Baca Targets Gangs, Releases

Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca has set a couple of lofty goals for his next term, first among them: eliminating street gangs in a county where they have been entrenched for decades.

“I say we must set the bar as high as possible; otherwise we’ll fall short and the problem will fester and reappear,” Baca said. “We shouldn’t lower our goal until we find an answer for the last gang member standing.”

He also wants to end the long-standing and controversial practice of releasing inmates from the county jail system before they have served their full sentences.

Some experts called the sheriff’s goal on gangs admirable but unrealistic. And his promise to stop freeing inmates early, although not nearly as difficult to fulfill as eradicating gangs, also faces obstacles.

Baca, elected last week to a third term, has been known for making bold statements during his 7 1/2 years as head of the nation’s largest sheriff’s department, once setting a goal of eliminating homelessness.

The sheriff said he intended to wipe out the county’s estimated 1,200 gangs -- with more than 80,000 verified members -- by bringing together law enforcement agencies, religious leaders and community groups. The idea would be to lock up the most dangerous offenders and offer alternatives to other gang members and those thinking about joining gangs.

He also wants to eliminate early releases of inmates by the time his upcoming term ends in 2010.

In the last four years, the sheriff has released more than 150,000 inmates after they served just a fraction of their sentences. Many have been freed after serving just 10% of their time, a move necessitated by budget cuts that led the sheriff to close jails and decrease inmate capacity.

In order to achieve that goal, the sheriff said he would have to expand the jails’ capacity from 18,000 to 30,000, at a cost of hundreds of millions of dollars in construction and personnel.

The gang issue will be the top priority in coming months. The sheriff has proposed placing a measure on the November ballot that would call for a quarter-cent sales tax increase to fund gang enforcement.

Baca, who oversees a $2-billion budget, is also in discussions with Supervisor Mike Antonovich for millions of dollars in additional county funding to target gangs without raising taxes.

“My No. 1 priority is to unify law enforcement and communities to turn the gang problem around,” Baca said. “The past 30 years of pure enforcement, without the social intervention, hasn’t diminished the gang problem. We just keep cycling gang members into the prison system. And more keep coming.”

Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley said he considered the sheriff’s gang plan “a worthy goal, however long it takes.”

“It’s probably the biggest and most entrenched criminal justice problem in Los Angeles. I think we’re in for the long haul in terms of totally eliminating gangs,” Cooley said.

“I can’t criticize these goals. I’d like to solve poverty and hunger and bring about peace in the Middle East as well.”

Malcolm Klein, a retired USC sociologist who has studied Los Angeles gangs for 44 years, said the idea of wiping out L.A.’s gangs is “ridiculous.”

“There have been hundreds of attempts at gang control across the country. Very few of them have demonstrated any success,” Klein said. “Of those that have been evaluated, almost none have demonstrated success. Some have made things worse.”

Wes McBride, a former sheriff’s gang detective and president of the California Gang Investigators Assn., seemed equally pessimistic.

“It’s a noble calling, to do away with gang members. But that isn’t going to happen,” said McBride, who spent 28 years as a Los Angeles County gang detective and is considered an expert on the region’s gang problem. “They’re too embedded in the community.... We have the distinction of being the gang capital of the world.”

McBride praised Baca for placing an emphasis on gang crime, however, and said he intended to speak to the sheriff about adding resources to the department’s gang unit, which has been cut along with most other programs.

“We don’t have to live with the size of the problem we’re living with,” McBride said.

Sheriff’s officials estimate that gang members committed more than 9,000 violent crimes in Los Angeles County in 2005, including 513 homicides. The county spends millions of dollars investigating and prosecuting the cases, officials said.

The district attorney’s office has 54 prosecutors assigned to its hard-core gang unit -- the largest unit in the department -- and has nearly 3,000 open cases against suspected gang members.

In addition to a countywide policing effort, Baca said he would like to install hundreds of video cameras that would allow deputies to monitor crime-plagued areas around the clock, starting with a pilot program in Compton. A Compton-based company has offered to pay for the cameras, Baca said.

Additionally, the sheriff said, the county should use religious and community groups to provide education, jobs and a sense of hope to inner-city youths who would otherwise turn to gangs.

“The most difficult task is to transform the gang society into a productive part of society. That’s a big task,” Baca said. “There should be enough will on our part to shut off whatever attractiveness a gang might have.”

Greg Boyle, a Jesuit priest and founder of anti-gang program Homeboy Industries, said he believed Baca was on the right track. His group provides jobs and services such as tattoo removal to gang members seeking to turn their lives around.

“It sounds like he’s trying to say, ‘We can get to a day where gangs are no longer with us,’ ” said Boyle, who has spent two decades working with gang members in Los Angeles.

“The first step is being able to imagine that day might come. One reason why gangs have always been with us is because we say gangs will always be with us, rather than imagine a different way.”

At the same time he’s focusing on gang programs, Baca said he would use additional funding from the county to increase bed space in the county jails and gradually increase the time that inmates spend in jail. The jail space also would serve as an important tool in the battle against street gangs, Baca said.

“There must be the stick. It’s not all about the carrot,” Baca said. “We know how to do the enforcement side. We have to cut off the recruitment into gangs. Until we cut it off, new gang members will commit new murders.”