Dr Charles Katz received his Ph.D. in Criminal Justice from the University of Nebraska at Omaha. He is currently an Associate Professor of Criminal Justice and Criminology at Arizona State University. Dr Katz has co-authored or co-edited two previous books and has been published in several scholarly journals such as Criminology, Justice Quarterly, and Crime and Delinquency. Dr Katz has conducted research in over 20 police agencies across the United States as well as several state and federal agencies. Dr Vincent Webb received his Ph.D. in sociology from the State University of Iowa. He served as chair of the Department of Criminal Justice at the University of Nebraska at Omaha for over 20 years and as chair of the Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology at Arizona State University for seven years. In 2005 he joined the faculty at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale as Director of the Center for the Study of Crime, Delinquency and Corrections. Dr Webb has published in a variety of criminology and criminal justice journals including Justice Quarterly, Crime and Delinquency, Criminal Justice and Behavior, and Criminology. He is the coauthor/coeditor of three other books on criminal justice topics. He served as the Principal Investigator for the Joint Commission on Criminal Justice and Criminology Education and Standards. He is a former President of the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences. He has presented research papers at numerous conference both in the United States and in several other countries, and he has served as a consultant on several national research projects evaluating criminal justice policies and practices.

• 1. Studying the police response to gangs; 2. Setting and methods; 3. Historical analysis of gangs and gang control; 4. Scope and nature of the current gang problem; 5. Form, function, and management of the police gang unit; 6. The gang unit officer; 7. On the job; 8. Policing gangs in a time of community policing; 9. Conclusion and implications; References.