Women involved with gangs say the violent beatings and gang rapes they endure are part of their lifestyle.
Ten women interviewed about their involvement - for between two and 35 years - with gangs say that even if they leave, reporting the violence to the police is not anoption.
Nor can they go to some women's refuges for help, in case they are tracked by gang members and put other women's safety at risk.
The women's accounts of their involvement has been documented by Christchurch Stopping Violence Service facilitator Glennis Dennehy, who spoke at this week's Beyond Violence conference in New Plymouth.
The women Ms Dennehy spoke to had either experienced or watched other women being subjected to gang rapes, machete and axe attacks, being burned with hot fat as punishment, injection with unknown drugs and having gang insignia tattooed on them against their will.
In her study the women's names were changed to those of flowers and all contact details destroyed after the interviews to ensure the women's safety.
Ms Dennehy said the women were fearful of leaving the gang environment because their partners and other gang members would threaten to "track you down and kill you."
"It doesn't matter where you go or what you do, there are too many of them, they're everywhere," said Pansy. "You can't hide."
Even police have "a degree of cautious respect" for some gangs' intelligence operations, and their ability to find people.
Christchurch gang liaison officer Detective Richard Neale said some gangs had complete dossiers, including photos, of their enemies.
"Christchurch gangs are crack researchers and are able to find information on almost anyone. They were very good at using publicly available information to track people down," he said.
Some of the women Ms Dennehy interviewed said the hardest part of gang life to handle was the emotional abuse from other women.
Women are also used to set other women up to be "blocked" - gang raped.
Ms Dennehy said all the women she had spoken to had since escaped gang life. She said society could help such women better if gang culture were more widely understood.
