In order to better understand the rise of these groups, I went into the original neighborhoods to document the history which led to these groups. There are 88 incorporated cities and dozens of other unincorporated places in Los Angeles County (LAC). In the process of conducting this research, I visited all of these places in an attempt to not just identify gangs active in Los Angeles, but to determine their territories. Through several weeks of field work and research conducted in 1996, I identified 274 black gangs in 17 cities and four unincorporated areas in LAC. The first major period of black gangs in Los Angeles began in the late 1940s and ended in 1965. There were black gangs in Los Angeles prior to this period, but they were small in numbers; little is known about the activity of these groups. Some of the black groups that existed in Los Angeles in the late 1920s and 1930s were the Boozies, Goodlows, Blogettes, Kelleys, and the Driver Brothers. Most of these groups were family oriented, and they referred to themselves as clubs.[2] Max Bond (1936:270) wrote briefly about a black gang of 15-year-old kids from the Central Avenue area that mostly stole automobile accessories and bicycles. It was not until the late 1940s that the first major black clubs surfaced on the East side[3] of Los Angeles near Jefferson High School in the Central Avenue area. This was the original settlement area of blacks in Los Angeles. South of 92nd Street in Watts and in the Jefferson Park/West Adams area on the West side, there were significant black populations. By 1960 several black clubs were operating on the West side[4] of Los Angeles, an area that had previously restricted black residents during the 1940s.
Several of the first black clubs to emerge in the late 1940s and early 1950s formed initially as a defensive reaction to combat much of the white violence that had been plaguing the black community for several years. In the surrounding communities of the original black ghetto of Central Avenue and Watts, and in the cities of Huntington Park and South Gate, white Angelenos were developing a dissatisfaction for the growing black population that was migrating from the South during WWII. During the 1940s, resentment from the white community grew as several blacks challenged the legal housing discrimination laws that prevented them from purchasing property outside the original settlement neighborhoods and integrate into the public schools. Areas outside of the original black settlement of Los Angeles were neighborhoods covered by legally enforced, racially restrictive covenants or deed restrictions. This practice, adapted by white homeowners, was established in 1922 and was designed to maintain social and racial homogeneity of neighborhoods by denying non-whites access to property ownership. By the 1940s, such exclusionary practices made much of Los Angeles off-limits to most minorities (Bond 1936; Davis 1990:161,273; Dymski and Veitch 1996:40). This process contributed to increasing homogeneity of communities in Los Angeles, further exacerbating racial conflict between whites and blacks, as the latter existed in mostly segregated communities. From 1940 to 1944, there was over a 100 percent increase in the black population of Los Angeles, and ethnic and racial paranoia began to develop among white residents. Chronic overcrowding was taking a toll, and housing congestion became a serious problem, as blacks were forced to live in substandard housing (Collins 1980:26). From 1945-1948, black residents continually challenged restrictive covenants in several court cases in an effort to move out of the dense, overcrowded black community. These attempts resulted in violent clashes between whites and blacks (Collins 1980:30). The Ku Klux Klan resurfaced during the 1940s, 20 years after their presence faded during the late 1920s (Adler 1977; Collins 1980), and white youths were forming street clubs to battle integration of the community and schools of black residents.
In 1943, conflicts between blacks and whites occurred at 5th and San Pedro Streets, resulting in a riot on Central Avenue (Bunch 1990:118). white clubs in Inglewood, Gardena, and on the West side engaged in similar acts, but the Spook Hunters were the most violent of all white clubs in Los Angeles. Between 1973 and 1975, several the non-Crip gangs decided to form a united federation, as many Crip gangs began indulging in intra-racial fighting with other black non-Crip gangs. Because of the sheer numbers that the Crips were able to accumulate through heavy recruitment, they were easily able to intimidate and terrorize other non-Crip gangs, resulting in one of the first Crip against Blood gang-related homicides. A member of the LA Brims, a West side independent gang, was shot and killed by a Crip member after a confrontation (Jah & Keyah 1995:123). This incident started the rivalry between the Crips and the Brims. The Piru Street Boys (non-Crip gang) in Compton had severed their relations with the Compton Crips after a similar confrontation, and a meeting was called on Piru Street in Compton where the Blood alliance was created. Throughout the mid-1970s the rivalry between the Bloods and Crips grew, as did the number of gangs. In 1974 there were 70 gang-related homicides in Los Angeles, and by 1978, there were 60 black gangs in Los Angeles, 45 Crip gangs, and 15 Blood gangs. By 1979, at the age of 26, the founder of the Crips was murdered, Crip infighting was well-established, and gang crime became more perilous. The county reported 30,000 active gang members in 1980 (Table 1.1), and gang murders reached a record high 355 (Table 1.2). The Los Angeles District Attorney�s office and the Hard Core Gang Unit began to focus their resources on prosecuting gang-related offenses during this time (Collier & Horowitz 1983: 94). From 1978 to 1982, the number of black gangs grew from 60 to 155 (See chapter 5), and by 1985 gang homicides were reaching epidemic proportions after a brief lull of activity during the Olympics of 1984. The epidemic of gang-related crime and homicides continued to soar throughout the 1980s, peaking in 1992 with 803 gang-related homicides.
In three years, after the first Crip gang was established in 1969, the number of black gangs in Los Angeles had grown to 18. Table 1 reveals that in each year where gang territory data was available, the growth in the number of gang territories was significant. In the six years between 1972 and 1978, 44 new black gangs formed, and only two gangs became inactive. In the 14 years between 1982 and 1996, 150 new gangs formed. However, the most dramatic growth was in the four years between 1978 and 1982 when 101 new gangs formed. In addition to the number of gang territories increasing, the spatial distribution of gang territories changed during these years, penetrating several new places within Los Angeles County. The dramatic increase in the number of gangs from 1978 to 1982, which was most evident in Los Angeles, Compton, and Inglewood, occurred during the same time when unemployment was rising because of plant closures. A major phase of deindustrialization was occurring in Los Angeles that resulted in 70,000 workers being laid off in South Los Angeles between 1978 and 1982, heavily impacting the black community (Soja et al. 1983: 217). Unemployment at the expense of base closures and plant relocations has been linked, among other factors, to persistent juvenile delinquency that has led to gang development (Klein 1995: 103,194). Spergel found that gangs where more prevalent in areas where limited access to social opportunities and social disorganization, or the lack of integration of key social institutions including youth and youth groups, family, school, and employment in a local community, were found (1995:61). Also the type of community was believed to influence the prevalence of gangs, and neighborhoods with large concentrations of poor families, large number of youths, female-headed households, and lower incomes were key factors (Covey et al. 1997:71). In addition, poverty that is associated with unemployment, racism, and segregation is believed to be a foremost cause of gang proliferation (Klein 1995: 194). These conditions are strongly associated with areas plagued by poverty, rather than the suburban regions identified in this study.
By the mid 1990s there were an estimated 650,000 gang members in the United States (U.S. Department of Justice 1997), including 150,000 in Los Angeles County (Figure 1.1). In addition, in 1996 there were over 600 Hispanic gangs in Los Angeles County along with a growing Asian gang force of about 20,000. With gang membership increasing, gang-related homicides in Los Angeles County reached epidemic proportions for black and Hispanic males that represented 93 percent of all gang-related homicide victims from 1979 to 1994 (Hutson, et al. 1995). From 1985 to 1992, gang-related homicides had increased in each of the eight consecutive years (Figure 1.2). However, the year following the Los Angeles Civil Unrest of 1992, there was a ten percent drop in homicides, the first reduction in gang-related homicides in Los Angeles since 1984. This drop in killings was the result of a gang truce implemented by the four largest gangs in Watts, the Bounty Hunters, the Grape Streets, Hacienda Village, and PJ Watts (Perry 1995:24). In 1992, shortly before the urban unrest of April 29, 1992, a cease-fire was already in effect in Watts, and after the unrest, a peace treaty was developed among the largest black gangs in Watts. Early on, the police started to credit the truce for the sharp drop in gang-related homicides (Berger 1992).
Notes:
[1] A majority of the Crips and Bloods in Los Angeles are African American with the exceptions of a Samoan Crip gangs active in Long Beach, a Samoan Blood gang active in Carson, an Inglewood Crip gang with mostly members of Tongan descent, and a mixed Samoan/black gang active in Compton. With the exception of these four gangs, Crips and Blood gangs are predominately African American.
[2] The groups during this time identified themselves as clubs, but the police department often characterized these groups as gangs.
[3] The East side of Los Angeles refers to the areas east of Main Street to Alameda in the City of Los Angeles. This area includes Watts, and the unincorporated area of Florence. It does not include East LA, Boyle Heights, or other eastern portions of the city. Those areas are usually referred to by their specific names.
[4] The West side of Los Angeles refers to the areas west of Main Street, an area that was off limits to blacks in the 1940s. Through time, though, the border between east and west has moved slightly west in the �mental maps� of those who lived in this area. Later Broadway became the infamous border, and later again the Harbor 110 freeway became the border. Some today consider Vermont Avenue the division between the West side & East side. Gangs have always identified geographically to either East side or West side and they have maintained the use of Main Street as their point of division between the two.
[5] Main Street was the street that bounded the Central Avenue community to the west, but over time, this boundary would move further west. Success to move out of the ghetto occurred in a westerly direction, and over time, Broadway became the boundary, then later Vermont.
[6] Personal interview with Raymond Wright.
[7] Organization was a Los Angeles based black political cultural group from the 1960�s that was under the leadership of Ron Karenga (also known as Maulana Karenga).
[8] Interview with Danifu in 1996.
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