Gang

[9] Criminal societies in the underworld started to develop their own ranks and groups which were sometimes called families, and were often made up of lower-classes and operated on pick-pocketry, prostitution, forgery and counterfeiting, commercial burglary, and money laundering schemes.

[19] Many criminal organizations, such as the Italian Cosa Nostra, Japanese yakuza, Russian Bratva, and Chinese triads, have existed for centuries.

[30] Miller (1992) defines a street gang as "a self-formed association of peers, united by mutual interests, with identifiable leadership and internal organization, who act collectively or as individuals to achieve specific purposes, including the conduct of illegal activity and control of a particular territory, facility, or enterprise.

Members have been accused of significant department abuses of policy and constitutional rights, terrifying the general population, intimidating their colleagues, and retaliating against whistleblowers.

[32][33] Biker gangs are motorcycle clubs who conduct illegal activities like the Hells Angels, the Pagans, the Outlaws, and the Bandidos,[34][35] known as the "Big Four" in the United States.

[37] Some clubs are considered "outlaw" not necessarily because they engage in criminal activity, but because they are not sanctioned by the American Motorcyclist Association and do not adhere to its rules.

[48][49][50] These include groups like the Los Pepes, Sombra Negra, Friends Stand United, People Against Gangsterism and Drugs, and OG Imba.

Criminal gangs may function both inside and outside of prison, such as the Nuestra Familia, Mexican Mafia, Folk Nation, and the Brazilian[27] PCC.

[56] Most are typically divided into:[57][58][59] The numerous push factors experienced by at-risk individuals vary situationally, but follow a common theme of the desire for power, respect, money, and protection.

Such individuals are often experiencing low levels of these various factors in their own lives, feeling ostracized from their community and lacking social support.

Joining a gang may appear to them to be the only way to obtain status and material success or escape a cycle of poverty through profits from illegal activity.

To validate a person as a gang member, the officials generally must provide evidence of several factors, such as tattoos, photographs, admissions, clothing, etc.

A survey of Mexican American gang members and associates defined these categories as girlfriends, hoodrats, good girls, and relatives.

[76][77][78] Many street gangs, like the Bloods and MS-13, have a ritual where they would beat up (also known as "beat-in" or "jump-in") aspiring applicants for several seconds to show their toughness, willingness, and loyalty.

[81] The Cosa Nostra requires people wanting to be full members or become made men to take part in a ceremony involving oaths, agreement, and bloodletting to show their loyalty.

Triad ceremonies take place at an altar dedicated to Guan Yu (關羽, GuānYǔ), with incense and an animal sacrifice (usually a chicken, pig or goat).

[87] Giovanni Tinebra, the chief public prosecutor of Caltanissetta, once stated, "Instead of going to school, many boys go into the countryside where there are people who teach them to shoot and turn them into killing machines.

The earliest and most famous example was the time when the Medellin Cartel hired Israeli soldier Yair Klein to train militiamen and assassins.

The dense environments of favelas in Rio and public housing projects in Chicago have helped gang members hide from police easily.

[110] Gang-related activity and violence has increased along the U.S. Southwest border region, as US-based gangs act as enforcers for Mexican drug cartels.

[75] "Hoodrats" and girls associated with rival gangs have lower status at these social events, and are victimized when members view them as fair game and other women rationalize assault against them.

Most modern research on gangs has focused on the thesis of class struggle following the work of Walter B. Miller and Irving Spergel.

John Hagedorn has argued that this is one of three concepts that shed light on patterns of organization in oppressed racial, religious and ethnic groups (the other two are Manuel Castells' theory of "resistance identity" and Derrick Bell's work on the permanence of racism).

[119] Social disorganization, and the disintegration of societal institutions such as family, school, and the public safety net, enable groups of peers to form gangs.

[127] Some members of criminal gangs are "jumped in" (by going through a process of initiation), or have to prove their loyalty and right to belong by committing certain acts, usually theft or violence.

One study focused on terrorism and symbols states that "[s]ymbolism is important because it plays a part in impelling the terrorist to act and then in defining the targets of their actions.

"[135] The Internet is one of the most significant media used by gangs to communicate in terms of the size of the audience they can reach with minimal effort and reduced risk.

"[142] Professor Simon Hallsworth argues that, where they exist, gangs in the UK are "far more fluid, volatile and amorphous than the myth of the organized group with a corporate structure".

[141] This assertion is supported by a field study conducted by Manchester University, which found that "most within- and between-gang disputes ... emanated from interpersonal disputes regarding friends, family and romantic relationships", as opposed to territorial rivalries, and that criminal enterprises were "rarely gang-coordinated ... most involved gang members operating as individuals or in small groups.

[111] In 2006, Scott Barfield, a Defense Department investigator, said there is an online network of gangs and extremists: "They're communicating with each other about weapons, about recruiting, about keeping their identities secret, about organizing within the military.