A 14-month effort to target the most violent of Portland's entrenched gangs focused on the Rolling 60s Crips, a gang Mayor Sam Adams called "toxic."
"It's going to take the entire community to make sure we put them out of business, and that is our goal," Adams said at a news conference Tuesday at the Life Change Christian Center in North Portland.
Adams, along with Portland Police Chief Mike Reese, Amanda Marshall, the new U.S. Attorney for Oregon, and community leaders, announced the arrest of 31 gang members or gang associates. It was the culmination of the city's renewed attack on gangs, which was solidified in October 2010 with the revival of the Gun Violence Task Force, Adams said.
The 31 arrests included 13 gang members who were indicted last week on federal charges ranging from drug possession, to felon in possession of a firearm or outstanding warrants for compelling prostitution and domestic violence.
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Portland police Chief Mike Reese said the gang team was called out 100 times in 2011 for Measure 11 crimes including shootings, stabbings and serious assaults.
That's a slight increase from the 93 call-outs in 2010. But there were eight gang-related homicides this year, seven of which remain unsolved, including the November killing of 13-year-old Julio Cesar Marquez. Marquez, whose body was found in a Northeast Portland alley, died of blunt-force trauma and gunshot wounds, becoming the city's youngest gang-involved homicide victim in at least a decade.
Reese said the most recent gang member arrests bring the total gang-related arrests made in 2011 to 402.
"At a time of lean budgets, we must be an agile police department, moving resources to these emerging crime trends " Reese said. "And today more than ever, we need community involvement."
Reese said the Rolling 60s is a generational gang, with deep family ties and a strong link to the community in North and Northeast Portland.
"They come back to this community to commit crimes, but they live in Vancouver, Gresham, Beaverton, Hillsboro, and it's more challenging for law enforcement," he said.
Reese said by targeting hotspots like Holliday Park with good results, the bureau is now zeroing in on "hot gangs," focusing enforcement efforts on the gangs that are causing the most problems. Other agencies are also looking at new ways to target gangs. In October, officials with Multnomah County's Adult Community Justice Department, announced a more aggressive "Rapid Response to Gang Violence" program. The department is building a list of the "major players" involved in gangs who are on probation or parole. Police will exclude them from school sporting events, and parole and probation officers will visit their homes to make sure they aren't carrying firearms.
Last week's busts were not complicated affairs, police and federal officials said. There were no wire taps, no racketeering allegations, just a lot of officers keeping their eyes on the streets and collecting intelligence, said Capt. Ron Alexander, with the Portland Police Bureau's gang enforcement team. "Just plain old hard work," he said.
Adams called the investigation that led to the indictments "a new coordinated effort, bringing back all the lessons learned from previous efforts: We're doing all we can."
Bryan Denson contributed to this report.