La Ronge residents are reacting to what they say is a growing youth gang problem.
Tania Colbert is the manager of the Northland Motor Hotel on La Ronge Avenue.
She says the cold beer and wine store of the hotel has been held up twice in recent weeks by armed male youths who appear to be part of the same group.
In both incidents, the culprits were wearing bandanas over their faces.
Colbert says she believes in both crimes the males were members of the youth gang the Sask. Kings.
Kevin Roberts is the sports and recreation director at Jonas Roberts Memorial Community Centre.
He says youth gang activity is a growing problem on the Lac La Ronge Indian Band reserve too.
“There is a growing concern of gangs in the community,” he says. “You just have to look at the last two incidents of robbery and the clothes that they’re wearing. That in itself, the guys that are involved there that we know of, they’re a part of that.”
Roberts says there is also more than one youth gang active in La Ronge.
“Primarily the Aboriginal gangs are recruiting Indigenous youth from the reserve. So it’s well noted that the Sask. Kings they call themselves, they’re in La Ronge, and there’s the Terror Squad.”
To steer young people away from gangs, Roberts has recently started a poster campaign based on a similar campaign done by the Abbotsford Police Department in British Columbia a few years ago.
The campaign aims to combat the potential allure of gangs by presenting stark images of what gang life could entail in reality.
The first poster has already been released on social media and there are plans for seven more to follow.
RCMP recently arrested two males in relation to an armed robbery at a business in the 900 block of La Ronge Avenue and are currently looking for another two suspects involved in a similar robbery in the same area.
When contacted, police say they are not willing to speculate whether the two robberies are connected or if they are gang-related.
(PHOTO: Recent surveillance image released following La Ronge robbery. Photo courtesy of La Ronge RCMP.)