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Prevention on the streets Medford Police gang unit takes safety and antidrug focus By JULIE SWENSEN The Medford Police Department has a new unit working to crack down on gang-related crime. But the Gang Street Drug Unit, or GSD for short, doesn't just work to suppress gang activity. It also concentrates on school safety and street-level drug activity, and handles surveillance in other cases for cops who don't have the time. Asked if there's a gang problem in Medford, Sgt. Mark Bell, who's part of GSD, said, "Anytime you have gangs, it's a gang problem." Based in an office in the Medford parking garage, the GSD was established a couple of months ago at the direction of police chief Eric Mellgren. In a nutshell, police define a gang as a group of people who work together to commit crimes. Police know of six groups in Medford that have identified themselves as gangs. They have names such as Brown Nation and Brown Pride. Although the number of members is unknown, police estimated that about 20 would be in the core group of a gang. Police also know of other groups who won't identify themselves as gangs. Most of the gang problems involve small amounts of drugs, and stealing from cars, stores and houses, Bell said. Police said statistics weren't available on gang-related crime, as it's hard to say exactly what constitutes a gang and it's labor-intensive to compile such data. While Bell didn't know if such crime has dropped, he said that visible gang activity (such as wearing gang clothing) has decreased from years past. He attributed that not only to police work, but also to school officials who no longer allow such clothing to be worn. Instead of gang clothing, police now look for tattoos signifying a group. But GSD is concerned with conduct, not clothing. Focusing on the age group of 14 to 24, GSD gets ideas of what to look into from weekly meetings with probation officers. GSD also gets input from a citizens advisory committee, which includes a prosecutor, juvenile and school officials, the owner of a teen nightclub and the parent of a child who's been involved in a gang. The unit then forms its strategy for the week, working afternoons to evenings. On this day, Bell and his cohorts are scouting houses where a particular car might be, because they've learned that a stolen gun might be inside. Bell said gangs here have had a few fights. The biggest one occurred when Brown Nation's graffiti was defaced -- a sign of disrespect. While there have been some rivalries, it hasn't gotten to the point where they're shooting each other on the street, he said. The sergeant likened Medford's gang problem to what Salem's was four to five years ago. But now in Salem, two gangs are shooting at each other. He said he hopes that GSD will prevent Medford from becoming like Salem. The police department has had a gang unit before -- the now-defunct Gang Enforcement Team -- whose officers worked on gang problems when they had time apart from other calls. But the GSD unit is a full-time job. It's made up of a sergeant and five officers, including school resource officers reassigned after school got out. Soon there will be six officers. Its members were reallocated from general patrol. Medford police Lt. Tim George said that in Littleton, Colo., police and Columbine High School officials hadn't heard of the "Trenchcoat Mafia," to which the two teen-age shooters belonged. But that type of activity won't go unnoticed by the GSD, he said. Among its work, the GSD has tracked down drugs in an Alice Street home, and dealt with a man who was rumored to have a gun in his car at a local high school. "We have prevented violence by our actions," George said. Mellgren said he gave Bell the freedom to change GSD's name if it's thought of only as a gang unit. "My sense is we don't have a big gang problem, but we have a big issue working with kids," he said, referring issues of drug problems and violence. Mellgren said the purpose of the GSD is to intervene in kids' lives before things go bad. GSD deals with young people, regardless of whether they're affiliated with gangs. Most young people in Medford aren't affiliated with one, he said. "The unit is as much preventative as it is straight enforcement," he said. Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA