Gang Violence: The Gang Problem In Las Vegas

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The city of Las Vegas has changed rapidly from becoming a beautiful city to a violent place to live in. The city has seemed a rise in homicides as well in the last few years. The strong presences of these gangs are taking innocent lives and making the community a harder place to raise a family in. Many of the gangs in Vegas account for most the drug trade, as well as the staggering homicide rate. The gang problem is not only a problem in Las Vegas, but it is all over the world. Gang violence is a problem in every major United States city including Chicago, Los Angeles, and Atlanta. Las Vegas Metro Police Department (LVMPD) has implicated many programs to fight the increasing gang issue across the valley, from bringing back the gang unit to having more police officers patrol the known gang spots. These programs were implicated to stop the criminal gangs that are looking to build their territory in Nevada. The three criminal gangs that are mainly affiliated with Nevada are the Gersons’, the Crips, and the Playboys. The Gerson Park Kingsmen is one of the oldest gangs in Southern Nevada. They got their name after the old Herbert Gerson Park housing project near Martin Luther King Blvd and Lake Mead. The gang is a hybrid street gang composed of Bloods and Crips. The gang originated in the 1970 and they are the oldest criminal gang in Las Vegas. Members are known to wear green and black as those are their colors and they are also associated with the numbers 369. The number