this stuff is what makes them crazy.”
http://www.drugwarrant.com/articles/why-is-marijuana-illegal/

That's only part of a sordid tale.

[Euromutt]

21. Whoa, talk about voodoo pharmacology

Mixed in with a healthy dose of racism, I hardly need point out. I have never heard of anyone getting violent on marijuana. Hashish, yes (been on the receiving end, even), but not marijuana.

[paulsby]

22. in my 20+ years experience as a cop

I can say the same thing. that's why i (and a surprising # of beat cops- you'd be surprised) think mj should be decrim'd or legalized.

alcohol, meth, coke, etc. can all increase people's violent tendencies, with the realization that it doesn't MAKE people violent people still have free will.

but mj influences peoplein the other direction - towards "mellow".

it's a stereotype, but it's also true

[PavePusher]

23. Actually, I think that voodoo...

requires a better constructed logic chain than that dreck. :evilgrin:

[virginia mountainman]

4. Problem is...

They will plea down, the serious crimes, and very soon, they will be back out, with much more street cred, cause they "did time"

[spin]

9. Sad but true. (n/t)

[Hoopla Phil]

19. Yep, plea down or rat out a bigger fish.

[Treo]

5. 1200 cops to find 53 bad guys WTF? NT

[spin]

6. I get the opinion that these were bad dudes. (n/t)

[billh58]

10. With hundreds

of relatives and bad friends in the hood...

[ManiacJoe]

12. Not to find, but to surround the many scattered houses.

[Francis Marion]

24. This gang's leadership does not rate a sporting chance

to avoid arrest. They had killed a cop earlier, and needed to be put in check.
Nobody got hurt during the operation on the LE side or on the gang side.
The reason it took so many officers was due to the size and timing of the raid. They had to be hit simultaneously over a very large land area, so that calls for large numbers of officers.

[Katya Mullethov]

13. If they keep shooting cops maybe

Then they will get marched into the sea , but that isnt likely .

[spin]

16. Gang members need to realize that shooting cops is a BAD idea. (n/t)

[PavePusher]

17. They need to realize that shooting ANYONE...

is a bad idea.

Unfortunately, good luck in L.A. in getting a Carry Permit....