Recent shootings concern officials, residents

A spate of summer shootings has created fear and concern among Chattanooga residents and a City Council member who say they've seen a spike in gang violence.

"There is more happening throughout the city of Chattanooga as far as the gang situation," District 5 Councilman Russell Gilbert said. "It seems to be getting worse from year to year."

At least seven shootings have occurred in the city this month, leaving 11 people with gunshot wounds, according to Times Free Press archives. Police say some of the shootings were gang related.

Gang members are suspected in a shooting last week that sent a stray bullet through a 15-year-old girl's window while she slept in her bed. Tara Dill, mother of the teenager, said Chattanooga police officers told her summer-time gang activity had escalated.

"The police did say the gangs have declared an all-in-all war on each other," she said. "I think people need to know that."

Chattanooga Police Chief Freeman Cooper said he did not know of any gang war but occasionally hears talk about feuding gangs.

"That's not unusual when we arrest individuals for incidents that are ongoing, that they say they may be at war against another gang," he said. "But that's just terms used, not the reality of what's going on out there."

Part of the problem, Mr. Gilbert said, is that city leaders denied there was a gang problem for many years.

"If we would have looked at this closer years before, when other people were saying there was a problem, maybe we wouldn't be at the level we're at now," Mr. Gilbert said.

Chattanooga Mayor Ron Littlefield said in a televised interview last week that officials may have hurt themselves by not adequately addressing the situation.

"We perhaps did ourselves no favors over the years by denying that we have a gang presence here; it just wasn't that strong," the mayor said.

City spokesman Richard Beeland said that had the issue "been addressed more in the past, maybe we wouldn't have as many problems now."

But Chattanooga police say the level of violence is no higher than it was last summer, when the stabbing of a man in East Lake Courts in June led to a day of shootings, fire bombings and a car fire. Typically, those who are shot know the shooter and are involved in illicit activity, police said.

Mr. Gilbert admits that gangs here are more of a mechanism for selling drugs than the highly organized enterprises thought to exist in larger areas.

"It's really all about territory and selling drugs," he said. "Whoever has the biggest territory can sell the most drugs."

"DEVASTATING" FEAR

During a shooting that involved suspected gang members last week, a bullet shattered a window in the bedroom of James and Tara Dill's 15-year-old daughter, then struck a wall just a foot above the girl's pillow.

The shooting left the Dill's two teenage children scared to sleep at their Holiday Hills Circle home off Bonny Oaks Drive.

"It's devastating," Mrs. Dill said of the shooting, which took place about 2 a.m. "You're thinking, 'My child could have died if she was turned differently.'"

Because investigators do not always have suspects, determining whether shootings are gang-related is difficult, said Sgt. Todd Royvals, who oversees the department's crime suppression unit.

"It hinges mostly on the suspects, a lot of what victims are telling us, who we think suspects are," he said. "If a possible suspect gets shot at the next night, obviously it's a retaliation shooting. But a lot of times, we don't have suspect information and we can't put it together."

Police log each shooting to determine whether the incidents are connected and if they resulted from gang violence, Chief Cooper said. The department also has educated officers on how to spot gang connections at a crime scene, though it has not shifted any personnel specifically for tracking gangs, police said.

"It's an ongoing effort for us to stay on top of matters, and our end result is to end all shootings or any type of violent crime," Chief Cooper said.

Officers are taught to look for such things as the colors of the clothes being worn by those involved in the incidents as well as the kinds of tattoos they may have, police have said.