LA cops thwarted by woke reforms blocking them from tracking 80,000 gang suspects
The Los Angeles Police Department says it has struggled to track street gang activity since it was barred from using an internal intelligence database following pressure from police reform advocates.
Capt. Ahmad Zarekani, who leads the LAPD’s Gang and Narcotics Division, said investigations into gang-related crime have been hindered since the department stopped using the CalGang database in 2020.
“By our own rules and ordinances, we’re not supposed to keep track of gang members,” Zarekani said in an interview with the California Post. “Now we’re not allowed to track anyone by their gang association.”
The CalGang system previously contained personal information on roughly 80,000 suspected gang members. Police say that information is no longer available to investigators.
In July 2020, California’s then–Attorney General, Xavier Becerra, ordered law enforcement agencies across the state to stop using the database after allegations that some officers had entered inaccurate gang affiliations. The move followed increased pressure from activists calling for police reforms after the death of George Floyd and the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement.
Advocacy groups, including the Liberty Hill Foundation, supported ending the database, arguing that it disproportionately targeted Black and Latino men, who accounted for about 90% of the individuals listed in it.
However, Bill Essayli, the U.S. Attorney for the Central District of California, said the change has made it harder for local authorities to combat gang activity and shifted more responsibility onto federal prosecutors.
“They’re not reforms — what’s the opposite of reform? It’s degrading,” Essayli said. He added that the decision reflects what he described as state leadership prioritizing criminals over law-abiding residents.
Essayli also criticized activist groups that pushed to dismantle the database, saying they focus too heavily on statistics when arguing that government policies are discriminatory.
“I don’t care about statistics — I care about individual victims who are harmed every day in California,” he said, noting that many victims of crime are people of color.
Los Angeles attorney Scott Meyers, who is running for the California State Assembly, said the decision to eliminate the database shows how public safety policy has been influenced by activist pressure.
“The lawmakers have bent a knee to extremists,” Meyers said, arguing that activists are pushing policies that weaken law enforcement.
The controversy over the database also included allegations of misconduct within the LAPD. Criminal charges were filed against three officers accused of knowingly entering false information into the system, while another 21 officers were investigated. A previous LAPD audit had also found that some database entries were inconsistent or unreliable.
Despite the loss of the system, law enforcement agencies continue to pursue gang investigations. This week, federal agents and LAPD officers carried out a joint operation targeting the 18th Street Gang.
The operation, known as “Operation Dead Horse,” lasted three days and focused on the gang’s leadership structure. Authorities arrested 12 people on charges including drug trafficking, extortion, murder, racketeering, and illegal gambling.
Among those arrested was Keiko Marie Gonzalez, 59, also known as “Moms,” “La Señora,” and “The Queen.” Prosecutors allege she helped run the gang on behalf of her husband, Jorge Gonzales, who is currently serving time in a California state prison and is reportedly connected to the Mexican Mafia.
Other suspects arrested included Edward Escalante, 49, known as “Toro,” and Edwin Martinez, 32, who was known as “Dreamer.”
Even with the arrests, Zarekani said it is difficult for police to estimate the number of gang members operating in Los Angeles without the old database.
“In LA, we have the hub of gang activity in the whole country,” he said.
“Before, when you identified a gang member, you could go to a database and create a file for them. You took pictures of tattoos and monitored where they worked. All of that was basically lost.”
The 18th Street Gang, also known as Barrio 18, is a large multi-ethnic street gang that originated in Los Angeles and now has an estimated 30,000 to 50,000 members across the United States, Mexico, and Central America.
Zarekani said the recent arrests dealt a “significant blow” to the gang, though authorities expect it will attempt to rebuild.
“Now what they need to do is restructure their leadership. It’s going to take time to recoup,” he said. “But I’m sure they’re going to try to rebuild. To what capacity, we don’t know right now.”
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