by Colin Dennis

Created on: October 09, 2009   Last Updated: October 12, 2009

What is a street gang? A joint meeting of Canadian Police Chiefs in 2005 defined a gang as: "Three or more persons, formerly or informally organized, engaged in a pattern of criminal behavior creating an atmosphere of fear and intimidation within any community, who may have a common name or identifying sign or symbol which may constitute a criminal organization as defined in the Criminal Code of Canada." Other definitions have also referred to the presence of an "identifiable organization" or "hierarchy" and participation in "antisocial" behavior.

Membership in gangs range across racial, ethnic and economic divides. Young people join gangs through peer pressure, for protection, and as a way of earning easy money. The effects of gangs vary from community to community. Research has shown that in communities where the population falls below 50,000, youth gangs are usually smaller with few members and that the gang problem may peter out as fast as it develops. This is certainly true of small cities and towns with populations of less than 25,000 (Howell and Egley, 2005). Less populated areas experience a more fluctuating gang problem than do larger more populous areas. Egley, Howell and Major (2004), observed that over a six year period from 1996 until 2001, only 4 percent of those areas with populations of under 25,000 reported a gang problem in six consecutive years. This figure grew to 32 percent for cities with populations between 25,000 and 49,999.

Those communities with population below 25,000, which irregularly report gang problems, tend to have three gangs with almost 50 members compared those with population over 25,000 which have six gangs and 100 members when regularly reporting gang problems. (Howell and Egley, 2005). Gangs that emerged from these areas in the 1990's or later had certain peculiar features: they usually had a much higher ratio of middle-class teens, mixed gender members, more females and more white youths.

Gangs have been responsible for the increased proliferation of illegal weapons in the streets and the dealing of drugs in public schools. Very often as a result of these activities, innocent bystanders get caught in the crossfire of conflicts between competing gangs. Gang-related murders have spiked since the late 1980's. In Chicago, gang-related homicides increased five-fold between 1987 and 1994, growing from 51 to 240. From 1984 to 1995, gang-motivated homicides in Los Angeles County quadrupled, from 212 to 807. One offshoot of the

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