Sweeping Order to Limit Activity of 18th Street Gang

In a tough initiative to curb the mayhem of Los Angeles’ most notorious gang--18th Street--a Superior Court judge on Friday barred members of one the group’s cliques from associating with each other in a terrorized southwest Los Angeles neighborhood.

Judge Alan G. Buckner approved a preliminary injunction that carries unprecedented provisions in Los Angeles’ long and frustrating war on gangs. The most significant and controversial: a ban on three or more gang members congregating, standing, sitting, walking, driving or appearing in public together anywhere in a 17-block area of Jefferson Park.

Recalling the violence that accompanied the civil rights struggle in the South during the 1960s, Buckner said he never dreamed he would witness something similar 30 years later in Los Angeles “where moms and dads have to take their kids in the house to get them out of the line of fire.”

City Atty. James K. Hahn, whose staff obtained the injunction in a public-nuisance lawsuit against the gang, cautioned, however, that the order “is not a magic bullet. It will not solve the gang problem in Los Angeles County.”

But he said he hopes the judge’s ruling will give “one little neighborhood a breather” from gang violence and intimidation and put street gangs in the city on notice that “it’s no longer business as usual.”

The city attorney’s office has indicated that it may seek similar restrictions on 18th Street strongholds elsewhere. The injunction issued Friday will remain in effect indefinitely, until a civil trial is held and a court decides whether the restrictions should become permanent.

The 18th Street injunction granted Friday will take effect later this month after final paperwork is signed by the judge and the 18 defendants are served. Violators could be held in contempt of court or charged with misdemeanors. Civil injunctions have been used previously to suppress street gangs in Los Angeles and in other cities around the country. Last month, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of a civil injunction against a street gang in San Jose that barred virtually all gatherings of gang members.

The one issued in Los Angeles Friday is the most restrictive ever sought in the city. It is the first since the nation’s high court has broadly upheld the rights of communities to control street violence through severe restrictions on the ability of gang members to publicly associate.

In addition to prohibiting gang members from consorting in groups of three or more, it bars them from blocking sidewalks, streets and passageways; possessing any tools that can be used in applying graffiti; acting as lookouts or using flashlights and walkie-talkies to warn of approaching police; and harassing, threatening or intimidating residents who have complained about the gang to the police.

The judge’s order also bars gang members from congregating in public view on the private property of one alleged member.

During a court hearing attended by about 10 gang members, Buckner said the property had been used as “a staging area and safe house” for the group.

In a brief exchange with the judge, some gang members complained that they are being harassed by the police and that the injunction would be used by the police to aggravate the abuse. Some of them uttered obscenities and profanities on the way out of the courtroom.

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That animosity was evident in the words of Alexander “Smoke” Alvarado, one of the defendants named in the injunction. “Put it like this: LAPD is a gang, too,” he told news crews outside the courthouse. “I’m an LAPD killer, because I hate ‘em.”

The city’s crackdown on the 18th Street gang follows a series in The Times late last year that chronicled the group’s rise to power, with a Southern California membership estimated to be as high as 20,000. Considered extremely violent, gang members have been involved in drug dealing, street extortion, robbery and murders.

The Jefferson Park neighborhood that is the target of the injunction is a working-class community with a large population of immigrant families living in decaying bungalows. It is bounded by Westhaven Street on the north, Jefferson Boulevard on the south, Alsace Avenue on the east and Hauser Boulevard on the west.

In the neighborhood Friday, some people predicted that the injunction will only drive gang members underground, making it even more difficult to root them out.

“It’s been the same, and it’s always going to be the same,” said Torrie Jackson, 16. “You can bring in the police, but things will never change. They’re still going to be here. It really ain’t going to stop nothing.”

One 18th Street gang member said the injunction wasn’t going to stop any members from congregating.

“It’s bull----. They’re violating our rights,” said the youth, who refused to give his name. “Now, I think things are going to get worse. People are going to be mad.”

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Fear of the gang’s anger--and the breadth of its power-- caused many residents to shrug when they heard that the injunction had been upheld.

“They ain’t going to be able to break up no gang,” said Yumiko Smith, 16. “This gang is going to be here forever.”

Despite such pessimism, some residents said life in the neighborhood has brightened as the proposed injunction has moved through the court. They said the gang has been keeping a low profile lately.

One resident, Sal Gonzalez, 33, said a relative quiet has descended on the community, where graffiti blaring “EIGHTEEN” scars many of the small bungalows that dot the neighborhood’s narrow streets.

It used to be so bad, he said, that he lived in fear inside his own apartment. Outside, gang members would openly sell crack cocaine, and bullets would pierce the concrete walls of his building.

“Before, there were 40 or 50 [gang members] out here, hanging out on the corner or on my stairs when I got home from work,” Gonzalez said as he washed his truck Friday afternoon. Behind him, traces of old graffiti showed through layers of paint on the building’s walls.

“I was scared,” he said somberly. “Now, it’s a lot better. You don’t see them out here anymore. I feel more secure, and I just hope it stays that way.”

Across the street, Manuela Ayavar, 40, watched her young son Angel splash in a small wading pool.

“Things are better--we feel safer,” Ayavar said in Spanish. But, she added, she doubts the injunction will help the neighborhood.

“The problem isn’t with the gangs here--it’s with the other ones who come into the neighborhood and start shooting,” Ayavar said.

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Still, other residents said the gang continues to rule Jefferson Park. The scene during the day--young children racing up the street on their bikes and neighbors sitting on their front steps--belies the danger that emerges when night falls, they said.

“There are a lot of gangs around here--everything is still crazy,” said longtime resident Roberto Castillo as he walked through the neighborhood with his two young grandchildren. “In the night, you hear shootings and noise. It’s very difficult to live here. I think the injunction is a good idea.”

He pointed to a window of his neighbor’s pickup truck, shattered by a volley of bullets in recent days.

“When the children are asleep, they hear this and wake up scared,” Castillo said, shaking his head. “It’s not right.”

Barbara Aldridge, 65, who has lived in the neighborhood for 35 years, said that when dusk falls she no longer feels safe enough to walk half a block to her mother’s house. Two people have been shot on her street in the last few years.

“I hope to God it works,” Aldridge said of the injunction. “Do you see the bars around my house? You shouldn’t have to live like this.”

If the injunction isn’t effective, she added, she’ll erect another iron gate across her driveway.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Hope for a Neighborhood

The injunction issued Friday tells members of the 18th Street gang what they can do in a small area south of the I-10 and east of La Cienega:

THE INJUNCTION . . .

* Names 18 members of one branch of the sprawling, violent 18th Street gang.

* Bars more than two of the 18 from associating in public view at any time.

* Prohibits juvenile gang members from being in public from 8 p.m. to sunrise unless traveling to school or work.

* Bars gang members from acting as lookouts to warn that police are coming.