Police: Youth gangs on rise

Officials say groups no longer tied to territories or colors

Santa Fe police arrested six young people last week following a shootout at the Santa Fe Place mall.

Shots fired during a teen fight in late April at the midtown Tuscany at St. Francis apartments prompted an hourslong SWAT operation and a shelter-in-place order for nearby schools.

The month before, court documents allege, a group of masked teens robbed a Domino’s driver at gunpoint.

Police suspect each of these incidents is related to what they describe as a mounting problem: the rise of youth gang activity in Santa Fe.

“Two years ago, we didn’t have much of a gang problem” in the city, Intelligence Officer Christopher Abbo said. “Fast-forward to this year, and it’s blown up.”

A suspect in the recent fatal shooting of a 17-year-old Ohkay Owingeh member and Santa Fe Indian School student in Española could be connected to a gang, according to court documents, but police have not determined whether the boy’s death was related to gang activity.

The rise in criminal activity among young people, typically between the ages of 15 and 22 or so, is fueled by social media, pop culture icons such as rapper Chief Keef, and influence from gang-like groups that move around from Albuquerque to Santa Fe and surrounding areas, police say. Unlike youth gangs of the past, these loosely connected “gangs” don’t necessarily function with strict territorial or affiliation guidelines.

“It’s not like what we used to think: You wear this color, you do this,” Abbo said. “It’s changed so much.”

Youth don’t always stick to just one such group, he added, and it’s not unusual for groups to work together or move from town to town.

“It wouldn’t be unusual to go to a gang party now and have [several groups] all party together,” Abbo said. “They commit crimes, and that’s what’s

linking them together.”

Capt. Robert Vasquez said violent crimes have increased in Santa Fe so far this year, and these groups could make it worse.

“If we don’t get control of this, we’re definitely going to have a spike,” Vasquez said, “an increase of violence with these groups.”

Local investigators point in particular to a trend of youth violence in Albuquerque.

According to Albuquerque-based media outlets, police in that city were seeing an increase in juvenile gang violence in 2016 and early 2017. In March 2017, the District Attorney’s Office in Bernalillo County indicted 15 members of the group on charges related to burglary, gun thefts and other crimes, KOATTV reported.

That influence has crept up to Santa Fe, local police say. They suspect, for example, that some of the youth involved in the shooting at the Tuscany at St. Francis apartments this spring are affiliated with a gang-like group that has caused problems in Albuquerque.

Police also suspect that social media, violence in pop culture and drugs have had a role in drawing teens to the violent groups.

If a kid doesn’t have high self-esteem, Abbo said, and they start getting “likes” on social media posts about gangs or guns, that could give them an ego boost.

“We’re seeing these kids that are glorifying this life with guns, violence and narcotics,” he said. “You may not be anybody, but then you get social media … and you start glorifying the lifestyle.”

Intelligence officers said the groups often have nearly unlimited access to firearms and don’t seem hesitant to open fire in public places — the Tuscany at St. Francis apartments and the Santa Fe Place mall, for example.

A criminal complaint filed in the Santa Fe County Magistrate Court following the mall incident last week says six young people in a Dodge pickup are suspected of engaging in a shootout with people in another car in the mall’s parking lot. There was only one adult in the pickup, the document says — an 18-yearold man who had asked the other teens in the car to drive him to Santa Fe from Española.

When police searched the truck, a search warrant shows, they found at least four guns, a box of ammo and dozens of cartridges.

On Thursday night, a fistfight between four young people in Española escalated into an armed standoff and the shooting death of 17-year-old Nicholas Kaye, a basketball player at the Santa Fe Indian School. Española police Chief Louis Carlos said Friday that officers had not confirmed whether gang affiliation had anything to do with the incident, but a court document in the case indicates one of the accused killers, Daniel Suarez, might have had a gang connection.

Suarez, 21, and Jonathan Avila, 18, were arrested on suspicion of first-degree murder, aggravated assault and attempt to commit first-degree murder in Kaye’s death in a gas station parking lot.

A youth riding in the car with Suarez told police the man had been “yelling unknown gang slurs as he was driving through the parking lots” before the shooting.

Vasquez said Santa Fe police recently met with officials at the District Attorney’s Office, representatives of the juvenile justice community and other law enforcement to talk about how to solve the problem.

In the coming weeks, he expects to arrest a handful of young people the department has been investigating on suspicion of violent crimes and drug trafficking.

But the problem extends beyond law enforcement, Vasquez said.

He urged parents to monitor their kids’ social media accounts to see if they’re making references to gangs or violence. He also applauded students at local schools who have reported classmates making threats online.

“Without the involvement of the community to change the culture, nothing will change,” Vasquez said.

Detective Casey Salazar agreed. “These groups are likely to go to violence very quickly,” he said. He cautioned the public to “be a little more cautious, more willing to call [police] if something seems out of place.”

As members of the Santa Fe Police Department’s Criminal Intelligence Division were speaking with The New Mexican on Tuesday afternoon about youth violence, another report came in: Three masked men had fired shots at a house in the 500 block of Calle Beatrice.

Intelligence Sgt. Cipriano Varela confirmed the department suspects youth were involved. But, he said, it’s too soon to tell whether the youth were involved with gangs.

“There certainly may be a connection because of all the things happening right now, Varela said, “but we’re still connecting the dots. To say for certain is going to take a little bit more time.”