FORT WORTH, Texas — Fed up with deadly drive-by shootings, incessant drug dealing and graffiti, cities nationwide are trying a different tactic to combat gangs: suing them.
Fort Worth and San Francisco are among the latest to file lawsuits against gang members, asking courts for injunctions barring them from hanging out together on street corners, in cars or anywhere else in certain areas.
The injunctions are aimed at disrupting gang activity before it can escalate. They also give police legal reasons to stop and question gang members, who often are found with drugs or weapons, authorities said. In some cases, they don’t allow gang members to even talk to people passing in cars or to carry spray paint.
“It is another tool,” said Kevin Rousseau, a Tarrant County assistant prosecutor in Fort Worth, which recently filed its first civil injunction against a gang. “This is more of a proactive approach.”
Critics say such lawsuits go too far, limiting otherwise lawful activities and unfairly targeting minority youths.
“If you’re barring people from talking in the streets, it’s difficult to tell if they’re gang members or if they’re people discussing issues,” said Peter Bibring, a lawyer with the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California. “And it’s all the more troubling because it doesn’t seem to be effective.”
The ACLU and other critics of gang injunctions favor community programs. The Rev. Jack Crane, pastor of Truevine Missionary Baptist Church in Fort Worth, is helping provide gang members with counseling, shoes and other resources needed to help them escape that life.
“We don’t want to lose another generation,” Mr. Crane said.
Civil injunctions were first filed against gang members in the 1980s in the Los Angeles area, a breeding ground for gangs including some of the country’s most notorious, such as the Crips and 18th Street.
The Los Angeles city attorney’s lawsuit in 1987 against the Playboy Gangster Crips covered the entire city but was scaled back after a judge deemed it too broad.
Chicago tried to target gangs by enacting an anti-loitering ordinance in 1992, but the U.S. Supreme Court struck it down in 1999, saying it gave police the authority to arrest without cause.
Since then, cities have used injunctions to target specific gangs or gang members, and that strategy has withstood court challenges.
Los Angeles now has 33 permanent injunctions involving 50 gangs, and studies have shown they do reduce crime, said Jonathan Diamond, a spokesman for the Los Angeles City Attorney’s Office.
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