The December shooting death of King County Sheriff's Deputy Steve Cox was a reminder of Highline's growing gang problem.

Cox was gunned down while investigating a shooting in White Center. His killer, who lived in Burien, had been involved in the murder of another gang member in SeaTac earlier that evening.

"There definitely is a gang problem" in the Highline area, Deputy Joe Gagliardi said.

Gagliardi, a King County deputy sheriff working as a patrol officer with the Burien Police Department, is assigned to a Special Emphasis Team for gang suppression in White Center and Burien. Burien contracts with the sheriff's office for city police services.

This problem "is not at the levels of the Seattle Central District or Los Angeles or elsewhere in California," Gagliardi said, but "the fact is there are gang members present here, and that increases the possibility of violence as well as nonviolent crime that goes along with it like break-ins."

Gagliardi, who moved from the San Francisco Bay area in 2005 because he and his wife could have a better quality of life here, said, "We're lucky that the gang problem isn't as violent as it is in some other places."

In the White Center and Burien area, there are "five or six Hispanic gang sets, five or six Asian gang sets, and three or four black gang sets, not to mention the Gypsy Jokers - an outlaw motorcycle gang with a clubhouse in Burien."

Gang sets, he said, are subgroups of main gangs like the Crips, Bloods, Sure