Anthony Taylor Jr. was killed over the color red.
The 20-year-old Bloods gang member was partying with friends past midnight, hanging out on the corner of Guilford Avenue and East 22nd Street, a red bandana tied to his belt.
But police said a member of the Young Gorilla Family, which claimed the Barclay neighborhood as its own, had warned Taylor he was not allowed there wearing the signature color of the rival Bloods.
The two men fought, as they had in the past, but this time another Young Gorilla retrieved a 12-gauge shotgun and, according to police, ended the long-simmering feud with a single blast. The gunman then fired on Taylor's best friend, Adrian Holiday, a hotel valet and Baltimore County Community College student who was not involved in a gang.
Both died on the corner, across the street from a branch office of the Maryland Division of Parole and Probation.
On city streets long beset by violence, last September's double slaying presaged a rising threat.
Though Baltimore crime has long been fueled by loosely formed neighborhood crews, increasingly organized groups have found new reasons to kill - such as showing a red bandana on the wrong street. Now, those who police the city and schools, as well as the jails and prisons, are fearful of the potential growth and impact of these gangs, which are more brazen in their crimes and quick to pull a trigger.
Seeds of that growth were planted about six or seven years ago, law enforcement officials believe, when out-of-state gangs began targeting Baltimore - taking advantage of the city's thriving drug trade and proximity to Interstate 95. Often, they made inroads by recruiting within the state's prison system.
Today, statistics can be hard to come by and much of the evidence is anecdotal, but police say they already have identified about 2,600 known or suspected members of street gangs, including 400 Bloods, 100 Crips, and a few dozen members of Mara Salvatrucha, or MS-13 - a Latino gang that has gained a prominent and violent foothold in the Washington suburbs.
Baltimore gang members mimic the mannerisms, coded language and secret hand signals of their counterparts in Los Angeles and other cities; court documents in a murder investigation even indicate that L.A. gang leaders have sought tribute money from members here.
