SIMI VALLEY : Police Arrest 16 in Gang Crackdown

It didn’t take long for the Simi Valley Police Department to put its tough new anti-gang policy into effect.

Just two days after the policy was implemented, police arrested 16 alleged illegal immigrants suspected of being gang members or friends and relatives of gang members in an early morning raid Wednesday on more than a dozen homes in Simi Valley.

The alleged illegal immigrants are in the custody of the U.S. Border Patrol and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, which aided Simi Valley police in the raids. The 13 males and three females arrested are expected to be deported to Mexico, police said.

Gang violence has plagued Simi Valley in recent weeks. Gang members went on a vandalism rampage last week, smashing house windows and damaging cars on Bonita Drive in retribution for a gang member who was hit by a car. That same week, rival gang members beat up a 14-year-old and sprayed Apricot Road with bullets in a drive-by shooting.

Police Chief Randy Adams responded with an eight-point plan to combat gang violence. The plan was approved by the City Council on Monday.

“There will be zero tolerance for illegal gang activity in Simi Valley,” Adams said. “The Police Department will continue to aggressively pursue every available avenue to send that message.”

Adam’s program includes beefing up his department’s gang-suppression unit, working more closely with probation officials to target specific gang members, and working with immigration officers to arrest and deport gang members who are in the United States illegally.

The department arrested nine suspected gang members last week--eight of them were found to be illegal immigrants--following the Apricot Road shooting. Those arrests led to Wednesday’s raid at homes police suspected of harboring other illegal immigrants, some of whom are believed to be gang members.

Police officials said the raid would not be the last under the new program.