A short history of the Crips and Bloods

The Crips gang was started in 1969 by 15 year old Raymond Washington, in Los Angeles. The original name was Baby Avenues or Avenue Cribs. The name Crip became so common among the Avenues Cribs that it became the acceptable name in 1971. Many Crip sets were formed during this time they included Avalon Garden Crips, Eastside Crips, Inglewood Crips and the Westside Crips. Also around this time Stanley "Tookie" Williams, started the Westside Crips. The original intent was to continue the revolutionary ideology of the Panther's and to act as community leaders and protectors of their local neighborhoods. They became increasingly violent and constantly expanded their turf. In the early 1980's, the gang was heavily involved in the drug trade.
The original style of dress was to wear black leather jackets. They walked with a shuffle like a limp and also carried canes.

In the 1970's colors became a way to signify allegiance to one gang or another. The Crips began using the blue bandanna or blue flag and displayed them in their left side as their color. It has been suggested that the color selection was because blue was the color of Washington High School. The Crips use the letter C to replace the letter B in their conversations and writings. The initials BK represent their status as "Blood Killers." And the Bloods used the red bandanna and started displaying them on the right side.

The Bloods were originally Crip Sets. The Pirus, at one time hung out with the Crips they were called or known as the Piru Street (Boys) Crips. Several members of the Pirus gang had a conflict with some of the Crips and warfare ensued. During the summer of 1972 Robert Ballou, who was not a member of a gang was killed for his leather jacket the Pirus felt that because he was not a member of any organization and neutral he should not have been killed. They got together with the Lueders Park Hustlers, L.A. Brims started in 1969, Denver Lanes, the Bishops. and other organizations targeted by the Crip Sets and formed the Bloods.

Street gangs in Los Angeles had rumbles before this time and were usually over control of parties or hangout spots and high school rivalries. Weapons were not used often, gang members preferred fistfights. It was considered a punk move to get a weapon to retaliate after a fight. The most common weapons included baseball bats, bumper jacks, or an occasional knife.

Is that a Drug House

Is That A Drug House?
If we are going to stop crime and drugs from taking over our neighborhoods, we must all work together as a team. Without your help and assistance, local law enforcement officers face many restrictions. Your involvement is the key to stopping crime.

Do you have a drug house in your neighborhood?
Drug houses don't just happen in other neighborhoods. There are drug houses in all types of neighborhoods. There are four things that make a drug house:

Product
Buyer
Seller
Location
Most neighborhoods have very little control over Product, Buyer, or Seller. Drug dealers look for locations where neighbors do not communicate and isolate themselves. This makes it easy to intimidate those neighbors that do notice drug activity. Drug dealers like neighborhoods that say "It can't happen here". Money is a key element for the drug dealer. If they establish a drug house in a neighborhood where kids and adults have money to buy drugs, business will thrive.

What are the warning signs of drug activity in the neighborhood?
Do any of these sound familiar?

Excessive foot traffic to and from a house or property
Loitering in or around a house
Frequent and unusual traffic patterns such as Stop-Enter-Leave
Threats of intimidation connected to a residence
Open exchange of drugs and money
Gang activity in the neighborhood
Graffiti on structures in the area
Prevention is the best way to stop drug houses
You can reduce the chance that a drug house moves into your neighborhood. Get to know your neighbors. Meet and know your Police Officers. As problems develop in the neighborhood, work with law enforcement to resolve them quickly.

What should you do if there is a drug house in your neighborhood?
One of the tools of the drug dealer is intimidation. There are safety in numbers.

log all activity connected to the suspected drug house
Talk to a Shawnee Police Officer and give the information to him.
Speak with property owners about problems that the tenants are causing for the neighbors. If you are having problems, the property owner is probably having problems too.
Report all problems to the appropriate agency. Police, Fire, Public Works are just some of the agencies that you may call with problems.

Graffiti on the wall now what

Report it:

• Report graffiti immediately.



• If you see graffiti in progress, report it "DON'T TRY TO INTERVENE."



• Take a photo of the graffiti. It may provide information that will lead to identification of the vandal.

Remove it:

• Removing graffiti promptly is the best way to prevent it. Prompt, persistent removal usually results in a nearly zero rate of recourrence. Before any graffiti removal begins, however, find out whether the police want to photograph it as evidence.

Prevent it:

• Rapid removal is one of the best ways to prevent future graffiti. Removing graffiti tells the vandals that people care about the community and that their work has little chance of being seen.



• Choose paints and coatings to deter graffiti. Dark colors make graffiti harder to see.



• Plant shrubs, or climbing vines to restrict access to tempting walls,



• Use good lighting to deter vandals from popular graffiti sites.



• Involve the media.

Gangs and Links

Some of the Gangs that we have in Oklahoma

Westside 90's Crips, Playboy Gangsta Crips, Rollin 60 Crips- Started in 1966 in L.A., 107 Hoova Crips - comes from 10700 block of Hoover Street in Los Angeles, Hard Hoova Crips, Shotgun Crips, Rollin 20's Crips, Outlaw 30's Bloods, 456 Piru Blood, Juarito's, South Side Loco's, Grande Barrio Central - is the largest gang in the Oklahoma County Juvenile detention center.
Sureno, Nortenos, South Side Loco's - Is the largest gang in Oklahoma City


Gang Information Links:

Florida Department of Corrections - http://www.dc.state.fl.us/pub/gangs/index.html

Dealing With Gangs
http://www.dealingwithgangs.org/

Oklahoma Gang Investigators Association
http://www.ogia.net/index.htm

Gang Watchers
http://www.gangwatchers.org/gang-laws.html

All about gangs:
http://allaboutgangs.blogspot.com/2008/03/black-street-gangs-in-los-angeles.html

National Gang Center:
http://www.nationalgangcenter.gov/


Federal Bureau Of Investigation
http://www.fbi.gov/hq/cid/ngic/violent_gangs.htm





Hand signs - are used by gang members to show their gang affiliation. They create letters or numbers with their fingers and hands.

Teens that gather in groups

It is a part of society that young people will congregate in public. It is both inevitable and socially necessary. Congregating is part of the rite of passage of sorts from childhood to adulthood, allowing youth to socialize and bond with their peers, out of their parents' view.

Young people's self-identity and self-worth are profoundly shaped by how they believe their peers perceive them, and gathering in public provides opportunities to see, and be seen by, others. Group settings provide a relatively safe context for teenagers to flirt and pair up with one another, supported and protected by their friends.

But they often do not always see how their gatherings affect other people. It can often make people feel afraid or apprehensive regardless of their behavior when most people see such a gathering they automatically see them as a gang.

Such gatherings can become disorderly depending of their conduct such as cursing, blocking sidewalks and streets, playing games in the streets, playing music loudly, drinking, fighting, littering, making offensive remarks to passerby and vandalizing property.

Young teens usually are looking for a place where they can hang out with each other without excessive adult supervision. In England, the police arranged for their teens to help an architect design a public youth shelter.

Some of the following can help problems from occurring:

Employ youth where businesses are negatively affected by disorderly conduct, it can promote a sense of responsibility among youth. Make sure that youth have adequate transportation to and from events this removes the risk of them being on the streets. Give teens a place to gather where they will not be complained about. Install closed-circuit TV where problems exist. Rules of conduct need to be established and made known to area teens if they wish to be in that particular place.

Mediating conflicts between youth needs to be a factor in helping teens know that there are other ways of handling situations. And that they must be held accountable for their actions.

Is my Child a Gang Member?

If you see a cluster of the following in your teen, start asking questions:

Insistence on wearing certain items or styles or colors of clothing or jewelry. Tattoos, especially temporary ones or ones drawn on the skin with ink. Graffiti marks on or in notebooks or bookbags.

Fascination with gang- or violence-related themes in movies or music. Truancy for reasons that are vague or unacceptable. Hand signals, strange words or other patterns of covert communication or patterns of movement among neighborhood youth who associate with your child.

Possessions of value (bikes, jackets, sneakers) that suddenly appear without your child having the financial means to buy them. Insistence on spending time with only a few people instead of a wide circle of friends based on common interests. Minor run-ins with the law or curfew violations.

Withdrawal from family activities or secretiveness about whereabouts or activities. Evidence of drug involvement; while all drug use may not be gang-related, drugs and gangs tend to "go hand in hand,"

Desire to carry, or actual carrying of, a "weapon" such as a knife or even scissors or a nail file. Fascination with weapons.
Questionable activities among your son's friend's parents, older siblings or other relatives. Be especially concerned if your son is developing "friendships" with young adult males a few years older than he is, especially if those friends also have had trouble with the law.

You need to be aware that gangs "need" kids of a certan age. Gangs, they say, have to have someone to do visible and dangerous things, such as deliver drugs or messages on the street -- tasks that more sophisticated adults might balk at. Young teens are easy marks because
1) they may not understand the seriousness of the legal consequences of their actions;
2) they may be willing to do things because of the promise of "big" money that would seem insignificant to adults, and
3) they're more easily sucked in by the power, prestige and "glamor"of being in a gang.

Gangs are alluring to kids because they offer them structure, support and security --things that become even more attractive if they're missing at home. Like a family, a gang offers a sense of belonging, But unlike a family, the structure and support are not their to encourage the child to stay in school and improve his own life but to continue and enhance the gang and its illegal activities. And the security, is only there so long as it's convenient for other gang members. "You could say to kids, "If you get in trouble, do you think gang members will do anything for you?'

How to prevent attraction to gangs

While no parent can guarantee that a child won't get attracted to a gang, there's less risk if parents:

Realize that it's not just urban kids who get involved. Gangs can exist in the suburbs or rural areas, and urban gang members travel to suburban hangouts such as malls.

Don't think girls are immune to gang influence. While there are some all-girl gangs, girls also can get involved on their own, or through friends, boyfriends or relatives.

Be alert to your surroundings in the neighborhood and take steps to improve it. Don't always assume the movements and patterns of behavior of youths in your immediate vicinity are innocent.

Pay attention, know places and people your children need to avoid. Know your children's friends and families. Find out about them before you allow your kids to spend time with new people. Know your child's whereabouts. Although young teens need some time with friends, families need systems and routines for checking on each other.

Young teens need supervision. Provide structured activities for your children. Kids involved in recreational activities they enjoy, have less free time for others to use unhealthy influence's on them. Encourage your children's academic life and other talents. Steering children in positive directions builds self-esteem through accomplishment.

Learn all you can about gang signs and symbols and activities. Attend programs and tap into these resources. Teach kids not to use drugs. Sometimes Gangs and drugs go hand in hand.