LONG HOT SUMMER IN THE CITY

Fractured gangs blamed for Chicago homicide surge

CHICAGO — There are many theories about what has caused a recent spike in Chicago’s homicide rate, including a splintering of established drug gangs, the warm winter and high unemployment in some neighborhoods that seem a world away from the city’s beaches, lush parks and skyscrapers.

The numbers clearly show there is a problem, with eight killed and at least 35 wounded in a spasm of gunfire last weekend.

The violence is nowhere near its historical peak of the early 1990s, when Chicago recorded roughly 900 homicides per year. But from Jan. 1 through late May there were 203 homicides, an increase of more than 50 percent over the 134 during the same period in 2011.

Mayor Rahm Emanuel has made combatting gangs a priority and has stood with Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy to unveil a plan of attack. Among the new police tactics is the deployment of dozens of specialized undercover officers to units on Chicago’s West and South sides and then saturating those neighborhood streets with uniformed officers.

In addition, Gov. Pat Quinn on Monday signed into law the Illinois Street Gang RICO Act, which aims to dismantle gangs by boosting penalties for crimes performed as part of a criminal enterprise.

In Englewood, a roughly 20-by-20-block South Side neighborhood, homicides jumped from 40 in 2010 to 60 last year, which is more than half of the total 2011 homicides for cities such as Cleveland, Milwaukee, Washington, D.C., Oakland, Calif., and Kansas City, Mo.

Though police are loath to attribute this winter’s unusually warm weather as a possible factor, because it smacks of excuse-making, there were far more people on the streets in January, February and March — including gang members — than during those months in 2011.

Just as important have been dramatic changes within the gangs themselves.

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