Gang bill, deemed 'overly broad,' dies in committee again

A bill taking aim at criminal gangs and gang crime was tabled to death in a Mississippi Senate committee Tuesday.

In spite of generally agreeing that the issue of gang violence needs to be addressed, the committee said they felt the bill was overly broad and needs to be made much more narrow in order to keep overzealous police and prosecutors from rounding up groups of people for arbitrary reasons. Authors of the bill, however, say they believe the language is clear.

"The problem is struggling with the definition of gang activity, and I think we're still trying to explain why a high school football team isn't a gang, or I suppose why the cheerleading squad isn't a gang," said Judiciary B Chairman Hob Bryan, D-Amory.

The bill, known as the Mississippi Gang Act, does describe the definition of gangs in Section 2, with one caveat being that the members of the group are involved in criminal activity. It also states that the term does not include people associated in law or in fact who are not engaged in criminal gang activity. An amendment to the bill out of an abundance of caution excepts sports teams and any charitable organization or business, such as fraternities, said Jackson, George and Greene County District Attorney Tony Lawrence, who helped author the bill.

"I don’t think any member of the committee disagrees with having a policy of trying to rid gangs from the state of Mississippi. We just don’t want it to create more problems," said Sen. Derrick Simmons, D-Greenville. "Without the proper training of officers, without putting the right dollars behind giving all these law enforcement agencies the professional development and training they need, we just possibly create a situation where, as opposed to promoting community policing, we are in turn promoting hyper-criminalization."

Lawrence said he was shocked to hear that the language was still an issue after he had tweaked the bill more than once.

"Those concerns that were brought up yesterday were brought to me by Sen. (Brice) Wiggins (R-Pascagoula) last week and I felt the language not only addressed the concerns, but I don’t know any law enforcement or prosecutor in the state that would prosecute a sports team under a gang act," Lawrence said.

Sen. Chris McDaniel, R-Ellisville, said in places where the law is even a little ambiguous, it is open to abuse.

"We can’t keep encouraging a culture of over-criminalization. There are far too many young people already incarcerated, so whenever we construct a criminal statute, it has to be very narrow," he said. "The process sometimes is slow and cumbersome, but it’s supposed to be — the deprivation of someone’s freedom, that’s an incredibly powerful thing for the state to do."

Simmons said he wasn't convinced the bill wouldn't cause problems with race, age, or socioeconomic profiling, although gangs in Mississippi span the spectrum of all of those things.

Wiggins said if the bill is perceived as vague, the wording needs to be addressed for next year.

"The reality is that there were some things that could be seen as over-broad. That’s the committee process," he said. "The idea was to get a bill that can address the problem, because there is a gang problem in this state, but also to have a bill that can be voted on and passed on the Senate floor."

"That’s what I think is a really good part of the legislative process is that you’re vetting the bill to get the right bill, especially in this case where you’re dealing with crime, civil liberties, things that have gone on in this country," he continued. "We owe it to the citizens to get the right legislation."

A combined bill in the House still target aspects of gang activity, Lawrence said. House Bill 1367 addresses witness intimidation and false affidavits used to disrupt the criminal justice system, and makes killing a state witness a capital offense. But without SB 2027, "it's going to be another long and frustrating year for law enforcement and prosecutors," Lawrence said.

Lawrence said a coastal gang task force "declared war" on the gangs on the coast a year and a half ago, and they were counting on the bill to help them in those endeavors. He said just because someone is charged with a crime does not mean they're charged under the gang act unless law enforcement can meet the burden of proof that shows they are affiliated with a gang.

"No prosecutor in the state would charge a basketball team. We're fighting Latin Kings, Simon City Royals, people who are killing and robbing and committing crimes," he said. "There is a very strict verification process."

The bill would allow for training for local law enforcement agencies through the Mississippi Association of Gang Investigators, and special programs in schools to encourage kids to stay away from gangs.

Wiggins said the fact that the final committee discussion on the bill fell on deadline day was a detriment to getting all the concerns addressed, as he and fellow bill sponsor Sen. Gray Tollison, R-Oxford, were unable to attend the committee meeting.

"The bill ended up dying, but I know that I’m committed to getting it passed. You have the prosecutors, you have the gang investigators, you have people that now understand the bad gang situation in the state of Mississippi, led for example by the horrible (Jessica) Chambers murder. It’s the right thing to do for us to get this passed," he said.

Contact Therese Apel at 601-961-7236 or tapel@gannett.com. Follow her on Facebook and Twitter.