[chefws]

Gangs, drug dealers may re-emerge, authorities say

06:21 AM CDT on Tuesday, September 27, 2005


Stacey Plaisance / Associated Press



BATON ROUGE -- Hurricane Katrina did what authorities couldn't: put a stop to illegal drug operations in New Orleans and pushed its ruthlessly violent gangs from the streets of the city's poorest neighborhoods.


The exact landing point of gang members isn't known for sure, though federal authorities suspect popular evacuation sites like Baton Rouge, Lafayette and Houston. But no matter where they land, the thugs from the Big Easy have been put at a distinct disadvantage, authorities say.


"They are crippled," said U.S. Attorney Jim Letten. "They don't have the buddies, don't have the turf they're familiar with."


Gangs were largely responsible for the city's pre-Katrina murder rate of nearly 10 times the national average. Though gang members only made up a few hundred of the city's core population of 450,000, they terrorized highly concentrated areas of poor neighborhoods, often shooting at will during drug disputes and intimidating potential witnesses into silence -- or killing them.


"They prey on the paupers," Letten said. "We know who some of them are and where some of them are, but we still have to get a better grip on it."


Though there's no proof New Orleans gangs have regrouped in other cities, authorities agree the emptying of New Orleans presents a unique opportunity for law enforcement. With the city's criminal element dispersed, gang activity is easier to spot.


For example, when a Gretna, La., man was killed in a drive-by shooting in Baton Rouge, where the population since Katrina has reportedly doubled to at least 800,000, law enforcement swarmed.


"Gangs are a top priority for us because they can have a big, negative impact on a community," said Mark Chait, special agent in charge of the New Orleans office of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.


The ATF is paying close attention in Louisiana and Texas to cities along Interstate 10 west of New Orleans, the highway long used as a major drug corridor. And police are looking for spray-painted insignia and other signs of gang activity, even checking suspects for gang-affiliated tattoos.


Unlike larger, nationally organized gangs, those from New Orleans are small, elusive and harder to track. Sometimes consisting of as few as two or three members, they're known to use children to push their drugs, Letten said.


"We've seen them shoot each other over a parking spot, a word, a hand gesture," Letten said. "They have no regard for human life."


Because of the population boom in Baton Rouge, the anti-gang task force once based in New Orleans has moved here, along with one of the ATF's Violent Crimes Impact Teams -- the 21st of as many in the nation. The VCIT program was launched roughly a year ago in more than a dozen of the country's most violent cities, including New Orleans, Miami, Los Angeles, Pittsburgh and Washington, D.C.


Besides Baton Rouge, the city of Lafayette, about 135 miles northwest of New Orleans, has been a concern for violent crime, said Chait, whose field division covers Louisiana, Mississippi and Arkansas.


Lafayette officials say the city has had no armed robberies, car jackings, drive-by shootings or other crimes associated with gang activity since refugees began evacuating there.


"If we saw any sign, whether a tattoo, colors, we would address it," said Lt. Craig Stansbury, spokesman for the Lafayette Parish Sheriff's Office.


After Katrina, Lafayette kept security tight at its Cajundome, the sports arena that was serving as a shelter to hundreds of evacuees before Rita forced them to relocate.


Because Houston and San Antonio took in many New Orleanians, authorities have also been paying attention to criminal activity in those cities.


(Copyright 2005 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)