I used to live on Apgar Street in North Oakland. I can confirm, at that time, the North Pole Gang was active. A shooting happened right in front of my house.

Other than that, you would see people hustling but they didnt really bother me or my housemates besides asking for a smoke now and again.

For the record, in two years, we were never burglarized, mugged or otherwise. The worst that happened to me is I was attacked by a juvenile pitbull that was being trained to fight. The owner apologized.

Were we just lucky? Seemed like most of the violence was gang on gang violence.

That being said, my (future) wife, who lived on 55th came home one night to greet the SWAT team at her house. Someone had been running around the neighborhood with an AK-47 and they thought he might be hiding in her backyard.

College.