Police task force arrives… Red Scorpions gang member temporarily leaves

GANG MEMBER LEFT FOR WEEKEND TO AVOID TASK FORCE

KAMLOOPS – The province's integrated anti-gang agency is praising Kamloops RCMP for the detachment's work at curbing organized crime in the city.

This comes one week after the Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit helped Kamloops RCMP arrest eight people who may have links to gang activity.

The unit's spokesperson, Staff Sgt. Lindsey Houghton, says once a Red Scorpions member got word of the task force heading to Kamloops, he fled for the weekend.

"That disrupted any activity he may have been a part of that weekend," Houghton says.

But gang activity isn't exclusive to Kamloops, and Houghton says organized crime isn't necessarily on the rise in the city, or in places like Vernon.

"I don’t think it would be accurate to say there was a rise or a fall (of gang activity) in any of those communities," Houghton says.

He calls people involved in organized crime "unbelievably transient," meaning they're not prominent in the community all the time.

“We have seen spikes in street-level drug-related… activity as they fight for control over the street-level drug trade,” Houghton says. "No community in B.C. is immune to it. We saw that in Vernon and that prompted our response to Vernon RCMP."

Houghton says since the special enforcement unit went up to Vernon in the spring, street-level violence has decreased. 

He also points to Kamloops RCMP's work on the short-lived Wolfpack gang, which seemed to be in and out of Kamloops quickly.

"Whether it's Kamloops or Fort St. John, these groups are always fighting over that street-level drug trade," Houghton says.


To contact a reporter for this story, email Ashley Legassic or call 250-319-7494 or email the editor. You can also submit photos, videos or news tips to the newsroom and be entered to win a monthly prize draw.

We welcome your comments and opinions on our stories but play nice. We won't censor or delete comments unless they contain off-topic statements or links, unnecessary vulgarity, false facts, spam or obviously fake profiles. If you have any concerns about what you see in comments, email the editor in the link above. 

Join the Conversation!

Want to share your thoughts, add context, or connect with others in your community? Create a free account to comment on stories, ask questions, and join meaningful discussions on our new site.

Leave a Reply

Ashley Legassic

Ashley was born and raised in B.C., and recently moved to Kamloops from Vancouver. She pursued her diploma in journalism at Langara College and graduated in 2015. She got her start as an overnight writer for the Morning News on Global B.C. After spending a year there, she decided to follow her passion and joined iNFOnews.ca as a reporter covering court, cops and crime in Kamloops. If you have a story you think people should know about, email her at alegassic@infonews.ca.


Ashley Legassic's Stories

More Articles