LA's crime surge fueled by gangs

Los Angeles gangs are behind robberies committed against some of the city's wealthiest residents, police recently announced after a spate of 'follow-home robberies' in the area. 

Police found that at least 17 gangs, most of which are based in Southern California, are responsible for the follow-home or follow-off robberies, the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) told the city's police commission last week. 

Those crimes usually take place in upscale parts of Los Angeles where suspects target victims who wear jewelry, high-end watches or other expensive items as they leave restaurants or stores. They then follow the people to parking lots or their homes, before swarming them and running off with their valuables. 

An incident took place around noon on April 11. A woman leaving a jewelry store in downtown Los Angeles was followed and approached by suspects in a car who shattered her vehicle's driver-side window as she approached an intersection, according to police.

The victim attempted to drive away but couldn't due to heavy traffic. When she stopped her car, she fled and sought help. The suspects then chased the woman in their vehicle and struck her with their car. Once on the ground, the two suspects, one of whom carried a gun, removed her watch and drove away, police said.

This was just one of more than 200 robberies carried out by the city's street gangs, according to the LAPD, which put together a taskforce late last year to investigate the robberies.

There were 165 such robberies in 2021 and 56 so far this year, said Captain Jonathan Tippet, who spearheads the task force, the Los Angeles Times reported.

Shots have been fired in 23 of the incidents, and two victims have died, Tippet said. "In my 34 years on the job, I've never seen anything like this", he told the Times.

Police identified the ongoing follow-home robberies as a crime trend in early 2021. It comes at a time when gun violence and crimes have surged after the start of the pandemic.

The downtown Sacramento mass shooting on April 3, during which six people were killed, was the result of a gang dispute that led to a massive shootout, local authorities said.

Sacramento County Sheriff Scott Jones told Fox News that the Sacramento shooting was the result of California not enacting tough-on-crime policies and letting violent offenders out of prison. 

"This is the latest, but it unfortunately won't be the last. Because if we don't change the way California and the rest of this nation treats criminals, then this is only going to be a continuing trend," Jones said.

Some activists and criminal justice reform advocates are concerned that wealthy residents and politicians will use the recent crime trend to win back past policing reforms. 

Hamid Khan, an organizer with STOP LAPD Spying Coalition, told the Times that the LAPD was being sensationalist about crime in the city, and suggested that police were blowing crime trends out of proportion to maintain control of the city's budget, it reported.

"LAPD has to constantly legitimize itself, constantly has to make itself useful to the community, by raising this specter of people running wild," Khan told the Times.