Southside Hoods

Southside Hoods are from Grand Theft Auto III, Grand Theft Auto Advance, and Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories. They are represented as a gang in each of those three installments of the Grand Theft Auto video game series.

Divisions
The Southside Hoods is composed of two rival divisions: Red Jacks and Purple Nines.

Red Jacks
Red Jacks consist of African-Americans wearing red street clothes. Every member carries a gun or baseball bat. They drive customized vans equipped with hydrolics. The hydrolics enable the vans to vibrate.

The Red Jacks are commanded by an unseen criminal known as D-Ice. He does not participate in any of the Red Jacks' street activities. This is due to his parole hearing. Instead, his younger brother leads the activities.

Purple Nines
Purples Nines consist of African-Americans wearing purple street clothes. Every member carries an uzi or baseball bat. Like the Red Jacks, the Purple Nines drive customized vans that are also equipped with hydrolics.

The Purple Nines leader is never seen or mentioned.

History
In 1998, a group of African-American criminals began to work for the Leone Family which was Liberty City's mafia. The don, Salvatore Leone, helped the African-Americans estabilish a headquarters. The place was set up in the Shoreside Vale disctrict of Liberty City. Afterwards, the African-Americans became a gang and began to call themselves Southside Hoods.

Two years later, a criminal known as Mike began to work for a street boss named Sorelli. As it turned out, Sorelli was affiliated with the Southside Hoods. He wanted revenge against Mike who accidently killed Sorelli's men. To help Sorelli get his revenge, the Southside Hoods set an ambush designed for Mike. He managed to escape the attack in a car and had it resprayed to hide his idenity.

In 2001, the Southside Hoods faced conflict. Half of the gang began to sell SPANK which was an illegal drug. The gang's other half was angered by the drug deals. Because of the anger, the gang split itself into different divisions: Red Jacks and Purple Nines. The Red Jacks were led by D-Ice who is a member of the gang. The Purple Nines were led by a mysterious person.

When D-Ice hired freelance criminal Claude, he sent Claude to perform a drive-by shooting of the Purple Nines. Afterwards, D-Ice had Claude destroy all of the Purple Nines' vans. The remaining Purple Nines decided to defeat the Red Jacks in a fight involving only baseball bats. D-Ice sent his younger brother and Claude to a picnic area where the fight began. Despite Claude and D-Ice's brother being outnumbered, they managed to eliminate all of their opponents. Afterwards, the Red Jacks gained dominance over the Purple Nines.