Problem+Research

**//[|West's Encyclopedia of American Law].//** Ed. Shirelle Phelps and Jeffrey Lehman. Vol. 5. 2nd ed. Detroit: Gale, 2005. p30-34.
 * //[|Encyclopedia of Drugs, Alcohol & Addictive Behavior].//** Ed. Pamela Korsmeyer and Henry R. Kranzler. Vol. 2. 3rd ed. Detroit: Macmillan Reference USA, 2009. p196-202.
 * Gang Violence started about 200 years ago.
 * Studies specifically on gangs have indicated that at least 90 percent of their samples have ever used alcohol, and between 80 percent and 90 percent have ever used cannabis.
 * (cannabis is also know as marijuana)
 * 90 percent of gang members are male
 * Seventy-one percent of these members are between the ages of 15 and 24, and 16 percent are age 14 or under
 * About 79 percent of the gang members, according to this survey, are Hispanic or black, while only 14 percent are white
 * To statistics from the National Youth Gang Center, more than 24,500 gangs, consisting of more than 770,000 members, exist in about 3,330 cities in the United States