The involvement of the youth and juveniles in criminal gangs particularly in the United States is becoming an increasingly an issue of concern to the criminal justice system. Thus, a plethora of criminal justice programs have been suggested in order to reduce the destruction of property, crimes and violence caused by street gang members. According to Kent, Donaldso and Smith (2000), various programs and policies have been implemented in a bid to help reduce the rate of gang related crimes. However, not much attention has been paid to the effectiveness of evidence based practices and programs. Moreover, the general lack of data on the most effective approach to end gang violence among the youth and juveniles also necessitates a proposal for legislators to come up with more appropriate legal framework to curb gang crime.
As a research by Howell (2010) shows, the best ways to reduce the involvement of the youth in gang crimes are through community gang prevention and intervention programs and services. To this extent, in order to prevent the involvement of the youth from joining criminal gangs, it is important for communities to strengthen schools and families, train parents and teachers on how to manage the youth, teach interpersonal skills to students and improve community supervision (p.1). To do this, it is important for there to be in place a strong legal framework that oversees the implementation of the various criminal justice programs relating to gang crime and gang activities. Such a legislative framework should seek to identify and deal with factors that lead the youth into joining gangs and getting involved in crime. Moreover, it should identify and seek loopholes in the existing framework that allows criminal gangs to operate on the streets. It is important therefore for such programs to identify the risk factors for the youth joining criminal gangs. Additionally, the programs should entail community assessments and strategies for preventing and intervening in gang involvements among the youth. Howell (2000) observes that some of the most effective and promising programs for gang prevention include primary prevention programs such as the Gang Resistance Education and Training program and secondary prevention programs like the Preventive Treatment Program.
Moreover, gang prevention programs should appeal to the youth, involve active engagement of the youth; continue social ties outside gangs and a focus on reconciliation or demobilization (Higginson, Benier, Shenderovich, Bedford, Mazerolle & Murray, 2015, p. 5). This criminal justice program on gang prevention suggested should be one that takes into account the individual social and economic factors that may make the youth to take part in criminal gang activities. Additionally, as law makers, the criminal justice gang prevention and intervention program should encompass evidence-based approaches to implementation rather than the traditional approaches that have failed to prevent criminal activities by gangs. It should also encourage multi agency cooperation that will ensure that youth involvement in criminal activities is closely monitored and deterred through alternative options. This program will be important in the long run in that it will help ensure safe societies, provide youth with alternative means of employment and hence make it less viable option for youths and juvenile. In addition to this, such gang crime prevention and intervention programs will ensure that evidence based practices of crime prevention measures such as alternatives to incarceration, reentry programs and law enforcement exchange programs.
Lastly, to be effective, gang crime prevention programs should incorporate situational, justice system, developmental and social crime prevention. The proposed program initiatives on gang prevention will be effective and suitable in that they will be directed towards at-risk youths, gives the youth viable alternatives to gang membership, cost effective and economically feasible in terms of sustainment and implementation. Further, this proposed program is beneficial in that it would led to improved perceptions of safety by the community, improve levels of credibility and trust between the community and law enforcement, improve collaborating and communication among community service providers and reduce gang membership and gang-related crime rates.
References
Higginson, A., Benier, K., Shenderovich, Y., Laura Bedford, L. M., & Murray, J. (2015). Preventive interventions to reduce youth involvement in gangs and gang crime in low and middle income countries: A systematic review. Campbell Systematic Reviews, 18, 5-172.
Howell, J. C. (2010). Gang prevention: An overview of research and programs. 1-21: US Department of Justice. Retrieved June 18, 2016, from https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/ojjdp/231116.pdf.
Kent, D. R., Donaldson, S. I., Wyrickb, P. A., & Smith, P. J. (2000). Evaluating criminal justice progrms designed to reduce crime by targeting repeat gang offenders. Evaluation and Program Planning, 23, 115-124. Retrieved February 18, 2016, from www.elsevier.com/locate/evalprogplan
