Many People Want Police ‘Hammer’ to Hit Gangs Harder

A day after Los Angeles police used their familiar program of sweeps and arrests to roust gang members from the crime-plagued streets of South Los Angeles, Watts resident Charles Brown said Monday that it will take more than “Operation Hammer” to make his neighborhood safe again.

“Hell yeah, I’m in favor of it,” Brown said angrily as he exited a grocery store near his home. “But they need two ‘Hammers,’ 10 ‘Hammers’ . . . a whole toolbox.

“I watched (gang members) snatch an old lady’s purse this morning,” said Brown, who has lived in South-Central Los Angeles for 49 of his 52 years. “The police have kind of cleaned up the streets, slowed down the gangs, but they need to do more. I have been here since 1943 and crime has never been this bad.”

Brown was not alone in his opinion. Reactions of South Los Angeles residents to the police incursions into gang-infested neighborhoods over the past two nights were nearly unanimous: Get the gang-bangers off the streets--fast and for good.

And while some argued that innocent people often get caught up in the sweeps, most of the residents agreed that the Police Department must increase its raids to eradicate gang violence.

“The police have been doing a pretty good job so far,” said William Deed, 46, “but they have got to do it more. As long as they aren’t harassing innocent people, I don’t mind having them come down here and sweep the area. We’ve got to get rid of this stuff.”

Between Friday night and early Sunday morning, Operation Hammer netted 412 people, including 113 known gang members, said Lt. Fred Nixon, police spokesman. Of the 113 gang members arrested, 23 adults and six juveniles were being held pending charges on felony counts. Police also held 71 adult gang members and 13 juveniles on a variety of misdemeanor counts. The others were being held pending charges ranging from traffic violations to drug possession.

20 Guns Seized

In addition, 20 guns were seized, nine from known gang members.

“It’s great,” said Jesse Tripp, 30. “The police are cleaning up the streets. It’s been pretty bad around here, especially at night. At night, they really get busy.”

Mable Washington, a 55-year-old Inglewood woman who owns an icehouse in South-Central, said she welcomed the increase in police crackdowns because gangs have brought trouble to her business.

“They tore up the roof and broke in,” she said. “It’s about time the police started to do something. Gang activity around here is terrible.”

Robin Wayne Herndon, 28, said he hoped that stepped-up police enforcement would make the area safe for his children.

“I think the city and all the people should be for it,” he said. “I have young kids in the community, and I want them to be able to come out and play and walk to the store without worrying about getting shot. That’s what the police are here for, to protect and serve.”

However, not everyone agreed that Operation Hammer was a positive step.

‘It’s problematic for three reasons,” said Jitahadi Imara, vice chairman of the Us organization, a group of community-based black activists. “One, it’s been done without community coordination and is not part of an overall community program. . . . Two, it creates a myth of doing something relevant, which ends up taking away from something more serious. It creates a myth of action. What you have is public relations and photo opportunities but . . . no serious results. Three, Us believes that it lays the basis for police abuse and misconduct.”

Imara said some people have been arrested in Operation Hammer merely because “they look like gang members.”

Paul Hoffman, legal director of the Southern California chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, said his group is examining the possibility that the program violated the constitutional rights of some of those arrested.

“The operation raises some concern that the police may have arrested some people without reasonable suspicion that they were involved in criminal activity,” Hoffman said. “That would violate the Constitution. One of the questions about these operations is whether the police have abandoned these constitutional limitations. We want to take a look at it more closely.”

Hoffman acknowledged that at least in some of the cases, the police may have acted properly in arresting suspected gang members. But many of the South Los Angeles residents urged police to show little regard for the rights of gang-bangers.

“The police should have a war on them,” said Jessie Brown, 46, Charles Brown’s wife. “They should just go get every known gang member and send him away, lock him up. The gang members don’t care about other people. They just stand right out here and try to sell you dope.”