Compton: Amid Heat, Gang Activity Takes Over City

[Christina Marie]

Amid Heat, Gang Activity Takes Over City
Sheriff’s Department beefs up patrols after 20 shootings, four murders in one weekend

By Allison Jean Eaton
Bulletin Staff Writer

The Sheriff’s Department has redeployed deputies it recently shifted away from the Compton Service Area back to the city after Compton experienced its bloodiest weekend so far this year.

Last Tuesday Sheriff Lee Baca announced that he would be sending deputies previously deployed elsewhere back to Compton to stabilize the city.

Just two weeks ago the city and county unincorporated areas saw seven murders in eight days, four of them taking place on Saturday, July 23. And between Friday, July 22 and Sunday, July 24, 20 shootings riddled the Hub City.

All are thought to be gang-related.

Two of the shooting victims were toddlers — 2- and 3-year-old girls — who were playing in the yard in front of an apartment complex in the 900 block of Santa Fe Avenue at approximately 10 p.m. July 22, officials said. The 2-year-old was hit in the arm and the 3-year-old in the back during the drive-by. Both were taken to Long Beach Memorial Medical Center and have since been released.

All of the July 23 homicide victims, ranging in age from 15 to 72, had no known gang ties, according to sheriff’s officials. They were all innocent bystanders in the wrong place at the wrong time.

The first was a 19-year-old female at an apartment complex in the 1200 block of North Bullis Road that is frequented by known gang members, said Service Area Lt. Joe Gooden. She was killed at approximately 12:05 a.m. When deputies arrived at the scene, there were reportedly approximately 75 distraught gang members in a heated exchange with the victim’s family members. Sadly, none of the witnesses would cooperate with deputies.

Later a 20-year-old Latino man was found gunned down in East Rancho Dominguez, Gooden said.

That night at about 10 p.m., a 72-year-old man was checking the oil in his daughter’s car on Peck Street when an unidentified white vehicle drove up and fired seven rounds, five of which hit the man in the upper torso, Gooden said.

Just 10 minutes after the 72-year-old was killed, a similar, most likely the same, white vehicle drove up to a 15-year-old boy near Corregidor Street and Center Avenue and fired rounds, killing him, Gooden said.

The violence has taken its toll on the community and elected officials.

During last week’s council meeting, Councilwoman Yvonne Arceneaux said she has been deeply troubled by the violence.

“This is an issue that’s bee been weighing on my heart and on my mind. There was actually a shooting on the street that I live on last week,” she said. “A 19-year-old was shot down on my street.”

She also referred to the murder of the 15-year-old near Center and Corregidor, the last of the four murder victims to lose their lives two Saturdays ago.

“I went by the location on my way to church [the next morning]...There were young people standing outside devastated by this incident, and I saw the despair on their faces.

“What I saw was very disturbing. One young man was there, he was 15 and a friend of the young man who was shot and killed,” she said passionately. “He paced the sidewalk early in the morning and they could not bring him back into the house.”

Her voice heavy with emotion, Arceneaux said she wanted “some reassurance” that the Sheriff’s Department is “in control over this and that they are going to be working diligently to stop all of this murder and mayhem in our city.”

Gooden told council members at the meeting that resources were being redeployed to the city and that the current gang task force would be augmented in an ongoing manner.

According to Gooden, a number of factors contributed to the spike in violent and deadly gang activity late last month.

“It was an excessively hot weekend where people were driven outside, and we’ve got a saturation of gang members,” Gooden said of the 55-60 estimated active gangs within the Hub City’s 10 square miles.

“You’ve got the heat, people being out of school for summer, poverty, high unemployment, not a lot of activities for the kids,” he said. “It’s just a recipe that creates a lot of tension and a lot of problems.”

But one of the largest contributors, sheriff’s officials concede, was the shifting of additional personnel away from Compton.

Capt. Mike Ford, who heads the department’s gang unit, said recently a number of deputies and investigators had taken promotions or been transferred away from the Compton Service Area. Gooden confirmed that this started in early July, meaning it only took a matter of weeks for gang members to notice the decrease in patrols.

Baca quietly in early January doubled the number of deputies and specialized personnel assigned to the Compton Service Area to stem the gang violence that claimed 76 lives in the city and unincorporated areas last year, the highest number in almost a decade.

Compton pays $14 million annually for 78 deputies. The additional 78 deputies and specialized personnel are currently being subsidized by county taxpayers as the city simply can’t afford them.

Gooden confirmed that many if not all of the shootings and murders were the result of rivalries between African-American and Latino gangs, or what he termed “black on brown.”

Baca said it would be “morally wrong” due to the racial nature of the gang activity not to send the additional resources despite Compton’s incapacity to pay for them.

“There’s no question about it that the additional personnel have had a huge impact in blocking off opportunity and access to victims,” he told the Los Angeles Times.

But although the tragic weekend has clouded the hope many in Compton have had since Baca sent the extra deputies and created the Compton Area Gang Task Force, Gooden points out that things are still looking up.

“Despite this very, very bloody weekend, we’re better off than we were last year,” Gooden said.

As of July 27, 26 homicides had taken place in the city and adjacent county unincorporated areas. During the same time period last year, there had been 46. And violent crime is down across the board.

According to Gooden, rape is down 33 percent, assault with a firearm is down 32 percent, larceny is down 23 percent and grand theft auto is down 32 percent. Overall, crime is down citywide by 19 percent.

“What we don’t want people to lose sight of is that we’re very successful,” he said. “The facts speak for themselves.

“We’re optimistic that with the redeployment of these resources, we’re going to stem the tide.”



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[stamps]

“It was an excessively hot weekend where people were driven outside, and we’ve got a saturation of gang members,” Gooden said of the 55-60 estimated active gangs within the Hub City’s 10 square miles."

It's gotten to a point in Compton where there are no more real territories. Some gangs have one street to "claim"!, and only 3 houses on that street!!!, and that's their "neighborhood"....

[streetsIswatchin]

Your very right right Stamps...its getting hard to hold down your own block in compton

[dont_fear]

Why is that, why cant they be holding on?

[UmanH-ay]

times are changing, your most likely to be sharing your hood with another group of people,the only dudes who i see properly holdin their hood down and makin sure no one sets up shop on it is nutty and the ville

[grape fo def]

times are changing, your most likely to be sharing your hood with another group of people,the only dudes who i see properly holdin their hood down and makin sure no one sets up shop on it is nutty and the ville

damn u must have some hi-power binocoulars to see all that from new zealand

[UmanH-ay]

times are changing, your most likely to be sharing your hood with another group of people,the only dudes who i see properly holdin their hood down and makin sure no one sets up shop on it is nutty and the ville

damn u must have some hi-power binocoulars to see all that from new zealand

lol who are you to be speakin on BS like this? your ass been exposed so many times with them multipe accounts from here all the way too allhood, kick rocks

[Midnight]

times are changing, your most likely to be sharing your hood with another group of people,the only dudes who i see properly holdin their hood down and makin sure no one sets up shop on it is nutty and the ville

Yeah I was off of Alondra and Wilmington and I saw a couple of Nuttys in front of they market across the street from the Louisiana spot. Down the street I did not see any Farms hanging out.

[UmanH-ay]

times are changing, your most likely to be sharing your hood with another group of people,the only dudes who i see properly holdin their hood down and makin sure no one sets up shop on it is nutty and the ville

Yeah I was off of Alondra and Wilmington and I saw a couple of Nuttys in front of they market across the street from the Louisiana spot. Down the street I did not see any Farms hanging out.

farms gotta big hood,but not enough of them to hold it down, some might say the farms share their entire hood with cv70, but yeah i didnt use to get much trouble nowadays goin through there, but they'll step outta their backyards to catch you slippin at night..

[grape fo def]

farms gotta big hood,but not enough of them to hold it down, some might say the farms share their entire hood with cv70, but yeah i didnt use to get much trouble nowadays goin through there, but they'll step outta their backyards to catch you slippin at night..

i aint even gon say nuthin

[UmanH-ay]

farms gotta big hood,but not enough of them to hold it down, some might say the farms share their entire hood with cv70, but yeah i didnt use to get much trouble nowadays goin through there, but they'll step outta their backyards to catch you slippin at night..

i aint even gon say nuthin

correct me then

[streetsIswatchin]

its getting hard to hold shit down because...in my perspective hoods are smaller and more numerous and have resorted to more sneaky type shit...beef with niggas on the next block makes it very dangerous for you when in 5 seconds you could get dumped on with no warning.
your enemies are riding around doing normal shit and if by chance they see you slipping they let you have it, before it was pretty well known when something was up cuz you had the vehicle from your enemy hood making a recon trip specifically for a hit. Or u just had niggas coming by to spray up your pad. Not really aiming and you had a pretty good chance of survivng.
Not like that today, you dont know when its coming. and they only a stone throws away.
And one more thing, cops are all over the place and will harrass you like nothing. Afakasi is right on what he said NBCC is all strictly Nutty controled and so is PVCC. you cant say that about any other hood

[streetsIswatchin]

Maybe CV155ST....but they have 151Bloods right there, but thats how its always been there. i guess i would add the 155 together with NBCC and PVCC

[Al_Capone_aka_pNuT]

we always held our shit (SBCC) but at same time we always had shared our hood with the CV3/BLP/LVP/CVWillow but besides that aint no black gangs ever set-up over here. SBCC pushed the Elm St east of Mayo Ave.

[BuCCyBlue]

That night at about 10 p.m., a 72-year-old man was checking the oil in his daughter’s car on Peck Street when an unidentified white vehicle drove up and fired seven rounds, five of which hit the man in the upper torso, Gooden said.

Just 10 minutes after the 72-year-old was killed, a similar, most likely the same, white vehicle drove up to a 15-year-old boy near Corregidor Street and Center Avenue and fired rounds, killing him, Gooden said.

Cuhh that sound like PVCC's busted at the Tanaz on PeCC and then the Tanaz Bustd at the PVCC's On Corregidor

[str8]

How long have the PVC'S And tanas been goin at it? becoz b4 they never really considered eachother main rivals or nothin, jus usually talkd trash bout eachother, PVC was busy with fightin all the CVs : 70, 155 TF

[BuCCyBlue]

How long have the PVC'S And tanas been goin at it? becoz b4 they never really considered eachother main rivals or nothin, jus usually talkd trash bout eachother, PVC was busy with fightin all the CVs : 70, 155 TF

thats shit just started when the tanas killed Village boy at this lil party