Two counties' top cops say gangs and guns do not see borders on a map and it will take a combined effort by law enforcement to prevent the further spread of both.
Lake County Sheriff John Buncich, in a news conference Friday in Crown Point with Cook County Sheriff Thomas Dart, said his department has identified about 2,000 gang members in Lake County. Several thousand gang members move freely back and forth between the two counties, they said.
The two men came together to announce the rollout of a Gang Prevention and Intervention Plan for all of Lake County, developed with the assistance of law enforcement officials in both counties and the latest research on gang violence prevention.
"Through our conversations we have come to realize Cook County's problems and Lake County's problems are pretty much the same," Buncich said.
Gangs and guns are No. 1 on the list.
"Guns, as you all know, are everywhere," Dart said.
Guns from Indiana are the No. 2 source of guns found at Chicago crime scenes behind guns purchased in Illinois, Dart said.
Buncich said gun shows remain a problem in Lake County. He said he has butted heads with the county's Board of Commissioners over the use of the Lake County Fairgrounds in Crown Point for shows.
"We know where they are coming from. The question is what do we do about it," Dart said.
Buncich said plans call for working more closely with the community through clergy and educators to try to get a handle on growing gang membership. The partnership will include the development of a joint strategy to combat gun trafficking and gang activity across the Illinois-Indiana border and a strategy to reduce the number of youths involved in gangs in the two counties.
Plans also call for sharing data and information more efficiently to track and capture criminals and pinpoint problem areas, and participating in the Cook County Gun Violence Task Force, among other measures.
Dart said the cooperation between the two departments is "unfortunately not the norm" in law enforcement, but the results have been really good. Both counties' drug and gun units have been working together for years.
"The issues going on around the nation starts with us in law enforcement being out in the community in an open way, a nonconfrontational way, not just at crime scenes," Dart said. Those types of relationships must be established and do not happen overnight, nor will they come about if the only interaction in the community is arresting people, he said.