CLICK HERE: Gangs...Not Just A City Problem
A few years ago, I went to a training on adolescent gang violence conducted by Lt. Ed Torres of the State Commission of Investigation. I worked in a medium security juvenile prison, the highest level of security for juvenile confinement in NJ. It was a rough place to work, plain & simple. Besides the overall stink inside the dingy, decrepit buildings I was a young woman in a sea of incarcerated adolescents with rap sheets three times longer than my fresh-out-of grad-school credentials.
Some of these teenagers were in prison for rape, murder, armed robbery, arson, and assault; all very serious violent offenses. The gang rivalry, recruitment, and extortion going on inside the confines of this campus was almost uncontainable. Kids affiliated with certain gangs were divided and separated so to avoid breakout violence in dorms.
Anyway, I knew gangs were a major dilemma (if not THE major issue) for prison administrators and officers but what I learned in that seminar on that day simply shocked me to my core. A map of New Jersey popped up on the screen Lt. Torres was presenting his Powerpoint slides on with red, blue, yellow, and black dots littering the entire map of New Jersey. Very little was left of the outline of New Jersey. The dots indicated active gang presence and not just by county....by municipality. Newton, Clinton, Somerville, Old Bridge, Freehold, Ocean, Toms River, Allentown, all the way down into the Pine Barrons and South Jersey. They are here, they are EVERYWHERE, and they go to school with your children.
Do not be naive or foolish to think your town is not on that map.
Lt. Ed Torres is hosting a seminar on the new gang presence in town TONIGHT, October 4th from 7-9pm at Somerville Middle School at 55 W Cliff St. The Spanish-version is held at Franklin Middle School on Oct. 16th from 7-9pm in the Franklin Middle School at 415 Francis St. in the Somerset-section of Franklin. This is something all middle school parents should attend. Make the trip.
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