Gun violence

Student-led group pinpoints solutions to youth violence

The youth-led Heal the Streets fellowship program, sponsored through Oakland’s Ella Baker Center, hosted a Solutions Salon on Saturday in West Oakland intended to engage community members, youth and policy makers in a dialogue about violence prevention in Oakland.

12/16/09 Moving Beyond Violence in Oakland

During the past two months, three Oakland North reporters have interviewed five teens at Castlemont High School on MacArthur Boulevard in East Oakland. This neighborhood is at center of some of the city’s worst violence, and it’s a violence that does not spare young people. During the last three years, one in every two homicide victims in Oakland has been between the ages of 12 and 24. Even amid this tragedy, the five teens that met with Oakland North have,…

At police workshop, a warning primer on gangs

Neighbors and parents, some wearing headphones for language interpretation, listened to an Oakland officer explain certain colors, signs, and tattoos–like the numbers 13 and 14–that may be markers of gang activity.

“Gang Wars: Oakland” leaves locals perplexed, upset

Gangs are a complicated reality in Oakland, a city haunted by violence and the negative reputation that comes with it. But this fall, the nationwide broadcast of “Gang Wars: Oakland” added a new layer of complexity to many viewers’ already complicated feelings about what that violence means and how outsiders perceive it.

Batts to town hall: “We have got to stop the killing”

New Oakland Police Chief Anthony Batts, at the first of a series of town hall meetings, told a West Oakland audience last night that he understood why some urban residents view police officers as “an occupying army.” Among the proposals he said he’s considered in the past: a citywide curfew aimed at bringing down youth violence.