Canada and the World
Current Events with a Canadian Perspective
Last update
19 November 2010
Street Gangs in Canada
There has been a rapid growth in street-
activity in Canada over the last 25 years and
the groups are now moving into smaller cities,
rural areas, and Aboriginal reserves, as well
as becoming more organized and
criminally sophisticated
Crips, Bloods, Mad Cowz, Latin Kings, Vice Lords, Gangster Disciples; these are just a few of the 300 or so street gangs active in Canada. Okay, the Crips not so much at present.
In June 2007, there was a massive police sweep that saw 95 alleged Crips arrested in the Toronto area. Also seized were 32 guns and drugs with a street value of more than a million dollars.
Another swoop in April 2009 hauled in 125 people, of whom 46 were alleged street gang members.
Such massive arrests make for good headlines and folks in the more comfortable neighbourhoods sleep a little easier. But, there had been five similar sweeps in the previous three years.
The short-
Drugs and Weapons
Michael Chettleburgh has some answers. He’s an expert on Canadian street gangs and he’s shared his knowledge about them in his 2007 book Street Thugs. He says that taking large numbers of gang members into custody just opens up a business opportunity for another group.
That business is trafficking in drugs and illegal weapons, with a secondary interest in robbery, home invasion, and the sex trade. This is what street gangs do.
According to the Criminal Intelligence Service Canada the street gangs get their drug supplies from biker gangs and Italian or Asian organized crime syndicates.
Because the profits are huge and there are plenty of guns around, a lot of people get hurt. Most of the violence happens when one group invades another gang’s patch looking to expand its drug trafficking income or recruit new members.
The death toll in 2005 from drug trade-
Reasons for Gang Membership
Reverend Harry Lehtosky has worked in the area where Mr. Haiart was killed for a quarter of a century. In an interview with The Globe and Mail he summed up the appeal of gang membership.
“It’s the roll of twenties a thousand dollars thick. It’s the sports jersey. The camaraderie. It’s walking with five or six buddies down the street watching people crossing over to avoid you and feeling like you own the place.
“The ultimate is to feel the cold steel of a gun in your belt and that feeling that nobody can touch you because you’ve got this piece. The illusion is that they’re carving out a piece of turf and what they don’t realize is that all they are carving out is a piece in the cemetery.”
For a teenager coming from a “no-
Let’s check back with Michael Chettleburgh. The fertilizer that makes violent street gangs thrive, he says, is a mixture of poverty, discrimination, and disadvantage.
And who is to blame for that? Everybody is, writes Mr. Chettleburgh, and before the problem can be dealt with, “It demands that we, as Canadians, accept responsibility for creating the conditions that have allowed street gangs to flourish.”
How so? Mainstream society has been happy to vote for politicians who promise tax cuts. With less money coming in, governments are forced to cut programs.
Mostly those cuts fall hardest on the people who are already on the margins and who need them most. There are fewer community supports and recreation opportunities for kids in poor neighbourhoods.
Mr. Chettleburgh says we need to “address forcefully the root causes of the gang problem like poverty, discrimination, social exclusion, ineffective parenting styles, and more. And, it demands that we act now and invest in prevention first, rather than largely employ ‘get tough’ approaches that will invariably fail.”
Stronger Policing Needed
But, there’s a sizeable body of opinion that likes the “get tough” approach. Among them is Reverend Lehtosky of Winnipeg.
The Globe and Mail reported that he believes defeating “the scourge will take an
overhaul of the major agencies involved. He thinks that police need more powers and
that child-
Michael Chettleburgh says most street gangs have a hard core of three or four real villains.
These are people with sociopathic characters. They have no conscience or sense of guilt, are emotionally immature and impulsive, and do not learn from experience or change their behaviour after punishment. Treatment of their disorder is unlikely to have much of an effect.
The rest of the gang, according to Mr. Chettleburgh is made up of kids who make bad choices. These followers usually make up about 80 percent of a street gang’s membership.
It’s this group that should be the focus of prevention efforts. Mr. Chettleburgh believes there is a chance of turning these young people “around before they get too deep into the gang culture or its criminal activities.”
Suggestions for Dealing with Gangs
Here are some of the things he says that need to be done:
- “Develop a coherent plan of community mobilization, encompassing police, business,
community leaders, government, schools, faith communities, and youth, rather than
implement ad hoc and stop-
gap measures; - “Continued presence and high visibility of police officers to address the gang leadership vacuum that is created after a sweep, as well as strengthen relationships with youth and community leaders;
- “Provide sustainable funding for community programs and social supports such as mentorship, job training, parent support, homework clubs, sports and recreation opportunities, intensive life skills development, English as a second language training, diversity awareness, food banks, and more;
- “Revitalize social housing and help low-
income people buy and renovate their homes, because where there is ownership there is attachment and engagement; - “Engender a sense of pride by celebrating the community’s achievements and many gifts, rather than focus solely on their failures;
- “Offer broad-
scale conflict resolution services and training, so that the community members can deal with its contentious issues before things spiral out of control.”
The scale of the task is beyond the resources of volunteer groups and faith communities.
That means government would have to do the job. But, it would come with a hefty price tag at a time when there still seems to be an appetite for tax cuts among the general population.
However, not spending money on diverting at-
Sources
“Toronto Police Arrest 125 in Major Raid Targetting Guns, Gangs.” CBC News, April 1, 2009.
“Winnipeg Becomes Homicide Capital” Julius Strauss, Globe and Mail, October 17, 2005.
© Canada and the World, September 2007
Updated June 2010
All Rights Reserved
GRADUATING
FROM PRISON U
Anyone serving a prison sentence must quickly choose which gang to join. Being a loner is not usually an option.
Joining a gang gives an inmate a certain amount of protection from some of the horrible things that go on in prison.
Existing gang members find the pen a good place to go trolling for recruits. The authorities know all about this and the gang culture that runs the inside of Canada’s jails.
Here’s what Criminal Intelligence Service Canada said about this in its 2006 Annual Report:
“Some incarcerated gang members are involved in gang recruitment and criminal activities inside federal and provincial correctional institutions, as well as occasionally influencing gang activities outside institutions. Gang members and associates continue to network within the correctional system, transferring information about criminal activities as well as promoting gang interests. In some cases, gang members mature criminally while in prison, demonstrating a greater awareness of law enforcement tactics upon release.”
When released, most inmates know a lot more about street gang life than they did when they went in.
According to the Criminal Intelligence Service Canada report, there are nearly 800 organized crime groups operating in Canada.
According to Michael Chettleburgh, the average person is more likely to be injured
or killed in a swimming-
Mara Salvatrucha, also known as MS-
“The first thing
to understand is that
the public peace -
sidewalk and street
peace -
kept primarily by
the police, necessary as police are. It is kept
primarily by an intricate, almost unconscious,
network of voluntary
control and standards
among the people
themselves, and enforced
by the people themselves.”
Urban development expert, Jane Jacobs
It’s currently popular to blame the United States for exporting its street-