The Maryland Gang Act of 2007 was supposed to allow prosecutors to crack down on the state?s growing problem of criminal street gangs. So it?s logical to assume that more than three months after the law took effect on Oct. 1, prosecutors would be using the act to press charges against gang members.
Right? Wrong.
An Examiner survey of Maryland?s largest jurisdictions ? including gang-plagued Baltimore City and Prince George?s County ? produced zero cases in which prosecutors have filed charges using the new law.
“It’s useless,” said Margaret Burns, a spokeswoman for prosecutors in Baltimore City, where authorities have documented 2,600gang members. “I don?t know if anybody else is using it, but we haven?t. It’s basically not helpful to prosecutors at all.”
Attorney General Doug Gansler and Maryland State?s Attorney?s Association President Scott Patterson wrote in a Jan. 1 letter to state Senate President Thomas Mike Miller that the Gang Act needs to be amended to truly be effective.
“Although this was an historic first step forward in the state?s battle against criminal gang activity, we believe these efforts fell short in a number of important respects,” they wrote.
Under Gansler?s recommendations, the law would expand to include destruction of property, second-degree assault, pandering and gambling among other crimes. It also would allow for property seizure from gang members and for 16-year-olds to be tried as adults.
Perhaps the most important proposed change in the law is an order for judges to hand down consecutive ? rather than concurrent ? sentences for convicted gang members.
“The impact of the gang prosecution act is substantially diminished without this change,” they wrote.
Jason Abbott, chief of the gang unit in the Maryland Attorney General?s Office, said the changes would make the act much more useful for police and prosecutors.
“We?re trying to expand the net in which we can prosecute gang members,” he said. “It’s a really small net right now.”
