02639
Victimization Patterns in Los Angeles: Who is at High Risk of Gang Violence and Where
Does It Occur?
Kiminori Nakamura
Mentor: George Tita
In order to understand the nature of gangs and their activities, one cannot avoid the issue of their
territoriality. We explore the question: Is one’s place of residency associated with one’s gang territory?
The answer to this question bears considerable weight in terms of the impact of gang violence on
communities. If gang members spend most of their time in their gang territory instead of the
neighborhood where they live, then communities where gangs hang out should be more susceptible
to gang violence than the communities where they reside. The current study employs a quantitative
approach by using the spatial typology of homicide developed by Tita and Griffiths (2003). The
spatial typology categorizes homicide incidents based on the spatial relationship between offender’s
residence, victim’s residence, and location of the incident. We extend the typology to not only
examining the residence of known gang members involved in homicide, but also where the turf of
the gang member is located. The data we employ contain information on all homicides for the period
1990–2000 in two areas of Los Angeles: The Hollenbeck and the Southeast policing districts. We
expect to find a noticeable contribution of territoriality information to the spatial typology. The
potential findings could have implications for solutions to gang violence.