Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- 1 Studying the Police Response to Gangs
- 2 Setting and Methods
- 3 Historical Analysis of Gangs and Gang Control
- 4 Scope and Nature of the Current Gang Problem
- 5 Form, Function, and Management of the Police Gang Unit
- 6 The Gang Unit Officer
- 7 On the Job
- 8 Policing Gangs in a Time of Community Policing
- 9 Conclusion and Implications
- References
- Index
7 - On the Job
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- 1 Studying the Police Response to Gangs
- 2 Setting and Methods
- 3 Historical Analysis of Gangs and Gang Control
- 4 Scope and Nature of the Current Gang Problem
- 5 Form, Function, and Management of the Police Gang Unit
- 6 The Gang Unit Officer
- 7 On the Job
- 8 Policing Gangs in a Time of Community Policing
- 9 Conclusion and Implications
- References
- Index
Summary
As a rule policemen assume that the gang must be suppressed – must be broken up. They fail to understand that boyish energies, like tics, suppressed at one place are sure to break out at some other. And when the breaking up of the gang has been accomplished, there is usually no attempt to provide substitute activities for the boys. Under ordinary circumstances, then, the “cop” becomes the natural enemy of the gang.
– Fredric M. Thrasher 1927This chapter focuses on the actual work of gang unit officers, as we describe what the gang unit officers were doing in the four cities that we studied, how they were doing it, and why, from the officers' perspectives, they were performing their jobs as they were. We also examined how gang unit officers spent their time over the normal course of a work day. We described the numbers and types of individuals that the gang unit officers came into contact with, how those contacts were initiated, and the various strategies and tactics that we observed being used by the gang unit officers in the field.
HOW THE GANG UNIT OFFICERS SPENT THEIR TIME
We directly observed officers at work in the four cities that we studied. For collecting and analyzing the data that would help us determine how the officers were spending their work time, we chose the time diary strategy.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Policing Gangs in America , pp. 198 - 240Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2006