The Gang Truce

I wanted to write about this story back in June when it first came out.  I'm glad I waited.

El Salvador is a deadly place.  Five gang murders occur a day, which is down from an average of twelve!  Two gangs have been terrorizing the country for years - MS-13 and Barrio 18.  These two gangs were formed in the United States in the early 80s and were imported to El Salvador as their members were deported from the U.S.

Drugs, money, and prostitution are the reason for the gangs.  The members control huge swaths of land with violence and bribery.  And apparently, they murder with impunity.

It's a different type of gang violence than we see in the United States.  The gangs run the land in El Salvador.  The police are even afraid to head into certain areas without a S.W.A.T. team for fear of not returning from them.  In the U.S., the gangs are not as organized or bold.  MS-13 and Barrio 18 are armed better and have more funding than the El Salvador government and therefore it is difficult to put a dent in their operations.  U.S. gangs make huge money from drugs and prostitution, but it is much more difficult to keep those profits when arrests and prosecutions occur.  Our government has money to make arrests and prosecute offenders.  We are able to seize proceeds of crimes.  We also have better weaponry than the gangs.

That is why everyone welcomed the news of a truce between the two gangs in the spring of this year.  Leaders of the gangs met with a bishop and an elected official and negotiated a truce to stop killing and stop recruiting.

There is one similarity to the U.S.  The gangs recruit young, impressionable boys and girls from impoverished neighborhoods.  They promise money, power, community, respect, and the hope of a better life.  All they have to do is carry a gun, sell some drugs, or rob someone.

In El Salvador though, it is join or die.

The truce begged two questions - could it last and was it true?  How many peace accords have we seen between the Israelis and the Palestinians?  India and Pakistan?  Yet the violence and threat of violence continues.  Tensions rise based on past slights.  Gang violence is a cycle of retaliatory murders and assaults until the line is so long that no one can remember how it all started.  All the members know is that they must hate and kill the rivals.

And so recruiting never stopped.  The truce seems like just a way for jailed gang members to negotiate a better lifestyle while incarcerated.  Maybe take a little heat off the gangs by the police and government for awhile.  Peace talks and promises of a truce have worked in the past to allow one side to believe in it while the other builds up their forces for an assault (Germany before WWII?).

Reports indicate that gangs in neighboring Honduras, who has the same problems but with a higher murder rate, are seeking a similar compromise.  But the discovery of those five bodies indicates that recruiting has not stopped.

What is the solution?  Citizens are clearly terrified of defying these gangs.  Children are conscripted into service.  Huge numbers of people are killed in a long running feud.  The government has to hope that the truce is in fact true, while at the same time continuing efforts to eradicate the gangs.  "Speak softly and carry a big stick," as Theodore Roosevelt said.

At least in the U.S., failure to join a gang does not always lead to death.  The key to stopping gang violence and membership here is a combined family training, community leadership, education, jobs, and criminal justice approach.  In Central America, it seems like military strikes are required to destroy the foundations of the gangs and then the infrastructure must be rebuilt forcing the gangs out.

But I do understand, it's easy to say from 4,000 miles away.  The threat of MS-13 and Barrio 18 in the U.S. is enormous and spreading daily.  These gangs cross the country and import drugs and the gang culture with it.  Dismantling them in their home will have an impact world-wide.  

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The Mob Mentality

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Flash mobs are created when a group of individuals text, Facebook, tweet, or use any other means to gather a group in one place for a specific purpose.  As you see, there are good and bad uses of this.  Criminal flash mobs are difficult to prevent.  They are almost impossible to prosecute unless the police or other citizens can pick a suspect out of a video.  It is very sad to view the aftermath of these groups.

It's the same mentality that draws young men and women into gangs.  It creates a sense of belonging and of being needed.  People in groups feel emboldened to perform violent acts that they otherwise wouldn't do on their own.  The majority of kids I speak with in gangs join because all their friends do and it is the only way they know to make money.  The way to stop it starts at home and in the education system.  By the time these children churn through the criminal justice system it's almost always too late.  

Can you think of ways to prevent criminal flash mobs?  Should their be additional crimes for these cases?

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Gangland

In the two years I have been the juvenile justice prosecutor, it has morphed into something totally different than I first expected.  It doesn't matter whether the juvenile is fourteen or nineteen.  Juvenile crime is becoming gang crime.

According to the FBI, there are over one million gang members in the U.S. committing 80% of the crimes.  I'd agree with this statement.  Over 80% of my cases are gang related.

Most of you reading this will think of gangs as they are portrayed in the movies and television.  The mafia, motorcycle clubs, bloods, and crips spring to mind.  In books and movies, gang members prey on other gang members and band together for protection.

The reality of street gangs that cause 80% of violent crime is far from the glorified life of those movies.  There are national gangs like the bloods or the crips.  Like any national organization this is usually broken down into different subsets depending on the community they live in.  Even unions and bar associations have local chapters.

Most gangs in America are bands of kids who grew up in the same neighborhood and decide to join forces to make money and live the gangster life.  They commit random acts of violence, which is why they are so terrifying.  The crimes are to further the gangs ability to deal drugs, buy drugs, or buy guns and the targets are usually an innocent citizen.  There is no main organization or agenda.  Most of the crimes spring from opportunity.

Need money?  So burglarize a house, rob the woman's purse (this is called "hitting a lick"), or hold up a store.

In my conversations with these kids, it is clear they don't know another life.  Their brothers or fathers ran on the streets and hustled for money.  All their friends do it.  The kids have no way of knowing that once they join the gang they become targets simply for their associations.

There is at least one case a week in my city where a person fires a gun in a house party because he saw a rival gang member there.  The victim is never the intended target, however.

Gangs have a dire effect on the community.  Parents must closely watch their children and instruct them to avoid certain areas or times of night.  Neighbors move out because a well-known gangster moved next door and his house gets shot at every day.  Why go to school if you can make more money running the streets than you can with a bachelor's degree?  Why get a part-time job serving coffee if you can make a week's check in a day?

Parents and schools must also compete with the glorification of gangs in movies, television, and social media.  Just check out these two videos.  (Viewer discretion advised).  Recruiting videos?  Just some innocent bragging?  What about the twitter handles flashing across the rap video?  This is what we are up against.  An army that is constantly recruiting and arming.

So what are the solutions?  How do you control this issue?  It's what we battle against every day.  Schools, parents, law enforcement, and communities must work together to provide opportunities and education about gangs.

We'll talk about some of the ways to prosecute gangs and give you some real-life, but highly edited, case examples in the coming posts.  Stay tuned.

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