GANGS AND VIOLENCE

Number of crimes linked to gangs in the summer of 1993:

6 homicides 142 aggravated assaults

29 simple assaults

18 robberies

ACTIONS TAKEN

Some legislative initiatives linked to the "Summer of Violence":

• The creation of the Youthful Offender System, which gives juveniles convicted as adults one more chance to serve their time in a more rehabilitative facility than an adult prison.

• Expanded curfew programs.

• More stringent gun laws, including a statute that prohibits anyone younger than 18 from possessing a gun.

BY THE NUMBERS

10th: Where Colorado ranked for violent juvenile crime in the nation in 1993, according to one study.

1: Number of handguns the Denver Police Gang Unit was confiscating from gang members per day at the height of the violence in the summer of 1993.

15: Number of gang-related assaults per day in May and July of 1993.

SEMANTICS OF THE SUMMER

• The term "Summer of Violence" did not appear in print until July 28, 1993, as a headline in the Rocky Mountain News.

"Summer of Violence/Where will it end?" the headline asked.

That same day, Louis Roth III was driving home when someone fired five bullets into his vehicle.

Four days later, a schoolteacher named Lori Anne Lowe was shot to death in the parking lot outside her Arapahoe County apartment.

WOUNDED JUVENILES

Number of juveniles treated for gunshot or stab wounds at Denver Health (then Denver General)

1993: 58 2002: 22

JUVENILE OFFENDERS

In 1993, nearly one out of every four murder suspects arrested in Denver was a juvenile male.

In 2002, nearly one of eight murder suspects in Denver was a juvenile male.

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