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Gangs In Chicago

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Chicago is considered the most gang-infested city in the United States, with a population of over 117,000 active members from nearly 60 gangs. Gang warfare and retaliation is common in Chicago. Gangs were responsible for 61% of the homicides in Chicago in 2011.

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Gang Violence Of Chicago

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For 18 days last summer, it seemed Chicago's gangs were locked in a free-for-all of random violence.

Between the Father's Day and Fourth of July weekends, 416 people were shot - 74 of them killed - with the worst of the carnage centered on two historically violent neighborhoods: Englewood and Austin.

Digging deeper, Northwestern University sociology professor Andrew Papachristos found something surprising: The violence largely involved only a small fraction of the city's gang "factions," just 6%.

Beyond that, Papachristos, a pioneer in the use of social network science to understand gun crimes, found that more than half of the victims came from small networks of people who, because of those ties, are highly likely to get shot. On Father's Day weekend, for instance, 104 people were shot. Fully one-third of them were in such networks, he found.

"Gun violence," he says, "is tragic, but, in the majority of cases, is decidedly not random."

Papachristos is aiming to get violence prevention groups to use social network science to identify people at risk of getting shot and reach out to them.

"What this could do is amplify real-time outreach efforts," he says. "This could help them respond more quickly."

He and his colleagues identify people who've been arrested together. They assemble charts that look like spider webs that represent people who are connected to each other through arrests. The more of those people who've been shot, the greater the risk of others in the network meeting the same fate, according to Papachristos.

In one such network, 19 people were shot from 2018 through last year's Fourth of July weekend, Papachristos's research found. Six of them were shot last year in the months leading up to that weekend.

Papachristos says such information can help outreach workers sharpen their strategies.

"Say you have 40 factions in Austin, and they're dynamic," he says. "It's good to know if you even have an 'in' with the network to start with and that you're following the right leads. It's also good to know that the other 94% were not doing stuff."

Papachristos relies on the police for arrest data and information about who's in which gang.

The way the police in Chicago identify gang members has come under fire, though, by civil rights activists, who say the information is sometimes outdated or wrong and can haunt someone who gets falsely branded as a gang member.

Papachristos says, "It's what we have to work with."

Papachristos was working at Yale University about a decade ago when he won recognition for research that showed nearly two-thirds of shootings and murders in Chicago occur in small social networks. His research was aimed at locating potential shooting victims.

But, in 2012, Garry McCarthy, who was then Chicago's police superintendent, took that work in a different direction. Under McCarthy, the Chicago Police Department created a "Strategic Subject List" that targeted people deemed likely to become involved in a shooting - not only as victims but looking at them as potential shooters.

The risk scores were based on arrests for gun crimes, violent crimes or drugs; the number of times a person had been assaulted or shot; the person's age at the time of the last arrest; gang membership; and a formula that rated whether that person was becoming more actively involved in crime.

Nearly 400,000 people in Chicago landed on the list.

Each was given a score on a scale of zero to 500, the highest risk. About 4,000 people were ranked 400 to 500, according to the police. About 125 people got a score of 500.

The Strategic Subject List was scrapped in 2019 after the city of Chicago's inspector general questioned the reliability of its risk assessments.

Jeff Asher, a crime analyst in New Orleans, didn't go that far, saying the risk scores "may be useful in predicting violence," but that "their effectiveness as part of Chicago's crime-fighting arsenal is in question."

McCarthy said those data-driven strategies were key to reducing the number of shootings. During his five-year tenure under Mayor Rahm Emanuel, the number of killings in Chicago was far lower than it has been in the five years since he was fired in late 2015 over the scandal involving Laquan McDonald, who was fatally shot by an officer who went to prison for murder.

Papachristos' research paper focused in part on the clients of violence-prevention groups and how they have fared. He examined shootings of people participating in Chicago CRED and Communities Partnering 4 Peace, known as CP4P. He identified 41 people involved with those groups and in social networks at the center of the violence between the Father's Day and Fourth of July weekends last year.

Seven participants - 17% - were shot during that period, according to Papachristos, though he says he couldn't draw conclusions about the effectiveness of the programs based on that limited information.

On Dec. 29, Chicago CRED, CP4P and the anti-violence group READI Chicago acknowledged "big setbacks" last year after the city's murder total hit 769, one of the highest in decades, and proclaimed: "2020 must be an aberration, not a trend."

The groups noted that they and others are expected to get nearly $60 million in public funding this year in addition to the $30 million they're getting from private sources.

"Nevertheless, it remains a fraction of the overall spending on policing, prosecutions and prisons, which runs into the billions," they wrote of the public financing.

CRED pointed to Roseland as a neighborhood that benefited from its outreach, counseling, life coaches, job training and education last year. Roseland saw a 23% rise in the number of nonfatal shootings in 2020 over the prior year, but killings went down 17%, according to CRED. Researchers are looking into how much CRED's efforts might have contributed to that.

"Chicago's murder rate should be on par with other big cities," according to Arne Duncan, CRED's founder and a former U.S. education secretary and Chicago schools CEO. "Right now, we're not even close. We have to think and act very differently."

Papachristos says society is rethinking how to reduce violence outside a traditional policing model - and science is key to the success of the few hundred civilian anti-violence workers in Chicago.

"It means mobilizing these 'preventionists' in fair and just ways - using network data to distribute the relevant resources to those in harm's way," he says. "This can be done in the same way we mobilize contact tracing to minimize the spread of COVID-19."

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Chicago's not-so-random gang violence: Just 6% of gang 'factions' tied to most shootings studied

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For 18 days last summer, it seemed Chicago's gangs were locked in a free-for-all of random violence. Between the Father's Day and Fourth of July weekends, 416 people were shot - 74 of them killed - with the worst of the carnage centered on two historically violent neighborhoods: Englewood and Austin.

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Chicago

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Impact 1

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Al Capone started from nothing, and ended up as the biggest mob boss in Chicago and throughout the United States. Born in Brooklyn in 1899, Capone started his notorious career by quitting the 6th grade; by doing this, Capone possessed free time and recklessness, leading him to join his local street gang ("FBI"). In his local street gang, led by Johnny Torrio, Capone became murderous to gain power and notoriety and thus his reputation began. Like all great criminals start, he did cheap and small jobs to make an easy buck, all for the sake of survival. As he grew up, Capone began to realize that the matter of control was too much in Brooklyn, but the crime scene of Chicago caught Capone's attention. Capone joined his friend Johnny Torrio in Chicago and became lieutenant in the Colosimo mob ("FBI"). February 14, 1929 marked the event of the St. Valentine's Day Massacre, which brought the attention of how powerful and strong Capone was as a leader and a criminal ("FBI"). "As the profits from beer and "alky-cooking" [illicit distilling] rolled in, young Capone acquired more finesse-particularly finesse in the management of politics and politicians" ("Alcohol and Al Capone"). The constant selling of alcohol not only helped with earning money, but let him gain power within politics, an even bigger step in developing a legal and undetected crime organization. With the movement and power, Capone had in Chicago, he gained the reputation he would have today. The start of Al Capone's own crime spree also follows the path that many crime organizations follow today, in which take simple or unchallenging crimes and eventually exploited them to major levels. Overall, the effects of Al Capone and how he came to power are only an important factor to consider with his crime organizations, but crime organizations today.

Al Capone's criminal organization was built upon crime schemes and alcohol smuggling. All of his work was organized in properties he owned. He was a very intelligent and wealthy man. "Capone controlled the majority of Chicago's vice industry, including speakeasies, bookie joints, brothels, horse and race tracks, gambling houses and distilleries"("Al Capone"). In other words, Al Capone owned all kinds of businesses that had the ability to maintain and control his criminal activity. Additionally, these businesses help funded the activities and the crime sprees that involved Capone's crime organization. With the format and the crime scheming Capone had, he was able to further advance the crimes and organizations. These techniques of formations and rulership are also used in gangs in the present and have been a reliable way for the gangs to control and commit crimes undetected. With the techniques used by Al Capone to keep his criminal organization surviving, it brought down various techniques keeping gangs today alive.
"Map of Chicago's Gangland, 1931." Map of Chicago's Gangland, 1931. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 Jan.
2015. http://www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/11538.html

Meisner, Jason. "Charges: Jail Guard Smuggled Pot in Sub Sandwiches." Chicagotribune.com .
N.p., 2015. Web. 18 Feb. 2015. < http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-cook-jail-marijuana-smuggling-met-20141021-story.html >.

"The Trial of Al Capone:Contempt of Court Decision (1931)." The Trial of Al Capone:Contempt
of Court Decision (1931) . N.p., n.d. Web. 06 Feb. 2015.
< http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/capone/caponecontempt.html >.

Al Capone had an important role in the smuggling operation to keep his criminal activities going. With Capone's smuggling operation, he "continued to expand his bootlegging empire.... he met the immense demand for alcohol (almost all adults drank bootleg alcohol during Prohibition) with an equally large supply" ( "Al Capone - Background Information."). In order to meet his supply, Capone gave all the adults that needed alcohol their needs, he was able to find a constant demand and make/expand his empire through the art of smuggling. Additionally, Capone used Canadian Scotch whisky from Frankie Yale, an old partner, and maintained a constant supply to fulfill their own orders ("Al Capone - Background Information."). Not only did Capone have a constant supply of alcohol from Canadian criminals, but Capone also managed to get all types of alcohol with Chicago being good distance to the border of Canada, Capone and his organization easily made millions from this. The smuggling operation was the most influential technique Capone used to gain power. This technique, however, is still used today as the reason Capone used it: money and power. Through smuggling, Capone was able to reach new levels of power as well as influence future generations to do the same.

Throughout time and history, the smuggling has changed and evolved, but the technique continues to be used for the same reasons it was during Capone's time: power and money. After the prohibition, the method of smuggling didn't go away, mostly due to the fact that other drugs had taken over the market. From the time of Al Capone being alcohol being most demanded, to all types of drugs in the streets of today being marijuana and heavier substances like cocaine, the method of smuggling didn't shrink after Capone, it grew. The drug market in the U.S is the most wealthy and powerful ones in the entire world, and with the attraction of wealth comes the increasing numbers of drug traffickers to the States ("Drug Trafficking in the United States"). With this idea, drug traffickers would most likely take areas in which trade is already widely establish and is additionally, and in the U.S the states are Florida, New York, and Illinois. And in the years, we see technological advancement, so be it being cars, planes, and boats; furthermore, the increase of technology demonstrates shows how much the simple idea Capone had in Chicago had impacted life here today. With the change of smuggling, we see the advancement of Capone's technique, and how his technique still last even today, though it might not be from the Canadian borders it was first obtained by Capone, it is still visible through the streets of modern day Chicago. It might not be Capone's fault for smuggling in general, but it sure has the impact that smuggling was widely introduced in Chicago by him.

In Chicago today, the crime organizations are not only far more developed and advanced comparing it to the time of Capone, but also much more violent. Chicago has become much more violent for, "The crime stats tell us that we were safer under Capone than Emmanuel. In January 1929 there were 26 killings. Forty-two people were killed in Chicago last month, the most in January since 2002" (Bartin). In this statistic, it is visible that the amount of violence and crime in Chicago has skyrocketed, and not only that, but the violence only gets worse. There were twice as much killings now than during the time of Capone. But where is all the mass genocide of Chicago residents coming from? It's from the gangs that surround both the city and its stereotypes. Only today do the gangs have sufficient structure and organization that Capone provided them, and with these things violence and control is a common sight in the streets of Chicago. With the power struggle, the number of bodies also rise, and the deaths all have Capone to thank, for he introduced the most powerful way to gain control, smuggling.

Looking from past to present, smuggling in general has been and still is a major support for criminal activities in both the Unites States and especially in Chicago. Smuggling still an unbelievable problem in Chicago, for no one knows exactly how much business is made through smuggling, but one can only infer that the number is beyond the millions. In the Chicago Tribune, Carlos Sadovi states in his report " Gang members charged with gun, drug trafficking" that in a drug bust, "More than a dozen men affiliated with a street gang have been charged in federal court with gun and drug trafficking near the Altgeld Gardens public housing complex on the South Side". The quote presented demonstrates close to home and under the radar the operations really are. Additionally, this quote gives us an idea of the current smuggling trade of today and what is used. But what makes this case so important? It isnt the focus on drugs (though that is quite important when it comes to dealing in Chicago) but the focus is more on firearms. In Capone's time, there wasn't need for any type of firearm because it was sold locally without as much restriction as we see in today's time. But with this smuggling of firearms, we see the reason in which why so many people die, the struggle of power between gangs forces them to gain more illegal substances and fight over other gangs with the firearms gathered from smuggling; moreover, having the effect of the hundreds of deaths associated with Chicago. With smuggling being such a huge problem still in Chicago, it is clear that the methods used by Al Capone were otherwise very long lasting and influential to the crime sprees and criminal organizations of today. In the end, smuggling has turned into the key focus of gangs today, even today, Capone effects the world of violence.

In the police world of the CPD, the matter of smuggling has not been taken hard enough to cripple criminal organizations and their smuggling operations. "While it is difficult to say how often crime complaints are not officially recorded, the Police Department is conscious of the potential problem, trying to ferret out unreported crimes through audits of emergency calls and of any resulting paperwork" (Al Baker pg.1). In this statement by Baker, the truth is that not even the own Police department know a good number to estimate of drug and smuggling operations in the region, and that would only lead to more and more murder by the day. Can the police really help stop this if they can't keep track of it? But how can the police destroy what Capone made possible almost a hundred years ago? Capone had started the operation of drugs in Chicago, the smuggling business became a major selling point for new drug traffickers, the improvements helped gain a faster and more influential crime organization, and crime and power lust became a huge problem in the world today. Sure it wasn't the intent for Capone to cause the murder we shave around us in the streets of Chicago, but the matter is that the introduction of smuggling Capone had brought to Chicago began the crime spree everyone in Chicago knows, and the murder stereotypes we carry with us for Capone's actions. So to destroy something as big as Capone's legacy, the police can't simply be relaxed on the issue, the only way of taking down that murder is to go head first into the smuggling operations in which Capone started so long ago. Overall, modern crime in Chicago is not a priority to the police; therefore, we are called the "murder capital".

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Al Capone started from nothing, and ended up as the biggest mob boss in Chicago and throughout the United States. Born in Brooklyn in 1899, Capone started his notorious career by quitting the 6th grade; by doing this, Capone possessed free time and recklessness, leading him to join his local street gang ("FBI").

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Al Capone finally dies, surrounded by his closest friends and family. His rein as crime boss comes to an end.

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Capone was able to return home to Palm Isle after the first treatments for his syphilis end. However in 1945, he becomes one of the first civilians to try penicillin treatment for syphilis.

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Capone bounced all over when it came to the locations for his sentence. In August he was transferred to Alcatraz which is the prison for the most dangerous and most wanted criminals, isolated on an island.

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Appeal was denied and Capone starts his prison sentence in Atlanta Penitentiary.

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Capone was indicted on June 5th on 22 counts of tax evasion. One week later he is indicted on Prohibition Violations as well. His trial began on October 6th and ended on October 17th finding him guilty of only 5 counts of Income Tax Evasion. This leads to a prison sentence of 11 years. He was fined $80,000 in total for court cases and basic fines.

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When Capone got back to Miami, he was arrested several times in account for suspicion, vagrancy, and perjury which were all waved and dismissed.

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On May 17th, Capone was arrested for a concealed weapon. on May 18th he was assigned a one year sentence, which he served at Eastern State Penitentiary. One year later, on March 18th, he was released.

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February 14, 1929 - St. Valentines Day Massacre

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February 14, 1929 - St. Valentines Day Massacre

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While Capone was in Florida, some of his men raided a rival gang in an auto garage. They wore police uniforms so the targets would face the wall when they walked in. After all targets were kneeling with their backs turned, the hitmen opened fire, killing the three men inside.

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Page 61 of the biography explains how Capone had been warned to stay out of Chicago, but he snuck in anywyas. He then packed his things and moved in to his villa in Miami Beach with his family.

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Capone was arrested and fined, $2600 for concealing a weaponp in Joliet, Ill.

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Hymie Weiss was killed on October 11 due to gunfire. As he left his car, bullets rained down from across the street. However when his body guard tried to defend him, he accidentally shot Weiss and he collapsed onto the sidewalk.

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Nearly a year after O'Banion was killed, part of his mob went after Capone. The biography says on page 41 "Using eight touring cars, they first shot blanks to lure the people outside, and followed with live ammunition spewing from machine guns, hoping to kill Capone on the spot. The ruse didn't work. Though 1,000 rounds were fired, no one, miraculously, was killed". Capone thought it was 3 certain people, Weiss, Moran, and Drucci. All part of the O'Banion mob.

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jjOn page 39 of the book, the author writes "With O' Banion having been eliminated on orders of Torrio in November 1924, Capone was able to move into the North side of Chicago and solidify himself with the Gennas". The elimination of a rival gang leader, freed Capone from certain areas.

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Torrio leaves on a trip to Italy with his mother. While he is away, Capone was told to take over in Cicero, which wasn't as violent as media made it out to be. The mobs used the government to threaten people instead of gunfire. For example, merchants who didn't comply, were met with extremely high taxes and loss of parking, until they got into line.

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In 1922, Torrio promoted Capone to Manager of the club "The Four Deuces". This saloon was the headquarters for Capone's gang, The Chicago Outfit. By 1931, the saloon was home to 12 unsolved murders.

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Al Capone was racing home drunk and crashed his car into a taxi, the driver was still inside. "Alfred Caponi" was the alias that Al used. Alfred was charged with driving while intoxiated, assault with a vehicle, and carrying a concealed weapon. The charges were later dropped.

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With his father gone, his family turned to him for financial guidance. However Al was becoming a rapidly growing crime boss and needed to get out of town after being suspected of murder. He moved to Chicago to become Johnny Torrio's right hand man. Eventually, the whole family moved too, hoping to profit off of Al's crime rate.

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Shortly after having a child with her, Al marries Josephine (Mae) in Carroll Gardens. He was 19, Mae was 21. She was not involved in his crime and racketeering. She told their son later in life to not do what his father did. Mae often hid her face in public to avoid paparazzi.

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After working at Yale for a while as a bouncer, he quits and becomes a bookkeeper at Ailleo Construction in Baltimore. This helped his accounting skills which would pay off in the future when he juggles millions of dollars.

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Al reached the age where kids were dropping our of school to help their families. However he was expelled for hitting a techer back, after they hit him as dicipline. He left and joined a street gang. This is where his criminal start began.

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On page 27 of the biography, it says "Abruptly, on November 14, 1920, Gabriel, his father, died of a heart attack. Capone would return to Brooklyn for his services. His flirtation with respectability was over." As you can see, this event in Capone's life just pushed him further into crime.

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Alphonse Gabriel Capone was an American gangster known for his position as mob boss. His people ran gambling, prostitution and unauthorized rackets. He was also known for gunning down targets and rival gangs. He quickly rose to fame in the crime industry of Chicago. Until his imprisonment for several accounts of Tax evasion. His gang, The Chicago Outfit, was taken over by Al's underboss, Frank Nitti. After his relase from prison he suffered a stroke and passed away. That was the end of Al Capone.

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Iorizzo, Luciano J. Al Capone: a Biography. Greenwood Press, 2003.

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Mary Josephine (Mae) Coughlin gives birth to Al's son Albert Francis (Sonny).

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Gabriel and Teresina had their 4th child, Alphonse Gabriel Capone in Brooklyn, New York.

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At the age of 18, Al got hired at the Harvard Inn as a bouncer. He happened to be caught checking out Frank Galluccio's sister. Frank was a well-known mob boss, and when Al went to fight him, Frank cut him 3 times with a knife. Thus the name "Scarface" was born.