Number of Murders Triples in 1988 : Police Report Increase in Gang Violence in Valley

Gang-related murders in the San Fernando Valley tripled in 1988 as local and outside street gangs competed for the area’s lucrative narcotics market, Los Angeles police said Monday.

During 1988, police counted 33 Valley murders in which victims or suspected killers were members of a street gang, according to year-end statistics released by the department. In 1987, there were only 11 gang-related murders, police said.

“Gang violence is significantly up,” said Detective Cliff Ruff, coordinator of the Police Department’s anti-gang operations in the Valley. “I blame it on the increase of drug trafficking.”

Ruff said the Valley offers drug dealers a better market and more profit for narcotics than areas in downtown and South-Central Los Angeles. Those factors have increased the competition for drug sales in the Valley, he said. Gangs from outside the Valley compete with each other, as well as local gangs, for the market, Ruff said.

“It’s capitalism, free enterprise,” he said. “There is a larger market, and the people have more money to spend. The dealers are going to go where the money is.”

The competition often leads to violence.

Gang-Related Slayings

In the Foothill Division, which includes Pacoima, Lake View Terrace, Sylmar and Sun Valley, half of the 44 homicides last year were gang-related. They included a quadruple slaying at a Lake View Terrace house used by a gang to store drugs and money.

Police said the sharp rise in gang murders was responsible for a 20% increase in the total number of homicides in the Valley in 1988. The year-end statistics show there were 107 homicides in 1988, compared to 89 in 1987. Police said nine of the 1988 deaths were ruled justifiable homicide, leaving 98 murders in the Valley.

All but 20 of the 1988 murders have been cleared by arrests, according to Deputy Chief Ronald A. Frankle, who is in charge of Valley police operations. Additionally, detectives made arrests in 15 cases that occurred before 1988, he said.

Overall crime in the Valley rose 7.3% in 1988, according to the statistics.

The number of rapes reported dropped about 5% to 439, aggravated assaults decreased 7% to 7,384, and burglaries were down 5% to 14,925. Robberies rose less than 1% to 3,863.

However, auto-related crimes increased sharply during the year. In the Valley, 17,885 cars--or about 49 a day--were reported stolen, a 12.5% increase. Burglary and theft from autos rose 16% to 18,537 reports.

Police noted that as burglaries in the Valley have decreased in recent years, auto-related crimes have gone in the opposite direction.

Frankle said there are several factors that account for the rise of one crime and the decrease of another. He said laws have been strengthened in recent years, making most burglaries felonies, whereas auto thefts are often prosecuted as misdemeanors, which carry lighter sentences.

Better Protection for Homes

Homes are better protected than cars by current security technology and neighborhood watch programs, Frankle added. An increase in the demand for used car parts has also fueled the stolen car market, he noted.

In the first quarter of 1988, car theft was up 30%. But Frankle said that increase was trimmed back to 12% by the end of the year, largely because of the formation of an auto-theft task force that made 300 “high-quality” arrests of commercial auto thieves and receivers of stolen property.