Suffolk needs a gang injunction plan that works

The idea of curtailing gang activity within specific boundaries has been tried with success in other municipalities.

But Suffolk County Executive Steve Levy's proposal to institute such a program on Long Island can't work without expanding beyond the police department. It must have the district attorney's office on board, and it must have input from lawyers involved with protecting civil liberties.

After more than a year of Suffolk reacting to cycles of violent gang activity - with increased patrols in Bellport, traffic stops in Brentwood and police monitoring feeds from privately owned video cameras in Huntington Station - it would do well to get in front of the problem for a change.

The power - and for some opponents, the key criticism - of civil injunctions is that they can stop crime before it happens by in effect punishing gang members before they can do a neighborhood more harm.

There is plentiful evidence from other parts of the country to show that civil injunctions take gang members out of parks. And away from schools. And stop them from hanging out in front of businesses. Or law-abiding residents' front yards.

According to studies on the effort, mostly from California, once an injunction is in place, it works so well that gang members do not migrate into neighborhoods adjacent to the so-called "safe zone."

But Levy's proposal, which he acknowledges is still evolving, needs considerable work.

New York, unlike California, for example, has no law that defines exactly what a gang member is. Levy ought to push for one, while supporting the effort of a political enemy, Legis. Philip Ramos, to begin another pilot program, a gang court, on Long Island. A court devoted to handling gang cases could help Levy with one issue in his proposal.

Under his plan, the county police department would use information gleaned from a variety of sources to determine who is or is not part of a gang.

But material gathered for investigative use by the police department should not be the strongest determinate of who is or is not in a gang.

In other areas of the country, that determination itself becomes part of the civil process. In other words, there are municipalities, that, in seeking an injunction, also have to offer enough evidence to convince a judge that gang members are, in fact, gang members.

That ought to become part of the process in Suffolk too.

Also, although the standard of proof is easier to meet in civil cases than criminal cases, gang members ought to have the fundamental right to defend themselves.

And reformed gang members ought to have a way to prove themselves and be removed from injunctions - which, in some municipalities, are in place anywhere from a year to the legal definition of forever.

That's especially important in neighborhoods where youngsters flirt with the idea of joining a gang. Or sign on under pressure as a way to keep themselves safe.

Even the best-constructed civil gang injunction will not solve the issues that, in too many Long Island neighborhoods, feed gang activity. Suffolk must become even more aggressive in working with so-called "hot spot" communities on public policy issues, such as creating jobs, as aggressive as it has been gifting county land to improve development in Wyandanch and Huntington Station.

And civil gang injunctions will never substitute for the greater number of police officers and detectives needed to fight gangs.

Levy's proposal is a start.

What's needed now is for Levy - who too often can be a stubborn, lone wolf - to open things up so Suffolk can put together a civil gang injunction plan that will work.