Paul Bass Photo
Spell with Assistant U.S. Attorney Peter Markle at this week’s Project Longevity call-in.
Stacy Spell used to track down gang members like the ones staring at him, so he could lock them up. This time he had a different mission.
The summoned gang members wore T‑shirts and tattoos. They sat in two rows of chairs. Wiping sweat from his brow, Spell, a dreadlock-wearing neighborhood organizer and retired homicide detective dressed in a suit, paced among them with urgency in both his step and his radio-announcer baritone.
“Whether you’re reppin’ down bottom in the Tre, whether you’re reppin’ up top in the Tre, or you’re reppin’ the almighty Latin Kings, or you’re reppin’ Read Street,” he told them, “we’re all connected.”
“We’re all here to say: This has to stop.”
The 23 assembled gang members stared back, saying nothing. They weren’t here Monday afternoon in the Gateway Community Room to talk. Spell hoped talking would come later.
They were here because their probation or parole officers ordered them to be there. Law enforcement had identified them as among the most likely young New Haveners to be involved in the city’s next shootings. So they were there as guests of honor at the latest “call-in” of an anti-violence initiative known as “Project Longevity.”
New Haven, the U.S. Attorney’s Office and the governor launched the project here in November 2012, then took it to cities statewide. It identifies the small number of gang-related young men most involved in violence. It brings them to these call-ins to hear from law enforcement officials and community leaders. They hear a plea to stop the violence. Then they get a choice: Take advantage of immediate help in finding jobs, housing, medical care or earning degrees to straighten out their lives. Or go back to shooting — in which case local, state and federal agents will come down on their entire groups to put them behind bars for decades under federal mandatory minimum sentencing laws.
The project is modeled after similar initiatives credited with reducing violence nationwide. Shootings and murders have consistently dropped in New Haven since the launch. It’s unclear how much credit should go to Project Longevity as opposed to unrelated drug-gang sweeps, revived community policing, and stepped-up civic anti-violence efforts. Problems within New Haven’s project under a previous leader contribute to the confusion; officials claim they have no statistics of any kind to report on recidivism or referrals for help among participants in New Haven’s first six call-ins.
Now those same officials hope Stacy Spell can turn that around. They brought him out of retirement as a police detective in November to take command of New Haven’s Project Longevity and launch version 2.0, with a clearer message, better connections to the community and, eventually, data on results.
Spell has worked hard since then to re-seed the program in the community, where his volunteer efforts with young people on the block, combined with his blunt-talking, evangelical fervor for saving lives, have earned him credibility.
He organized the first call-in on Feb. 10; he said eight to 10 of the 26 gang-bangers called in that day have since sought his help, while none has yet been rearrested. Monday afternoon’s session at Gateway was the second call-in Spell has organized so far.
He poured his heart into it.
“I’m a son of New Haven who lost two nephews to the street” as well as “half a dozen cousins,” Spell said. He spoke of the pain that caused his relatives. He spoke of murder scenes he arrived at as a detective, of lives he saw wasted, of ineffable pain transmitted to family members of the lost.
“Some of you have been shot,” he noted. Others have been the shooter. All are in danger of ending up on the wrong side of the next bullet.
Behind him, as he spoke, the invitees saw the project’s official message projected:
• Homicides and violence must STOP
• If you want help, we will make you a PRIORITY
• We need for you to do BETTER
• Tell EVERY ONE to stop shooting.
PUT THE GUNS DOWN!
They saw the project’s “four promises” projected:
1. The next group that KILLS someone will get the spotlight.
2. The MOST VIOLENT group will get our focused attention.
3. Our community WILL NOT tolerate the violence.
4. If you want help, we will make you a PRIORITY to do everything we can to assist you.
And they saw dozens of mugshots projected. They belonged to young New Haveners who came to earlier call-ins — and then failed to stop themselves or fellow members of the Playboys and Exit gangs from shooting people. Project Longevity has since arrested them, as promised, on federal gun or narcotics charges, which in many cases carry decades of jail time.
Spell urged the assembled gang-bangers not to take the messages as a threat, or as “talking down.”
“You are being spoken to as men, given outright respect,” he said.
Each attendee had received a copy of Spell’s business card with his cell phone number. “If you use it, I will do everything I can to help you.” He spoke of groups he works with, like SCORE, which reviews entrepreneurs’ business plans, and ElmSeed, which offers start-up money: “If you can’t find a job—make a job.”
The attendees heard other emotional appeals, as well. Lisa Craggett (pictured) spoke of losing her 15-year-old son Jacob last August in the Hill; Jacob was in the backseat of a car heading home from his grandmother’s house when he caught a bullet meant for the driver, with whom the shooter had had a “respect spat.” “I’m still in shock,” Craggett told the group. “I’m in therapy. When they put a bullet in my oldest son, they murdered my soul, my family.” She urged the group to think about their parents, their own children if they have them. “You don’t want to put them through what I’m going through,” she said.
As for her son’s alleged shooter? “I’m hoping he will die in prison, OK? My son got shot. They ran. Yet they call themselves a man.”
Will the 23 attendees dial Spell’s number?
The call-in broke up after a little more than an hour. The attendees filed out with impassive faces. Some headed straight for the door; others took up an offer to sample the fried chicken, corn bread, sweet potatoes and greens that Sandra’s Next Generation soul food had set up in the next room. No one approached by a reporter was interested in talking.
If they’re so inclined, they now know there’s someone who knows their story and stands ready to talk further.