Police Deal With Violence Fueled By Mexican Drug Cartels
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Tuesday, December 01, 2015
Brendan Murray, GoLocalPDX News Team
A map showing which cartels own what territory; via the DEA
Police in Portland and around Oregon are dealing with crime caused by gangs with ties to Mexican drug cartels, according to information released by Federal law enforcement. Police in the state tell GoLocal that the crime fueled by these cartels can have disastrous effects on the cities they control.
According to a map and information released by the Drug Enforcement Agency last month, a drug cartel known as “Los Caballeros Templarios”, or the Knight’s Templar, control the Portland-area drug trade. The group is powerful, operating not only in Portland, but in Salem and around the United States.
Local police told GoLocal that gang crime is one of the biggest problems in the area, and one of the hardest to solve.
"Yes the Los Caballeros Templarios are active in this area," Sgt Greg Stewart, with the Portland Police Department, told GoLocal. To the extent gangs deal meth, heroin or cocaine it is likely that the ultimate source of those drugs links back to cartels." "Many gangs have, unfortunately, diversified the criminal activities and are now trafficking females in the sex trade and even engaging in organized retail theft," Stewart said.
Dealing With Gang Violence
In Portland, gang violence has reached a fever point. Police reported that 129 acts of gang violence were committed in 2015 as of September 1, the most the city has ever seen.
“Generally a large portion of serious assaults such as shootings and homicide have some gang nexus,” Stewart said. “I can say that our Gang Violence Responses are among the most common types of callout for serious assaults. However, not all of these have ties to gang cartels.”
Stewart said that it can be difficult to pinpoint exactly which crimes are tied to gangs and drug cartels. Much gang violence is committed against rival gang members, who rarely talk to police about crimes.
“We use a number of methods to determine a gang nexus, this includes statements by those involved, know affiliations, graffiti and other information,” Stewart said. “ Again, we do not identify all the gang violence which occurs and frequently gang members prey on other gang members and are not willing to speak with the public.”
Police in Salem said that Hispanic gangs like those affiliated with Los Caballeros Templario are the most active gangs in the area. Most originated in California, according to police, and are associated with either the northern or southern portion of the Golden State.
Gangs have also started and grown in Salem itself. According to police, these “hybrid gangs,” as they are known started out small, but have risen to power and become increasingly violent.
“There are also gangs that have begun in Salem. While they began as Salem also has many ‘hybrid gangs,’ meaning that the gangs originated in Salem, and sometimes don’t follow traditional “rules” of gangs,” police said. “Some hybrid gangs started out as tagging crews, but as they expanded their tagging area, they began to have conflicts with established gangs and the tagging crew evolved into a street gang to protect themselves. Hybrid gangs have been involved in riots, as well as a shooting.”
Stewart said the same could be found in Portland.
"Many gangs have, unfortunately, diversified the criminal activities and are now trafficking females in the sex trade and even engaging in organized retail theft," Stewart said.
Prevention
In order to deal with their gang problem, the Salem Police Department started an inter-agency gang task force in 1999 after dealing with the most active year of gang violence in 1998. The unit is designed to squash out gang activity, and was succeeding initially.
The group was officially disbanded in 2002 as gang violence began to fall dramatically. The department still maintained a gang unit, however and gang violence continued to fall as the decade progressed. Since 2006, however, police said gang recruiting and membership had risen once again.
Portland Police employ a similar strategy, according to Stewart.
“We have a Gang Violence Response Team which goes out to investigate serious gang related violence,” Stewart said, pointing out that the Gang Violence Response Team does not respond to homicides. “These officers and detectives work in the Gang Unit and have specific knowledge about gangs and gang activity which can aid in these investigations.”
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Violent Crime Per Capita per 1,000 residents: 1.702
Total Violent Crimes: 16
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Sexual Assault: 4
Robbery: 10
Aggravated Assaults: 1
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Total Violent Crimes: 29
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Total Violent Crimes: 65
Population: 37,189
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Sexual Assault: 8
Robbery: 50
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Violent Crime Per Capita per 1,000 residents: 1.751
Total Violent Crimes: 26
Population: 14,852
Murder: 0
Sexual Assault: 3
Robbery: 20
Aggravated Assaults: 3
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Violent Crime Per Capita per 1,000 residents: 1.886
Total Violent Crimes: 186
Population: 98,635
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Sexual Assault: 40
Robbery: 86
Aggravated Assaults: 58
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Violent Crime Per Capita per 1,000 residents: 2.076
Total Violent Crimes: 12
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Sexual Assault: 1
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Aggravated Assaults: 0
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Violent Crime Per Capita per 1,000 residents: 2.191
Total Violent Crimes: 19
Population: 8,672
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Sexual Assault: 5
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Aggravated Assaults: 4
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Violent Crime Per Capita per 1,000 residents: 2.211
Total Violent Crimes: 38
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Violent Crime Per Capita per 1,000 residents: 2.235
Total Violent Crimes: 38
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Robbery: 15
Aggravated Assaults: 8
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Violent Crime Per Capita per 1,000 residents: 2.329
Total Violent Crimes: 18
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Sexual Assault: 2
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Total Violent Crimes: 22
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Robbery: 14
Aggravated Assaults: 5
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Total Violent Crimes: 22
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Sexual Assault: 2
Robbery: 20
Aggravated Assaults: 0
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Aggravated Assaults: 22
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Aggravated Assaults: 57
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Sexual Assault: 0
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Aggravated Assaults: 1
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Sexual Assault: 1
Robbery: 1
Aggravated Assaults: 3
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Total Violent Crimes: 47
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Total Violent Crimes: 11
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Sexual Assault: 0
Robbery: 9
Aggravated Assaults: 2
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Total Violent Crimes: 45
Population: 10,152
Murder: 1
Sexual Assault: 5
Robbery: 29
Aggravated Assaults: 10
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Total Violent Crimes: 37
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Murder: 0
Sexual Assault: 2
Robbery: 33
Aggravated Assaults: 2
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Total Violent Crimes: 16
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Murder: 1
Sexual Assault: 3
Robbery: 12
Aggravated Assaults: 0
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Total Violent Crimes: 2,911
Population: 615,672
Murder: 26
Sexual Assault: 262
Robbery: 1,776
Aggravated Assaults: 847
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Population: 110,276
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Sexual Assault: 47
Robbery: 285
Aggravated Assaults: 215
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Sexual Assault: 45
Robbery: 255
Aggravated Assaults: 93
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Total Violent Crimes: 18
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Murder: 0
Sexual Assault: 1
Robbery: 16
Aggravated Assaults: 1
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Total Violent Crimes: 12
Population: 2,157
Murder: 0
Sexual Assault: 0
Robbery: 12
Aggravated Assaults: 0
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Violent Crime Per Capita per 1,000 residents: 5.897
Total Violent Crimes: 65
Population: 11,022
Murder: 2
Sexual Assault: 5
Robbery: 42
Aggravated Assaults: 16
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#1
Baker City
Violent Crime Per Capita per 1,000 residents: 6.249
Total Violent Crimes: 61
Population: 9,762
Murder: 0
Sexual Assault: 1
Robbery: 56
Aggravated Assaults: 4
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