Strike Force Taking Phone Tips in War on Gangs : High-Profile LAPD Team of 33 Roving Officers to Pursue Calls to New Hot Line

The Los Angeles Police Department, diverting manpower from regular patrol units, announced Tuesday that it has formed a roving, 33-officer strike force to pursue gang-related telephone tips from citizens via a new “gang hot line.”

The high-profile strike force, which hit the streets last week, will assist the nearly 200 Los Angeles police officers already assigned to other anti-gang units, according to Cmdr. Lorne Kramer, the department’s gang enforcement coordinator.

Those existing units, particularly the department’s 150-officer Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums (CRASH) program, have become “spread too thin” by a recent surge in gang activity, Kramer said at a press conference.

Gang-related homicides declined 38% from 1980 to 1984, Police Department statistics show. However, there have been 62 gang-related killings so far this year in Los Angeles, a 20% increase over those that had occurred by this time in 1984, authorities said.

Kramer estimated that there are at present about 150 street gangs operating in Los Angeles, with a combined membership of between 10,000 and 11,000. Gang membership has doubled in the last four to five years, he said.

More Intense Approach

“A more innovative and aggressive approach to dealing with the urban terrorism of street gangs is called for if the citizens of this city are going to live in peace,” Kramer said.

Under the department’s plan, citizens will call the hot line (213 485-4551)--anonymously if desired--to report gang activity not of an emergency nature, such as narcotics use. Officers from the strike force--in uniform and driving regular black and white patrol cars--will then respond “as quickly as possible” to investigate, Kramer said.

The 911 number should be used for incidents requiring immediate police response, he said.

Two-thirds of the strike force’s 30 officers and three sergeants are fluent in Spanish, Kramer noted.

Although the hot line is scheduled to go into operation today, the new unit already has had an impact on gang activity, he said. Since July 27, when they were first deployed, strike force officers have made 94 felony arrests, confiscated 28 guns and 10 knives, and contacted 498 gang members.

The unit will operate for at least 90 days and possibly longer if gang crime statistics warrant it, Kramer said.

“One of the primary tasks of this task force is to try to reduce the level of fear among citizens . . . by reducing the conspicuous, chronic nature of gang members who congregate at specific locations and have virtually claimed some neighborhoods as their own,” Kramer said.

Initial efforts will be directed toward South and Central Los Angeles, specifically in the department’s Central, Newton, Rampart, Southwest and 77th Street divisions. Later attention likely will be focused on the San Fernando Valley.

Kramer said officers assigned to the strike force were selected from patrol units throughout the department. Their new assignment, he said, is not expected to leave their previous units understaffed.