Forest Park Safe? (Chicago, Naperville, Cicero: cul-de-sac, 2015, violent crime)

[ToriaT]

Also many of the so called sports bars in Forest Park are not that. They are trendy bars and restaurants and not frequented by people you would customarily think of going to a sports bar.

[Lookout Kid]

Originally Posted by ToriaT

Also I frequent Berwyn and despite what people say never have seen anything to go down that would be gang related or the like.

I knew a woman who lived near this incident in Berwyn, and it spooked her quite a bit.

Police from six towns break up South Berwyn gang party

[ToriaT]

Well I am sure. But the post is from 2008 which is quite a number of years ago. Lets hope the Berwyn police have gotten smart on how to control gangs in the suburb....also note the residency of the people that were taken into custody. Westmont, Lisle, Lagrange.....as well as other places. Yes it can happen, but it doesn't necessarily mean its rife with gangs. I am sure that there is some gang activity it just does not seem that visible to me. Supposedly Berwyn has a police surveillance vehicle it parks in areas where there might be a reported presence of gang or illegal activity to let them know "we are out there and watching you" . Don't know if this is true.

[chitownperson]

I agree Toria, that it's important to point out that incident goes back to 2008 and WEDGE have done a remarkable job in that respect. I also agree that it's interesting to note the residency of some of the backyard participants being from Westmont, Lisle and Lagrange. If we're to take such info as signs of gang activity in such suburbs, then we'll also have to take into account the supposed "gang activity" in the suburbs shown in the site below

[ CHICAGOGANGS.ORG] GANGS IN THE SUBURBS

Note that literally every suburb is shown to have "gangs", include the most affluent and furthest away from the city. "Gang activity" is obviously a very vague term, which could mean anything from a group of Latin Kings gang banging on a street corner, to some tough guy wannabe dealer in some white suburb that has some ties to a gang… I think this shows the importance of not taking singular events as evidence of and area having gang problems. I've yet to see gangs hanging out and causing trouble in places like Forest Park, Berwyn etc… But the real threat of gangs to the suburbs is the Heroin they important, and that's not limited to the inner ring suburbs, nor the less affluent ones.

[ToriaT]

I agree chitownperson. The real threat is drugs and the crime that brings along with it. That is an interesting website but it causes more questions than it answers. I can't figure out where these gangs might be in Wheaton because I've been living here since 1989 and never seen a hint of them. Of course that does not mean they don't exist. Or maybe they just don't commit many crimes here. My perception is the courts in dupage county are stricter and mete out harsher sentencing so maybe they are more low key. In Chicago and some of Cook county anything goes and the gang party you posted about might go unreported and unnoticed there.

[chitownperson]

It's true, Toria, that the site poses more questions. It's hard to tell what instances served to attach those gangs to those suburbs. The point of bringing that site up was that it's not alway black and white when a singular instance is brought up, as you alluded to before, so you can't look at the Berwyn incident back in 2008 as evidence that Berwyn has a gang problem. So when talking about gangs in suburbs it really comes down to specific analysis of what's actually happening in terms of crime and what motivation gangs have to go where. A gang leader of the "body snatchers" faction of the "Four Corner Hustlers" was found living in St. Charles (the body snatchers are a very violent faction of the gang). He moved there because it was safer for him to move further away from the city while still running his organization. If a gang leader has a tone of money, there's less incentive for him to live in the hood or stand on a street corner peddling drugs, so where to go? Wealther suburbs provide good cover while living a nice life. This is of course 1 of many possible answers for what gangs are going in suburbs, but selling drugs to suburban white kids seems to remain the biggest motivation, judging from the sky rocketing increase of hard drug use in dupage county and places like Naperville.

[Lookout Kid]

Originally Posted by chitownperson

...so you can't look at the Berwyn incident back in 2008 as evidence that Berwyn has a gang problem.

Berwyn has a well-documented problem with Hispanic gangs. It it totally out of hand? No. Are most Berwyn residents exposed to it? No. But it's there.

[chitownperson]

It's pretty isolated to a portion of a border, and WEDGE has been dealing with it, so I don't know what documentation you're referring to, but I don't know if saying Berwyn has a "gang" "problem" is entirely accurate. There are gang member activities from Elmhurst to Downners Grove too, but I wouldn't say they had a "problem". People just tend to jump the gun a bit with the inner ring suburbs, because they are close to the city, while ignoring the wealthier suburbs further out. Would it be fair to say that all that Heroin kids are doing in those far west and north suburbs are from gangs, so they have a "gang problem"? Cause whether the Latin Kings are standing on a corner or not, their business is selling smack to addicts.

[Lookout Kid]

Originally Posted by chitownperson

Would it be fair to say that all that Heroin kids are doing in those far west and north suburbs are from gangs, so they have a "gang problem"? Cause whether the Latin Kings are standing on a corner or not, their business is selling smack to addicts.

You love to talk about kids using heroin in the burbs, almost to the point of taking delight. I can tell you I'd rather live next to a teenager snorting heroin alone in his bedroom than some gang members trafficking the drug--though in a perfect world, neither would exist.

[chet everett]

Originally Posted by chitownperson

I agree Toria, that it's important to point out that incident goes back to 2008 and WEDGE have done a remarkable job in that respect. I also agree that it's interesting to note the residency of some of the backyard participants being from Westmont, Lisle and Lagrange. If we're to take such info as signs of gang activity in such suburbs, then we'll also have to take into account the supposed "gang activity" in the suburbs shown in the site below

[ CHICAGOGANGS.ORG] GANGS IN THE SUBURBS

Note that literally every suburb is shown to have "gangs", include the most affluent and furthest away from the city. "Gang activity" is obviously a very vague term, which could mean anything from a group of Latin Kings gang banging on a street corner, to some tough guy wannabe dealer in some white suburb that has some ties to a gang… I think this shows the importance of not taking singular events as evidence of and area having gang problems. I've yet to see gangs hanging out and causing trouble in places like Forest Park, Berwyn etc…

Quick friend, make the edits to fix that. I'll give you a hint, nothing between "Cicero" & "Coal City" in alphabetic order... Somehow it does not surprise that in running your little phony baloney scare site you also left off Glencoe, Lake Forest, Kennilworth and Winnetka.

Really this detour is silly. What ever "gang tagging" has been observed in a town like Forest Park is almost certainly "wanna be" behavior. The OP should not take the info on the "gang site" with any credibility.