Based on the first half of 2009, Gilroy gang investigators
expected a busy summer
– and were pleasantly surprised when gang activity dipped.
Based on the first half of 2009, Gilroy gang investigators expected a busy summer – and were pleasantly surprised when gang activity dipped.
The first six months of this year saw more gang-related aggravated assaults – incidents involving a shooting, stabbing or great bodily injury – and almost as many total gang-related incidents as all of 2007 and more than the same period in 2008. Crime tends to rise even more during the warm summer months when school’s out of session and more people spend time outdoors, police said.
“We saw a big increase over the first half of the year – significantly higher than in previous years,” said Sgt. Chad Gallacinao, who heads the Gilroy Police Department’s Anti-Crime Team. “If the pattern continued, we would have been much higher this year.”
Contrary to historical data, the upward trend appeared to slow around early June with a combination of proactive police work, regular probation and parole searches, and several high-profile arrests, he said.
Local, state and federal law enforcement officials teamed up to arrest 17 foreign nationals, including at least eight in Gilroy, with ties to violent street gangs in South County June 4. Led by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, the sweep specifically targeted gang members that committed violent crimes and were in the country illegally, Gallacinao said.
During the June 4 sweep, officers arrested suspected Sureño Cristian Jimenez, 21, who is currently in custody facing a murder charge for his alleged involvement in the gang-related slaying of Larry Martinez, 18, last November. His capture, along with the arrests of Heather Ashford, 19, and suspected Norteños Angel Solorzano, 19, and Robert Barrios, 20 – friends of Martinez’s who also face murder charges for their involvement in his death – sent a message to the community that gang violence will not be tolerated, Police Chief Denise Turner said soon after the arrests.
During a bail hearing, Officer Michael Bolton testified about the level of gang activity in Gilroy since their arrests.
“It was violent, it was severe and there was a lot of it,” Bolton told the court. Bolton served on the Anti-Crime Team until recently.
Since the defendants’ arrests, gang activity has decreased significantly, he said, further describing a recent encounter he had with a Norteño gang member from Fresno. The Norteño said he and some of his associates were going to “get the hell out of Gilroy” because Gilroy was “on lockdown,” Bolton said.
Awareness of the police and district attorney’s stance on the Martinez case and on gang violence in general may have trickled up to Morgan Hill as well, Sgt. Jerry Neumayer said.
After an equally busy winter, “we were expecting a wild summer,” Neumayer said. “But the whole summer, as far as gang activity goes, has been really slow. We were pleasantly surprised.”
Like Gallacinao, Neumayer shied away from crediting the decrease in Morgan Hill’s gang violence entirely to the arrests made in the Martinez case.
“It may be a factor, but I don’t know if they’re that smart,” he said. “I don’t know if they actually read the papers.”
Typically, when gang violence decreases in one community, it ramps up in neighboring communities, Neumayer said. Not the case however, with both Morgan Hill and Gilroy’s recent deceleration of gang activity, he said.
Meanwhile, Hollister has seen no decrease, said Sgt. Dave Westrick with the Hollister Police Department. Although combating gang violence is the department’s “number one priority,” Westrick said he wasn’t surprised that the Gilroy arrests hadn’t affected the crime rate in Hollister.
“It’s a totally different jurisdiction,” he said. “It’s just one case and gang violence is all encompassing.”
Despite the relative calm, a handful of recent gang-related incidents marred what was shaping up to be a quiet summer in Gilroy.
A drive-by shooting by the Kentucky Fried Chicken near First Street and Wren Avenue June 23, another drive by at Rainbow Park near the corner of Hirasaki Avenue and Mantelli Drive July 27, and an attempted murder on the 8200 block of Murray Avenue Aug. 6 reminded police that gang tensions are no longer secluded to certain sections of Gilroy but are more pervasive, extending into pockets all around the city, Gallacinao said.
“(Gang activity) definitely has decreased but that’s not to say it can’t increase again in a moment’s notice,” he said. “It can turn around in a heartbeat.”
