Last Sunday, three children (aged 12, 17, and 17) were shot at 12:30 am as a birthday party was letting out in the historic Montford district of Asheville. The police held details for a press conference Monday. Chief Bill Hogan explained that he waited until Monday because he’d been trying to tell people Asheville had gangs – children in gangs - but they weren’t listening.
Just a few months ago, the police department was saying the city had “neighborhood groups,†but no gangs. At the time, however, it wasn’t unusual to see educational materials on gangs in the police training room. The police are convinced a homicide committed April 29 was a gang activity.
Whereas the police were training to become familiar with the gangs of the stripe (e.g., MS-13) that have been popping up in the county, gangs of a different stripe (e.g., Bloods and Crips) are believed to have perpetrated the three public shootings that have occurred in Asheville with zero or one witness each this year. According to the chief, the neighborhood groups, like Southside, have mingled with and assimilated into the national gangs.
Click here for a one-stop source of information on North Carolina gangs.
