When 15-year-old Armen Petrosyan arrived in East Hollywood from Armenia in 1989, he encountered larger, long-established street gangs that often preyed upon the smaller and more recent group of Armenian immigrants.

[19] Gang activity has never been reported in East Coast, Midwestern, Northern or Southern Armenian-American communities primarily composed of Van (central) Armenians, Syrian-Armenians and Iraqi-Armenians.

[25][26] In 2000, the murder of a 17-year-old Mexican-American outside of Hoover High School in Glendale by Armenian Power members sparked dialogue to find ways to help end the war between the gangs.

[2] In 2014, two US citizens from Los Angeles who declared themselves members of Armenian Power were videotaped in Syria fighting in support of then-Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

[28] On February 16, 2011 during Operation Power Outage over 900 federal and local law enforcement authorities arrested nearly 100 people allegedly involved in Armenian organized crime in the Los Angeles area.