This title is part of The Wadsworth Professionalism in Policing Series, edited by Samuel Walker. This reader is a descriptive presentation of current practices within policing and juvenile justice (focusing on gangs) that utilize the community-policing model. By looking at specific strategies and their efficacy, the authors attempt to combat a major perceived problem with community policing; that the methodology of community policing can be subjective and nebulous, using ill-defined and misinterpreted practices. This book shows what is working for agencies across the country and how these "best practices" can be employed.
This book challenges current thinking about youth violence and gangs, and their racialisation by the media and the police. It highlights how the street gang label is unfairly linked to Black (and urban) youth street-based lifestyles/cultures and friendship groups.
This volume provides a systematic overview of the contemporary Latin American youth violence phenomenon. The authors focus specifically on youth gangs, juvenile justice issues, and applied research concerns, providing a rounded and balanced exploration of this increasingly important topic.
The United States has seen rapid proliferation of youth gangs since 1980. During this period, the number of cities with gang problems increased from an estimated 286 jurisdictions with more than 2,000 gangs and nearly 100,000 gang members in 1980 (Miller, 1992) to about 4,800 jurisdictions with more than 31,000 gangs and approximately 846,000 gang members in 1996(Moore and Terrett, in press). An 11-city survey of eighth graders found that 9 percent were currently gang members, and 17 percent said they had belonged to a gang at some point in their lives (Esbensen and Osgood, 1997).Other studies reported comparable percentages and also showed that gang members were responsible for a large proportion of violent offenses. In the Rochester site of the OJJDP-funded Program of Research on the Causes and Correlates of Delinquency, gang members (30 percent of the sample) self-reported committing 68 percent of all violent offenses (Thornberry, 1998). In the Denver site, adolescent gang members (14 percent of the sample) self-reported committing 89 percent of all serious violent offenses (Huizinga, 1997). In another study, supported by OJJDP and several other agenciesand organizations, adolescent gang members in Seattle (15 percent of the sample) self-reported involvement in 85 percent of robberies committed by the entire sample (Battin et al., 1998).This Bulletin reviews data and research to consolidate available knowledge on youth gangs that are involved in criminal activity. Following a historical perspective, demographic information ispresented. The scope of the problem is assessed, including gang problems in juvenile detention and correctional facilities. Several issues are then addressed by reviewing gang studies to provide aclearer understanding of youth gang problems.An extensive list of references is provided for further review.
Few issues attract greater concern and censure than those that surround youth 'gangs'. Comprising a series of essays from leading national and international researchers, this book subjects such claims to rigorous critical scrutiny. It provides a challenging and authoritative account of complex questions pertaining to urban youth identities, crime and social order.
Provides an introduction to the study of gangs how we define them, what we know and not know about gangs. This title offers both a domestic and international view of processes of delinquency and gang formation and identity. It is suitable for criminal justice, sociology and social work, parole practitioners, and public defenders.
This unique volume by eminent gang researchers presents valuable new data on European youth gangs, describing important characteristics of these groups, and their similarities and differences to American gangs. Their findings from the Eurogang Research Program highlight the impact of immigration and ethnicity, urbanization, national influences, and local neighborhood circumstances on gang development in several European countries. It is an important resource on crime, delinquency and youth development for criminologists, sociologists, youth workers, policy makers, local governments, and law enforcement professionals.
'Oxford Textbook Violence Prevention' brings together an international team of experts to provide an extensive global account of the global mortality and morbidity burden caused by violence through examining the causes of violence, and what can be done to prevent and reduce violence.
For decades street gangs have been synonymous with inner cities, where drugs and drive-by shootings are a fact of daily life. But in a disturbing new trend two gangs - Mara Salvatrucha and 18th Street - with their roots in Central America and Los Angeles, have ventured beyond our urban centers and into America's most exclusive suburbs. For the past five years journalist Sarah Garland has reported on the changing landscape and demographics of Hempstead, Long Island, following the lives of current and former gang members. In Gangs in Garden City she tells their stories. We meet Julio, a Salvadoran civil war veteran escaping the violence back home only to join Mara Salvatrucha in Los Angeles, and flee again for New York; Jessica, who comes from a family of Mara Salvatrucha members yet chooses to join a rival gang; and twelve-year-old Daniel, a recent Salvadoran immigrant who must choose between his best friend and the gang as he fights off bullies and tries to fit in. They have the same dreams and the same problems as suburban teenagers everywhere - except they learn the only way to survive is to join the rising tide of violence that surrounds them. Their disturbing personal narratives expose the cruel reality of segregation, racial income gaps, and poverty, which lie hidden behind suburban white picket fences in a pattern repeated all across America. While the gangs' growth has provoked a nationwide panic and a decade of federal and local law enforcement crackdowns, she asks why their spread is so prevalent, and what it reveals about the fractures in American society. Gangs in Garden City not only explores our false assumptions about these gangs, but also shows how immigration raids, rising incarceration rates, suburban decay, and inadequate funding of our nation's schools have worsened an alarming situation. Fearlessly reported and sensitively told, Gangs in Garden City unveils a hidden, troubling world that exists in the shadows of our own. Garland shows how the gangs next door will continue to spread - and thrive - if we do not act quickly to uproot them.
In the second edition of this groundbreaking social history, M. Ann Hall begins with an important new chapter on Aboriginal women and early sport and ends with a new chapter tying today's trends and issues in Canadian women's sport to their origins in the past. Students will appreciate the more descriptive chapter titles and the restructuring of the book into easily digestible sections. Fifty-two images complement Hall's lively narrative.
