Gangs moving to rural areas

As estimated gang membership passes the 1 million mark nationally, gangs are no longer solely an urban phenomenon. "Gang members are fanning out from cities, looking for fresh recruits and new markets to sell drugs and guns," Raju Chebium of Gannett Co.'s Washington bureau reports. "Some flee to rural areas to hide from the police or other gangs." The Justice Department’s 2009 National Gang Threat Assessment reveals by 58 percent of all law enforcement agencies reported gang activity in their jurisdictions in 2008, up from 45 percent in 2004.

"We have seen gangs that were centered in one city become national," Attorney General Eric Holder told the Senate Judiciary Committee in April. "We in law enforcement have to adapt to that and break old models, old ways of thinking. Gangs are not simply an urban phenomena any more." Ralph Weisheit, a criminal justice professor at Illinois State University, told Chebium that small-town gangs tend to be less violent than their urban counterparts and gang-related murders are rare in these groups.

Still, "Across rural America, authorities are stepping up enforcement when they see clear proof of gang-related crimes," Chebium writes. "In May, 600 federal, state and local law enforcement officers descended on Newburgh, N.Y., population 29,000, people, carrying 78 indictments naming members of the Bloods and the Latin Kings." Weisheit also questions the Justice Department's claim that gang membership has reached 1 million nationwide. He said "sometimes a "gang" is just a bunch of kids acting rowdy, wearing gang colors or imitating gang signs they see in the movies or on TV," Chebium writes. The key, Weisheit said, is learning how to distinguish a "gang from punkish behavior." (Read more)