Determined - Lake Illawarra Local Area Commander Superintendent Michael Willing has handpicked a team to investigate gang activi
Strikeforce to target gangs
July 02, 2009
Section: News
LAKE Illawarra area commander Superintendent Michael Willing sent his strongest message yet to members of so-called ‘postcode gangs’ that police know who they are and will use all of their powers to catch them before someone is killed.
“We are very concerned about the violence that we saw a couple of weeks ago when two young people were stabbed,’’ Superintendent Willing said last week.
“My fear is what’s going to happen – without being alarmist – is that we are going to get a drive-by shooting.’’
Superintendent Willing said he had picked a ‘flying squad’ called strikeforce Maye - comprising detectives and police from the highway patrol and crime prevention units and were using social networking sites as intelligence to track gang members.
“I have assembled this group of people, who are good at getting out and about and catching crooks basically, wholely and solely to get these guys.
“We know they’re out there – CMF and Warilla Boys - postcode gangs if you like – and I will take the fight up to these guys.’’
Superintendent Willing said he feared if the gang activity was not stopped now, members would graduate to more serious crime.
“The people who are in these gangs are largely born and bred here and are very connected to this area,’’ he said. “It’s not like we can cause them grief and they’ll move on. My concern is that as they get older, they will step up from minor type crime into the realm of being more organised and the last thing I want to see is a death.’’
Superintendent Willing said there had already been a number of charges for different matters and that detectives working on the recent stabbings were confident of a result soon.
The commander also said he was concerned that gang-related violence had “spilled over into schools’’.
“I raised the issue with all the school principals at a forum last week and they equally raised it with me.’’ Anyone with any information that could help the police with their inquiries is urged to call Warilla Police on 4295 2699 or Crimestoppers on 1800 333 000.
