By Allison Klein
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, November 30, 2007

At least five violent ganglike "crews" of young people are warring in the Columbia Heights and lower Georgia Avenue areas of Northwest Washington, where 11 people have been shot in recent weeks, city officials said yesterday.

Since early October, people in the neighborhoods have reported more than 100 gunshots, said D.C. Council member Jim Graham (D- Ward 1), who represents the area and has been pleading for more police attention. Officers have made two arrests in the cases involving the 11 victims.

"It's absolutely incredible more people aren't wounded and shot," Graham said yesterday. "This situation is red-hot."

D.C. Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier and Mayor Adrian M. Fenty (D) joined Graham yesterday at Georgia Avenue and Harvard Street in Columbia Heights to announce plans to target hostile crews.

The police department is streamlining its gang intelligence unit, giving $1.2 million to community partnerships for gang intervention and spending $1.8 million to expand the ShotSpotter system, Lanier said.

"These crews are a very, very strong driving force behind the crime," Lanier said. "We have to get right to the heart of that."

ShotSpotter, a collection of gunshot recognition sensors, finds gunfire within seconds and alerts police to where the bullets were fired. D.C. police began using the technology last year in the 7th Police District, the southern half of the city east of the Anacostia River.

ShotSpotter will soon be used in the 3rd and 4th districts, which include the areas around Columbia Heights and Adams Morgan and the neighborhoods along upper Georgia Avenue.

Lanier said the department is merging three squads into a Rapid Response Gang Intelligence Unit. The unit, with 39 members, will gather intelligence to support officers and detectives in the field and work the streets when necessary, Lanier said. It will be staffed 24 hours a day, she said.

Those plans, the latest in a series of strategies by Lanier to deal with violence in Graham's ward, were announced as the chief prepared for a D.C. Council hearing today on the crime issue.

The District has had 171 homicides this year, two more than were recorded in 2006. The number of armed robberies is up 27 percent from this time last year. There has also been an 11 percent jump in shootings and other assaults with guns, according to police data.

Halloween night was one of the most violent in Columbia Heights. Nine people were shot, including in a drive-by at 14th and Harvard streets NW that left four people wounded. A police car was half a block away and raced to the scene after an officer heard shots.

Much of the city's violence is being fueled by 83 crews that are active or have been in the past year, police said. Crew members shoot at each other and sometimes kill each other, and they commit other crimes such as robberies and carjackings, police said.

The police districts with the most identified crews are the 7th, with 19, and the 3rd, with 18, police officials said.

Columbia Heights community activist Thomas Kwesi Danda Smith said he has been frustrated by the police department's response to the violence.

"Police are reluctant to give us adequate coverage," Smith said. "We've been begging for foot patrols, for them to actually get to know residents, get to know business owners. They don't seem to have any ownership in the community or really care."