Trouble tags along at malls

Two teenage brothers stabbed, another teen shot dead in a fight, and a 23-year-old slain in a drug deal -- all at Triangle shopping malls, all in the past four years.

Malls here and across America remain crime scenes despite security guards, off-duty police, cameras and age-restricted hours. They're the modern meeting place, and they draw trouble along with fat wallets. That leaves mall managers with the task of scaring off criminals without also scaring off customers.

"It's almost always the food court," said Chris McGoey, a Los Angeles consultant who specializes in mall security. "It's legitimate loitering. You can order a Coke and sit there for hours. Then there's just rivalries. School rivalries. Street rivalries. They just run into each other."

When Raleigh police responded to a brawl and stabbing at Triangle Town Center on Saturday night, it was at least the 68th call to the shopping complex this year, according to a database of police records maintained by The News & Observer. In 2005, two brothers were stabbed in the back and buttocks on a Monday night.

Raleigh police say the weekend melee at Triangle Town Center erupted after a chance encounter between rival gang factions on the second floor above the food court. Police said there were several skirmishes along the second floor concourse, with a limited number of combatants. But hundreds of onlookers, most of them teenagers, started running through the mall, ignoring police commands to leave and heightening the potential for further violence.

Jack Love, general manager of the mall, met with Raleigh Police Chief Harry Dolan on Monday. "They've committed resources to up foot patrols, bike patrols and car patrols," Love said.

Whether actual gangs or restless groups of teens, large groups can make mall-goers nervous. Big groups of teens tend to congregate at Triangle Town Center on Saturdays, said Jay An, who operates two kiosks in the mall, Cellular & Stuff and iPod & Stuff.

It's a regular weekend occurrence for kids to scuffle with each other or security guards. He doesn't know whether they're in gangs.

After work, especially on Saturday nights, large groups of teens hanging out in the parking lot make An worry about going to his car. "It's very dangerous," he said.

It happens across the country

Mall violence persists in many places, most notably in Omaha, Neb., where a 19-year-old killed eight shoppers and himself in December. In February 2007, an 18-year-old gunman killed five people and injured several others at a Salt Lake City shopping mall before he was killed by police.

Deadly violence has also occurred at Triangle malls. In 2004, a 23-year-old man was shot and killed in the parking lot of The Streets at Southpoint mall in Durham during a drug deal. In 2005, police broke up a melee there involving several teens on a Saturday night, though no one was injured.

At Northgate Mall in Durham last year, a 22-year-old man was stabbed to death on a Saturday night. He was the fourth person slain in or near the mall since 2002, including a 16-year-old shot and killed outside the south entrance to the shopping complex after a 2005 fight on a city bus. The fight started when the victim rose to defend his sister against several young men who threatened her.

Northgate owns this record despite some of the strictest security policies around. After 6 p.m., children under 16 must be with a parent or guardian 21 or older.

"Kids love to come out and hang out at the mall," said Paula Harris, marketing director for Northgate. "Sometimes they come out and block a storefront. We like everyone who comes to the mall to be shopping."

Teens can attend movies later than 6 p.m., she added, but they must stay in a lobby outside the theater, not in the mall proper. "We have lots of moms and people calling us," Harris said. "They love it."

Other security policies vary.

North Hills mall in Raleigh restricts visitors after 9 p.m. to teens who are enrolled in high school or with a parent older than 21.

Crabtree Valley Mall has no age restrictions, but it does have security cameras inside and out, along with its own police officers who can make arrests.

Bans, limits, rules

Nationwide, malls have tried limiting time in food courts or requiring that people there buy something. Groups that can be easily identified and consistently cause trouble are often banned, he added, but those security measures can flirt with racial profiling.

"Everything has been tried," McGoey said. "You just have to do something."

Despite a decade of mall violence and a huge number of experts willing to testify in court cases, studies of mall violence tend to be localized and offer no nationwide statistics.

In the Triangle, mall crime appears unlikely to deter many shopping trips.

"I'm not worried about it," said Bob Mulder, active in the neighborhood that includes Triangle Town Center. "You just had a bunch of stupid kids doing stupid things."

That, he said, can happen anywhere.