Focus turns to fighting crime without a ‘gang injunction’
The final unraveling this week of efforts to create a Southlawn “safety zone” to ban gang activity was met with jubilation from civil liberties supporters, anger from law enforcement officials and ambivalence from community advocates who all agree that the South Union neighborhood deserves an effective solution to its crime problems.
With trial set to start next week, Harris County Attorney Vince Ryan and District Attorney Devon Anderson abandoned the civil legal action dubbed a “gang injunction” for programs that will provide job training and educational opportunities to the lawsuit’s former defendants.
The petition, which was withdrawn Monday, was the largest potential gang injunction in Harris County history, and one of three filed in the county.
The original suit sought to ban 92 people identified as suspected gang members from a 2-mile area of south Houston.
Community leaders turned their attention Tuesday to crafting concrete plans for reducing crime.
About a dozen people involved in the “Southlawn Working Group” led by Houston NAACP Branch President James Douglas met Tuesday to discuss solutions. Members include representatives from the county, the City of Houston and community organizations as well as some of the defendants’ lawyers and local NAACP officials.
“We know that the people in the community need improved education, they need improved opportunity and they need jobs,” Douglas said. “We know that the money is going to be available and we know that there are a lot of people out there who can provide the services.”
The funding source for the programs and who might deliver the services remain unresolved.
Harris County Precinct 1 Commissioner Gene Locke, whose district includes the area, said Tuesday that the city and county have applied for a grant to hire an anti-gang coordinator. He also has arranged for increased patrols from the Harris County Sheriff’s Office and Harris County Precinct 7 Constable May Walker’s deputies.
Locke opposed the lawsuit as a crime-reduction strategy.
“I believe that civil injunctions are not the most appropriate or effective measures to fight criminal activity,” he said. “The injunction bordered on violating First Amendment rights and had the effect of targeting people based on their age and color. We all want our communities to be safe, but there are existing law enforcement measures at hand that can be used in an appropriate way instead of gang injunctions.”
Ray Hunt, president of the Houston Police Officers’ Union, however, was incensed that the county dropped the lawsuit.
“We think that this is going to result in the good folks in that area out there continuing to be plagued by gang members, by violence and by drug dealing,” he said. “I’m confident that this is going to do nothing more than empower that gang to think that they will continue to run that part of the neighborhood.”
Hunt called the lawsuit’s demise “pure politics” based on misinformation about what he believes is an effective law enforcement tool.
“We tried to do a solution and nobody wanted our solution,” he said. “This is an insult to the law-abiding people who simply want to go to work or go to school without having dope-slingers and pistol-packers on the corner.”
Weak criteria
The original petition was filed in September under seal by county officials seeking a “Southlawn Safety Zone” after success securing gang injunctions in two other Harris County communities. The confidentiality order on the case was lifted in October.
The suit combined the state’s organized crime and public nuisance laws to request a protective order that would provide relief to a weary community under siege.
The lawsuit was named after the Southlawn Palms Apartments on Scott Street, where gang activity has been a chronic problem for years. The complex is beside Cullen Middle School, near Yellowstone Park and several other rental properties that house hundreds of children and seniors.
Critics said the legal action unfairly targeted young black men, and used weak criteria to label some of the defendants as gang members. Lawyers representing some of the original 92 defendants won support from activists in challenging the sweeping ban as a violation of constitutional rights.
That was the pivotal moment that set up a showdown between critics and supporters of the injunction as a solution to the Southlawn crime problem.
In March, the county dialed back the lawsuit, reducing the number of targeted defendants and the size of the banishment area.
County officials also intensified talks with community advocates about a possible settlement of the case. The informal mediation morphed into the Southlawn Working Group.
Gang injunctions in other areas of the country have been struck down by courts. For example, nearly 6,000 people who were subject to gang-related curfews settled their federal class action in March against the city of Los Angeles. Officials there agreed to spend up to $30 million on jobs programs and restorative justice efforts.
‘Lazy policing’
On Tuesday, the ACLU of Texas and allied groups that circulated anti-injunction petitions over the last few weeks issued a joint news release celebrating the end of the lawsuit.
“Vince Ryan and Devon Anderson did their best to keep the residents of Southlawn from learning their community had been targeted for a gang injunction,” said Caroline Duble, an ACLU of Texas community organizer. “This victory is not only a testament to the mettle of Southlawn’s residents, but also to the undeniable power of grassroots community organizing. We won’t allow government officials to operate in secret and target communities of color for harm.”
Charles X. White, a community activist and former gang interventionist, worked to have the lawsuit thrown out because he believed the efforts targeted neighborhoods populated by people of color. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the proposed gang injunction area is roughly 78 percent black and 20 percent Hispanic.
“We are thankful that the community groups and individuals worked to open the eyes of the county attorney and the district attorney,” he said, adding that there were additional law enforcement steps that could have been taken before filing a lawsuit. “To jump over accepted policing practices to get to a gang injunction is justifying lazy policing.“
Not everyone was pleased. Area resident leader Preston Roe, president of the La Salette Place Civic Club, was disappointed that the county didn’t go all the way with the lawsuit. His neighborhood was included in the original Southlawn zone, which included more than 1,300 acres roughly bounded by Loop 610, Texas 288, Old Spanish Trail and Cullen.
“I can’t see why they would file an injunction like that if they weren’t planning on following up on it,” he said. “Everything has opened back up again.”
He said offering resources and services to people with gang backgrounds doesn’t mean they will become law-abiding citizens.
“If a person doesn’t want to work, regardless of what type of job you put out there, they’re not going to work,” Roe said.
Crime not as bad
Southlawn would have been the third “safety zone” created in Harris County since 2010.
The first injunction was in northeast Harris County’s East Aldine area, and initially banned 47 suspected gang members from a 57-acre zone, including the Haverstock Hills apartments. In 2014, that “safety zone” — an area about 70 percent black and 25 percent Hispanic — was expanded to 217 acres.
The second injunction in 2012 targeted several blocks of Houston’s Brays Oaks community on Houston’s southwest side. The area is about 41 percent black and 40 percent Hispanic.
Haverstock residents Tuesday offered mixed reviews on whether the civil actions have helped crime in their area.
“It’s nothing like it used to be,” said Tommy Dirden, 79, who has lived in Haverstock for nine years and knows five people who have been killed in the complex during that time. He feels crime has decreased but wishes there was more visibility by law enforcement officers in the neighborhood.
Norma Mombouli, 54, has lived in Haverstock for a year and also has seen improvement in the crime problem.
“I heard a couple of gunshots a couple weeks ago, but we haven’t had as many as it was,” she said.