Gangs are trashing their old look of signature colors and symbolizing tattoos - which give away their status as a member - in attempts to make it easier to get away with crimes.
Specific colors or gang-related tattoos are easily identifiable by authorities and other people they may be trying to scam.
Police who deal with gang violence are increasingly noticing this change of style in gangs.
"Many of them don't wear colors. They tell us they're not in gangs," Johnmichael O'Hare, a Hartford police sergeant who monitors gangs, tells The Associated Press. "They're trying to avoid detection from law enforcement."
Similarly, William Dunn, a Los Angeles police detective and author of the 2007 book "The Gangs of Los Angeles," tells AP gangs likely feel that not wearing their typical attire may help their crime success rate increase.
"If you want to go into Macys or Neiman Marcus and use a fraudulently obtained credit card and you have all these tattoos, it's more difficult," he explains. "So we don't see so much wearing of the colors. We don't see so much of the tattooing."
Officials also tell AP gang members don't want to sport the identifiers because it often puts them in more restrictive cells due to security protocols.
