Deputies warn of gangs in county

By Annie McCallum

Published: November 19, 2008

The Amherst County School Board got a lesson on crime during a recent board meeting. Division officials met with sheriff’s office representatives to discuss crime in the division.

Some board members were surprised to hear the presence of gangs is not something readily discussed in the community.

Amherst sheriff’s Sgt. Denny Black praised the strong relationship between the school system and his office, saying officials have briefed administrators and on gangs, but parents don’t seem interested.

“A lot of times we’re not interested until it has an impact on us and then its too late,” Black said.

Black said gangs and gang-related crime are issues in Amherst County, as hard as that may be for some people to believe.

“We’re seeing a big increase as far as the activity,” he said. “It’s growing. It’s intensifying. If we don’t get a grip on it, it will be a bigger problem down the road.”

Amherst Investigator Gerald Higginbotham presented a PowerPoint to division officials documenting gang activity. Before starting, he told board members all the photos were from Amherst, not “big cities.” In fact, he said, most pictures are from the schools in the county.

“Eight years ago if you asked me if there was a gang problem, I’d probably laugh at you,” Higginbotham said, adding now that’s simply not the case.

As he showed slide after slide of gang tags, tattooed students, and various hand signals, he explained most of his gang information comes from the county’s schools. The average age of a gang member is between 12 and 14 years old, he said.

“The SROs (school resource officers) are my support, without them I don’t have any information,” he said.

After the presentation, which also included a visit from Tina (one of the county’s drug dogs), Superintendent Brian Ratliff thanked sheriff’s officials.

Ratliff also suggested the board think of times when they might have “captive audience” of parents where they could get across gang information and inform people who might not realize there’s a problem.