Case Study: The Civil Injunction Process

Scenario Summary The following scenario presents key players in any law enforcement agency, possible dialogs, inter-agency politics, and concerns when change is proposed. The facts come from an actual experience in Redondo Beach, California.

This study is about using the Civil Injunction Process against street gangs. The lawsuit’s defendants included 28 gangsters, having names such as, Scrappy, Monster, and Li’l Capone. They were, at one time, a source of terror for neighborhood residents,

yet these gangsters eventually faced jail time for innocuous actions such as littering or stepping on someone else’s property without permission. The gang had existed in Rio Sellas for generations. The number of its members was as high as 200, and their ages ranged between 12 to 45 years old. Although most members were Hispanic, there were other ethnic groups, including Whites and Asians.

For a long time, the citizens lived in terror of the gang activity which mainly occurred in Brown Park. Citizens complained of being intimidated and of gun fire, drug dealings, and drunkenness at all hours of the night. Many gang members lived around the park and used the park as a meeting place. As violent activity rose, the city could no longer ignore the problem.

Your Role/Assignment You will read the Case Study below and conduct research to answer the following four challenge questions presented in a two-to-three-page paper.

Challenge Questions 1. Why do you think that the North Side Protectors gang was allowed to operate for a long time in Rio Sellas? 2. Why did the Chief of Rio Sellas persuade other team members on the advantages behind seeking a Temporary Restraining Order? 3.Will the Temporary Restraining Order really stop the gang, or will the gang simply move its operations to another location or town? Describe the disadvantages for using a Temporary Restraining Order. 4. From where do you expect resistance from using a Temporary Restraining Order to come? What other alternatives are there for dealing with gang problems?

Marvin Diaz Chief of Police for a Southern California town, Rio Sellas, a town with a population of about 65,000. Chief Diaz has been a law enforcement officer for over 29 years, with the past five years as the Chief of Police. Chief Diaz has lived in Rio Sellas since he was 16, when his family moved to that city, and recently, he has received numerous complaints about criminal activity attributed to the “gang,” a group of local criminals.

Lotoya Cameron Chief Prosecutor of Rio Sellas. Cameron was born and raised in Rio Sellas, and now has family and friends in town. Cameron worked very hard during the day while attending DeVry at night so she could obtain a BS in Management—the degree later opened up the opportunity to go to law school. Afterwards, she returned to Rio Sellas to practice law. For the past three years, Cameron has been the District Attorney. She is very concerned about the increasing crime within the community caused by the “gang.”

Ronald Forest Like Cameron, Forest was born and raised in Rio Sellas. For several years, he ran an automobile dealership, and then was elected mayor. Although he has only worked in the office for 18 months, he’s committed to his campaign promise to deal with the “gang” problem. He receives a substantial amount of concerns from citizens about the “gang” and feels much pressure for doing something about the problem. He asked Chief Diaz to form a committee to further discuss the crime issue.

Father Pedro de Cuiz Priest and Spokesperson for “We Want Our Streets Back,” a community committee formed by local citizens.

Welcome everyone … as you know, we are here to discuss the group of criminals referred to as the “gang.” Several weeks ago, I assigned Chief Diaz to the task of gathering us together to look into this problem and come up with some type of plan to rid our community of these gangsters. Chief, the floor is yours!

Hello, everyone. Tonight, I wish to present the actions of another town having similar problems and tell you about what they did. These are the results from their action:

First, after the criminal behavior resulted from the North Side Protectors, or NSP, the Police Department sought assistance from the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office and declared the NSP a violent street gang under the authority of a section of the California Penal Code. This act is known as the Street Terrorist Act.

This town has the philosophy of community-oriented policing—its very design encourages personnel to search proactively for creative solutions to long-standing problems. Citizens were concerned by NSP activity around Brown Park and asked for the city to look into the matter.

The City Prosecutor’s plan called for filing a civil injunction against the gang members. Civil injunction either requires or limits certain actions by the defendants, and in this case, the injunction served as a protection order for the entire city. Therefore, the city was allowed to sue individual NSP gang members.

In the meantime, the police collected evidence to use against NSP.

Five months later, the police completed a 250-page report which the Prosecutor’s Office used to convince a judge to issue a Temporary Restraining Order.

This order prohibited gang members from participating in these activities: •Violating the midnight curfew instituted for adults; •Being in the presence of an individual who has a weapon; •Drinking alcohol in public; •Using, selling, or possessing drugs and drug paraphernalia; •Stepping onto private property, such as a neighbor’s lawn, without the owner’s written permission; •Whistling, yelling, or signaling to others in order to warn the approach of a police officer; •Blocking streets or public walkways;

•Using abusive language or racial slurs; •Threatening or harassing people; •Making unnecessary loud, boisterous, or disturbing noises; •Possessing graffiti-writing materials; •Congregating in groups of more than two people in Brown Park; •Associating with other gang members; and •Littering.

After the order was granted, a massive arrest operation resulted in 28 arrests, including NSP members in violation of drug possession and outstanding warrants.

The police established a surveillance team to focus their efforts on NSP leaders, and within a few weeks, they arrested three more members because they violated the conditions of their probation or parole.

The results were excellent. Before the Temporary Restraining Order was granted, there was an average of 42 gang-related crimes occurring every month. Yet after the order, there was a marked 38.5% decrease in violent crime. Also, after six months, violent crime further decreased by 90%.

My conclusion is that the injunction process gave the police a useful tool for combatting gang-related crime, and it demonstrates to citizens that when we work together, serious problems are solvable.

What are your comments?

I have a question for Lotoya … can a similar Temporary Restraining Order work for Rio Sellas? Yes, it can.

Father, what are your thoughts about this plan? The “We Want Our Streets Back” committee will support any plan with merit, and I believe that your plan shows the intended outcome. Therefore, I say that we should proceed with it.

Then, since we’re all in agreement, I’d like names from all of you so we can form a task force to implement a similar operation. The sooner we rid ourselves of these criminals, the better!

Use the questions located underneath the Your Role/Assignment tab located at the top of this page to write your paper. Make certain to use Microsoft Word when writing your paper.