Honolulu police have resurrected a database that helps officers track the membership and movements of O'ahu gangs.

With federal law enforcement money, the Honolulu Police Department in March began entering names, locations and other information into a central database administered by the department's Juvenile Services Division.

The database is part of a coordinated effort with law enforcement agencies in Honolulu and on the Mainland, and, though it is maintained by HPD, it is shared with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, State Department of Public Safety, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Association and other organizations.

Tracking the movement and evolution of gangs allows law enforcement agencies to deploy resources to areas where activity or membership is high. It also allows officials to identify links between gang members, and learn how and why they interact.

"We're very fortunate because the issues we have with so-called 'gangs' pale in comparison to what we see and read about on the Mainland," said Honolulu police Maj. Frank T. Fujii. "The message here is, if we're going to keep gangs out, or at a minimum here in Honolulu, it is going to take community effort."

Police officials said it has been difficult to track whether gang violence and activity has been increasing here.

More than 100 gangs are active in Honolulu, with most, such as the Samoan USOs and the Filipino Pinoy Boys and Bad Boys of Ilocano, organized by ethnicity. Others, like the Aliamanu Boys and Salt Lake Boys, form through neighborhood affiliations.

Street gangs, prison gangs and outlaw motorcycle gangs are the primary retail distributors of illicit drugs in the Hawai'i region, according to the National Drug Intelligence Center.

The groups are typically composed of members of various ethnicities who were born and raised in Hawai'i.

Kendrick D. Williams, acting special agent in charge of the FBI's Honolulu division, said the gang situation in Hawai'i and Honolulu is a "concern" but not a problem.

International criminal gangs such as MS-13, the Chinese Triads and the Latin Kings do not have established chapters in Hawai'i, he said, but members or affiliates often pass through and have been found scouting out territory or interacting with local criminal organizations.

"I would characterize Hawai'i's circumstance as a gang concern, not necessarily a gang problem. É Anytime you have a place like Hawai'i that represents a crossroads, you get people coming and going and that's good people and people who shouldn't be doing what they are doing," Williams said. "We keep a tag on any type of emerging type entities, like the USOs, and derivatives and offshoots of that. You always have wannabes playing it out."

NATIONAL DATABASE

Williams said a "major, pro-active" intelligence effort goes on in Hawai'i that incorporates the state, the four county police departments, federal law enforcement agencies and agencies on the Mainland.

"You don't want it to become a gang problem like what you see in L.A. or other cities. Nobody wants that here," Williams said.

After the loss of the Hawaii Gang Members Tracking System in 2004, HPD did not have an organized way to track and monitor activity.

Funding for the statewide computer database was provided by the Office of Youth Services through a grant. The funding was discontinued because there was limited use by the police departments and the system was not set up to purge outdated information.

Gang information collected by HPD is now being entered into the Western States Intelligence Network's Regional Information Sharing Systems National Gang Database.

The WSIN region includes Alaska, California, Hawai'i, Oregon and Washington. The center, based in Sacramento, also has member agencies in Canada, Australia and Guam.

Access to information in the database is granted to select personnel by the commander of the Juvenile Services Division on a case-by-case basis. Information is gathered from officers who come into contact with suspected gang members in the field, and the inputting officer follows specific criteria for the purpose of gang recognition.

The Juvenile Services Division collects and reviews all information and forwards it to WSIN to be entered into the center's database.

WORKING WITH YOUTH

Youth gangs in schools and public housing areas are handled by the state Department of Education, Honolulu police and a local nonprofit group. The state Office of Youth Services contracts with Adult Friends for Youth, a nonprofit agency that has worked with youth gangs and at-risk youth for more than 20 years.

Through school and community-based outreach, Adult Friends for Youth reaches 200 to 300 high-risk youth per week, and it is currently focusing on Waipahu and Farrington high schools and surrounding communities. At Farrington, Adult Friends for Youth works with members of 19 youth gangs and would like to expand its work to include other O'ahu high schools. However, resources from the state and other sources are scarce.

On Nov. 15, more than a hundred youngsters from Kalihi and Waipahu fought inside Pearlridge Center. Six boys were taken to the hospital in stable condition for treatment immediately following the melee, which took place on a Saturday afternoon while the mall was packed with people.

"It's amazing that something like these incidents occur and never get any public attention. Nobody talks about working with the kids that are at the grassroots of the problem," said Sidney M. Rosen, founder of Adult Friends for Youth.

"It seems that everybody is trying to isolate the good kids from the bad kids, and once the kid gets labeled as a gang member they don't get help. Unless we reach these kids and give them the help that they need, the cycle will perpetuate itself. The (gang) problem is increasing."

On Dec. 27, the same group of boys fought again in the parking lot of Pearlridge. No arrests were made during the second fight and, unlike the first melee, no one was injured.

"Whether it's setup fights or rumbles, the police in Kalihi are already tired of going to these fights," said Malakai Maumalanga, an Adult Friends for Youth staff member and former gang member who left the life and earned a master's degree in social work. "They are fighting with everybody and anybody, and they are fighting after school and in other communities."

HELPING SCHOOLS

The state Department of Education collaborates with HPD to participate in the national Gang Resistance Education and Training program, which is administered at 23 public middle schools on O'ahu.

According to Honolulu police, GREAT is designed to help middle school students become responsible members of their communities by setting goals, resisting gang and peer pressures, learning how to resolve conflicts and understanding how gangs affect the quality of their lives.

"If an individual school determines they are having gang problems, they contact HPD's juvenile services gang unit directly and work with them. It's really on a school-by-school basis," said Dave Randall, an educational specialist for health and physical education for the state Department of Education. "Schools have rules against showing gang signs and gang paraphernalia. We make sure that there is no gang activity taking place on campus within the school day."