Results of Crime Offensive Could Take 2 Years : Violence: County gang killings continue at a deadly pace. A fall summit planted seeds for a battle that is just now beginning to take root.

Only three months into the new year, the number of gang-related killings in Orange County is on a pace to equal or break last year’s record body count of 74, and officials are predicting that it could take two years before newly approved law enforcement strategies are able to make a difference in the continuing violence.

The news comes just days after local government officials were applauded at the Hall of Administration for their roles in last November’s first gang violence summit.

Out on the streets, however, the killing continues.

While there has been no single incident to match last year’s gruesome slaying of a 17-year-old San Clemente youth who was speared through the head with a paint roller, the county’s chief gang prosecutor, Doug Woodsmall, said the “numbers still keep rolling in.”

“I don’t think anybody really expected that this situation was going to go away overnight. The problem is of such magnitude that it is going to take time. (To see a change), it could be at least a year, probably two years.”

Of the 42 total homicides this year in Orange County, officials say they have linked 11 to gang-related killings in Santa Ana alone. Woodsmall, however, said that number represents an incomplete tally of gang killings for the first quarter of 1994 and is expected to rise in short order pending the investigation of other unsolved slayings throughout the county.

Also, law enforcement officials have identified 15 more local gang organizations, bringing the total number in Orange County to at least 300.

“There is a growth going on,” said Lon Erickson, a senior district attorney’s investigator whose office is in the midst of reconstructing a color-coded map showing the territories claimed by local gangs.

For law enforcement officers, the map provides a dramatic view of the proliferation of gangs in Orange County as virtually no area is free of their presence.

Erickson said the majority of the new gangs are graffiti “tagging crews” whose violent actions and use of weapons have elevated them to full-fledged gang status. The others include new splinter groups of existing gangs or roving bands of Asian gangs, which traditionally do not claim specific geographic bases.

“The firearms are more prolific, the deaths are occurring. Things are happening all the way across the board,” Erickson said. “We’re just doing the best job we can.”

The public outcry over gang violence in Orange County probably reached an apex at last November’s summit when about 1,000 people--students, families, police officers, government leaders and gang members themselves--issued a collective call for help in the local gang wars.

At the time, residents and county officials were just beginning to absorb a dramatic upswing in violent gang incidents, the most notorious being the death of Steve Woods, the San Clemente youth who was speared through the head with a paint roller.

The death was one of 74 gang-related killings recorded last year, up from 43 in 1992.

Since then, seeds for what officials hope will be a strong offensive have been planted and are just now beginning to take root.

A large part of the county’s offensive rests with a $2-million program in which teams of prosecutors and probation officers will be dispatched to gang-troubled neighborhoods in six areas--Anaheim, Costa Mesa, Garden Grove, Orange, Santa Ana and South County. There, they will be teamed with local police to build criminal cases against the most hardened gang leaders in those communities.

One of two teams slated for Santa Ana has been in operation since January. This month, the cities of Anaheim and Orange are expected to begin their programs and all are expected to be in place by June.

Sheriff Brad Gates, who was criticized late last year for indicating that he would not be participating in the program, now is also expected to join in the countywide strategy, law enforcement officials said.

Gates could not be reached for comment Friday.

The anti-gang project is an extension of the highly successful program in the city of Westminster known as TARGET (Tri-Agency Resources Gang Enforcement Team). In the coming days, Westminster Police Chief James Cook is expected to release a new study showing a continuing decline in gang violence in the city since the program’s inception two years ago.

“If anything, (the continuing violence countywide) justifies the importance of remaining true to the goals we established at the summit,” said Supervisor Harriett M. Wieder, who organized the November meeting. The countywide TARGET program was announced weeks after the summit meeting and officials have pledged to continue sharing new strategies in regular meetings of the Orange County Gang Prevention Alliance.

Recently, Wieder called together organizers and sponsors of the summit meeting at the Hall of Administration to recognize them for their participation.

“I’m hoping for a significant turnaround within a year,” Wieder said. “We’ve got to show some muscle. But I think there is a recognition that this community won’t stand for (gang violence). We don’t need to study the problem any more. We’ve got to do something.”

The increase in the number of gangs was of particular concern, Wieder said, but she attributed the trend, in part, to more sophisticated tracking methods used by law enforcement.

“These gangs just didn’t spring up like crocuses,” the supervisor said. “It sounds to me like we’re doing more to identify some that have always been here. The migration of gangs from Los Angeles to Orange County is another concern.”

Dist. Atty. Michael R. Capizzi agreed it could be some time before officials are able to get a “proper measure” of the effect the TARGET teams could have throughout the county.

“Public outrage is an important ingredient in galvanizing support for these programs,” Capizzi said. “I don’t think we’ve lost that.”

TRACKING GANG KILLINGS

County prosecutors tally gang-related killings by periodically reviewing crime statistics from all 31 Orange County cities. In those cities, police identify gang killings as any incident in which suspected gang members are involved directly or as accomplices.