WICHITA, Kan. — A recent article in Inquest argues that law enforcement’s use of subjective “gang member” designations can carry serious personal and legal consequences, often without clear standards or meaningful oversight.
Sharon Brett, a law professor at the University of Kansas, wrote in Inquest on Tuesday, April 14, that only 10 states have statutes establishing explicit, consistent criteria for identifying gangs and gang members. The remaining 40 states rely on their own frameworks, often focused on “expressive symbols, social ties, geographic locational, and claims from third parties.”
In Wichita, Kansas, the Wichita Police Department uses a gang intelligence database to designate and track individuals it suspects are members of a criminal street gang. Martel Costello was a teenager when he was added to the database following a 2016 arrest on unrelated charges. Brett notes that Costello told police he “was not, and had not ever been,” a gang member.
“After Costello attended his younger brother’s funeral, WPD officers arrested him for violating the terms of his probation,” Brett writes. “Other people in the database—including his own family members—had been present at the burial; Costello had therefore violated the terms of his probation.”
Costello’s case was far from isolated, according to the article. Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who made headlines last month after being deported to El Salvador, was targeted by the Trump administration because of his 2019 designation as a member of MS-13.
“The evidence? Abrego Garcia’s clothing, and the word of an unnamed informant,” Brett writes.
State laws that define gang membership and activity are often intentionally vague, resulting in long lists of people with no gang affiliations operating under conditions of heightened surveillance. According to Brett, many people are unaware that their names are on such lists until they face high bail or harsh probation conditions after arrests for unrelated allegations.
“Those who are designated as gang members and put on probation, like Costello, are barred from associating with anyone else in the database—but are not always allowed to even know whom that might include,” Brett writes. “Violating their probation can result in years of imprisonment.”
Arbitrary gang designations can also affect individuals outside the courtroom, limiting their ability to get jobs, pass background checks and receive public benefits. Brett further argues that federal agencies such as Immigration and Customs Enforcement can use “a single unverified police report” to quickly deport residents.
“Officers can label someone a gang member in one jurisdiction, and that information is viewable by officers in agencies hundreds of miles away,” Brett writes. “Gang designations thus feed the machinery of mass incarceration, ensnaring innocent people based on arbitrary criteria.”
The article urges litigation and grassroots organizing to challenge the use of subjective gang designations by law enforcement. Brett argues the practices conflict with constitutional protections, including the Fourteenth Amendment’s due process clause and the First Amendment’s protections for individual liberties.
Community action can be particularly effective in addressing harmful police practices, Brett writes. In Chicago, residents organized door-to-door campaigns and lobbying efforts to eliminate the city’s gang database. In 2023, police ended the program.
“Gang designations will endure—beyond current immigration crackdowns, inside and outside of the criminal legal system—unless we understand where they come from and direct at least some attention toward the project of their abolition,” Brett writes. “Armed with that awareness, advocates can engage in localized political and legal pressure to make gang designations a relic of the past.”
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