Commentary: LA County District Attorney Axes Gang Unit, Move Sure To Make City More Dangerous
The district attorney of Los Angeles will reportedly downsize or potentially altogether eliminate his city’s gang unit, even as the city struggles with a deadly crime wave. Los Angeles has for over a century been given…
The district attorney of Los Angeles will reportedly downsize or potentially altogether eliminate his city’s gang unit, even as the city struggles with a deadly crime wave.
Los Angeles has for over a century been given nicknames by locals and tourists struck by its natural beauty, history and its influence on the culture. The “City of Angels,” “La-La Land” and “Tinseltown” for its Hollywood section all come to mind.
But, as the Los Angeles Police Department knows all too well, there is another moniker for California’s largest city: The gang capital of the U.S.
The LAPD estimates there are over 450 gangs active in the city and its surrounding county, and that those gangs have as many as 45,000 members in total. That essentially means there is the equivalent of an army living among Angelenos, pushing drugs, disrupting the peace and killing each other.
That doesn’t even mention the fact that innocent civilians, unaware of their surroundings, can find themselves in the wrong color or the wrong block at the wrong time — which can prove menacing and deadly. Some innocent people living in LA have gone out and never returned home in some pretty high-profile cases in recent years.