Former gang member Alejandro (Alex) Santillanes, from left, and Christina Pelayo of Barrios Unidos, which operates anti-gang programs in Yakima and Toppenish, talks to parents, educators and students at the 2007 LEAP Conference.
GANGS A THREAT TO FAMILIES, COMMUNITIES
By Editor Ken Harvey
Anna Pelayo was a happy, well-adjusted 13-year-old when she moved with her mom, her older brother and her younger sister from Richland to Pasco in 1997.
Her earlier years before fifth grade had been spent in the Lower Valley, mostly in Prosser, where she was “a remarkable student,” according to her mother, Christina, and she was still doing well in the Richland schools.
After her mother and stepfather separated, however, Anna was enrolled at Stevens Middle School, where she was beat up by two female gang members because she was “too white” and didn’t speak Spanish, despite her Hispanic heritage, recounts Christina.
Anna ran away from home soon thereafter and began to hang out with members of a Lower Valley gang, living at least part of the time with a 23-year-old man who frequently beat her or locked her in a room for extended periods.
Anna would return home occasionally, including one last time for Christmas. Then around midnight Dec. 28, she received a phone call.
“Suddenly she said he had to leave. She was scared,” says her mother, who tried to persuade Anna to stay.
That was the last time Christina saw her daughter alive.
As best law enforcement can determine, according to Christina, Anna was kidnapped by four gang members shortly after leaving her home, beaten, sexually assaulted, made to beg for her life, and then shot in the head execution style. She was thrown out of a moving car along Taylor Flats Road a few miles north of Interstate 182 around 1:30 a.m. Dec. 29 and died in the hospital before her mother could say a final good-bye.
“I didn’t have time to tell her I loved her,” Christina says.
“Anna was a good kid who got mixed up in some terrible things. And it all started with the bullying at school,” Christina says. “I went to every agency and cried for help, but no one could help me. There are not enough resources out there.”
Christina spent years futilely trying to find Anna’s killers.
“They know who did it, but they don’t have enough evidence to go to court,” she says.
Meanwhile, Christina’s own life fell apart, as she went through 15 jobs in eight years.
“I will never be the same,” she says. “I used to make good money in hotel management. Now I’m poorer than poor.”
Christina was a featured speaker in one of the most popular workshops offered at annual LEAP conference. The threat of gangs to families and to communities is great, she says.
GANG ACTIVITY ON THE RISE
In 2002 there were only 25 incidents of gang graffiti in Kennewick, but by 2006 they had increased nearly tenfold to 218 incidents, according to Kennewick Police Department (KPD) crime analyst Kim Hathaway.
While graffiti is not the most serious of gangs’ many crimes, it is the most obvious and typically correlates with overall gang activity. As incidents of gang graffiti go up, other gang crimes go up, as well, she explains.
Gang crime can be much more serious, notes Officer Tony Valdez, who was recently recognized as KPD’s officer of the year for his work as Kennewick High School resource officer.
According to Valdez, in the early 1990s there were about 800 gang-related murders a year just in Los Angeles County – more than two a day.
Most authorities agree that gang activity is on an increase again, after dropping off in the late 1990s.
Officer Valdez says gang activity is on the rise for several reasons.
Gang activity tends to go in cycles, he says. In the Tri-Cities, gang activity last peaked in 1995 and dropped dramatically through 2002, but has since been increasing again.
In the late 1990s, Tri-City law enforcement targeted the hard-core gangsters and sent many of them to prison. During that period of time the communities also initiated the GREAT anti-gang educational program in local schools.
Many of the imprisoned gangsters are now being released and are returning to the area. And the GREAT program has been discontinued in many schools.
Kennewick Police Department is trying to suppress the increase and stop the cycle.
“Gang members will go where it is soft,” says Valdez. “Where your city is fair, firm and consistent, gang members will leave.
“We’re never going to get rid of the gang problem altogether, but we’re trying to send a message to the gang leaders: ‘If you are going to be involved in criminal activities here, we’re going to come after you hard and put you in prison,” KPD’s gang specialist says.
Many smaller communities are now experiencing gang problems they have never known before, Valdez adds.
Just like the Tri-Cities gangs were started, in part, by big-city gangsters looking for a new start, gangsters from smaller cities are now making their way to towns like Connell, Royal City and Mabton, Valdez says.
An officer from the Seattle Police Department says by city ordinance they are not even allowed to track gang membership or gang-related statistics, but Yakima and Spokane police departments have more than one gang specialists. Yakima has passed an ordinance making parents financially responsible for damages caused by their gangster children, and their gang specialists point out that undocumented families are likely to be deported if one person in the family gets caught in gang activities.
Officer Brian Miller, gang specialist for the Wenatchee Police Department, says gang activities there also tend to cycle, and there, too, gang crime is increasing after a significant decline.
“We are starting to see an increase again. We had a horrible rash of graffiti, and we made several arrests,” he says, noting that the graffiti was a challenge to other gangs, which then led to more graffiti and ultimately to gang violence.
“This has been one of our busier winters,” says Miller. “When we see a lot of activity like that in the winter, that really concerns us about what may happen when it gets warmer.”
Miller says 84 percent of all firearm assaults in Wenatchee are gang-related.
Most gangsters in the Mid-Columbia and Yakima Valley are affiliated with either the Sureños or the Norteños -- rival Hispanic gangs that have been feuding since they were established decades ago in California.
Dave Reardon, a crime specialist/analyst for Pasco Police Department (PPD), agrees.
Millers says all six of the gangs his department are tracking are associated with the Sureños. Nevertheless, there is a great deal of violence between the groups.
Valdez sees gangs being popularized by movies, TV, rap music and video games and attracting many younger kids.
Valdez says a lot of older gangsters are still involved, so the age range is becoming greater – from elementary school age to middle-age adults.
“The older gang members mostly run dope,” he says.
“Being a gangster is really appealing to our youth right now,” says Valdez. He refers a lot to a book by Lt. Col. Dave Grossman, “Stop Teaching Our Kids to Kill.”
Grossman’s job in the military was, in part, to desensitize young soldiers to the horror of killing another person. He claims the media, music and video games are similarly desensitizing America’s youth in general.
The media, says Valdez, have been specifically promoting gangs through such movies as “Scarface” and through gangster rap.
Kids are attracted to gangs for several reasons, according to local experts. These reasons include:
Former gang member Alejandro (Alex) Santillanes, whose Barrios Unidos, organization operates anti-gang programs in Yakima and Toppenish, agrees with Valdez and warns that “no one is immune, and it’s getting worse.”
Santillanes says the growth of gang affiliation in the elementary schools is “alarming,” and appreciates the commitment by Yakima Superintendent of Schools Ben Soria to fight gangs at all age levels, from elementary schools to high schools.
“Some school districts are just trying to ignore the problem,” Santillanes says. “And the problems are getting bigger and bigger and bigger.”
SCHOOLS SEE GANG RISE NATIONWIDE
The “2005 National Gang Threat Assessment” by the National Alliance of Gang Investigators Associations in conjunction with the FBI surveyed 458 police departments across the country. It concludes:
“The 2006 School Survey of Gang-Related Issues,” produced by the National Gang Crime Research Center, asked school officials nationwide about gang problems in their schools and neighborhoods.
The survey found that during the previous year:
GANG RIVALRIES ENDANGER LIVES
Christina Pelayo isn’t sure why her daughter was killed, but she admits Anna fell into a dangerous lifestyle after she dropped out of school.
Rare are the fatal attacks on innocent bystanders, but they do occur. The murder of popular teacher and coach Bob Mars of Benton City was one such incident, allegedly as part of a gang initiation.
Robert A. Suarez, 16, and 14-year-old Jordan E. Castillo attacked, robbed and killed Mars when he returned to Kiona-Benton Middle School after a football game. It is surmised by officials that the goal of the young gangsters was to vandalize and burglarize the school. Mars’ arrival was an unfortunate coincidence.
Prosecutors said the actual murder was committed by Castillo, who was tried as an adult and sentenced to 20 years in prison. Prosecutors said Suarez was the one that "jumped in" Castillo or, in other words, sponsored Castillo into the “MSP” or “Mexicans Stand Proud” gang. Suarez was sentenced to 26 years for felony murder.
The day following the murder, Castillo already had a new web tattooed on his hand, showing his successful initiation into the MSP, according to Benton County Sheriff Larry Taylor. The MSP is one of many gangs affiliated with the larger Sureños gang,
While gang members in schools can disrupt the education process and bully or intimidate other students, most victims of violence are other gang members.
About 95 percent of all gang members are high school dropouts, says Valdez, so “our schools are actually really safe.”
Although that apparently is not true in communities that have not taken a stand against the gangs.
In Kennewick, however, most middle school students who try to act like gangsters are just “playing house,” says Valdez. And students still in high school who have any gang affiliation might be considered apprentices.
By the time they get “jumped in” and become full-fledged gang members, they have dropped out of school, he says. And the “jumped in” process in the Tri-Cities is rarely deadly to outsiders.
A prospective gangster might be asked to participate in car prowls or small crimes, “tag” or graffiti buildings, or beat up someone in order to test his commitment.
Then the prospect is “jumped in” by willingly being beat up by several of the gang members.
Most life-threatening gang violence occurs when one gang disrespects another, says Valdez. Part of the gang philosophy, he says, is that “insults must not go unanswered.”
“The whole thing gets out of control, and someone gets stabbed or something,” he says. Gang members are encouraged to carry a weapon, and in the Tri-Cities, the weapon of choice is a knife.
Teachers, administrators, police officers and others in authority normally don’t have to fear young gangsters. The youngsters might cause discipline problems in a classroom, for example, but they understand teachers have a role, Valdez says, and they respect a teacher who does his job well.”
Tri-City law enforcement agencies have petitioned the federal government for a federal prosecutor to be assigned to the community. When gangsters are convicted, federal crimes tend to carry much longer sentences.
MOM FINDS LIFE AFTER DAUGHTER’S DEATH
Christina Pelayo has found a new purpose in her life since the death of her daughter by helping kids avoid her daughter’s fate and other parents avoid the pain she suffered.
Family and Friends of Violent Crime Victims helped her get more information about Anna’s case, and in return Christina became involved with the Everett-based organization. As a crime victims advocate, she helped others in her own situation.
“When this happens, you really don’t know what to do, so we kind of lead them in the right direction,” Christina says. But 2005 was a particularly difficult year, when she was assigned to work with the families of six different murder victims.
She is now working with Santillanes at Barrios Unidos. The organization operates anti-gang programs in Yakima and Toppenish, including youth centers, a new mentoring program, and provides training and organizational assistance to communities trying to figure out how to stop the growth of gangs.
The mentoring program will have sophomores and juniors in high school mentoring middle school students in Toppenish and at the Yakama Tribal School.
“I enjoy what I do now. I love working with the kids,” says Christina, and she is happy to report that her youngest daughter is now a happy, successful college student.
Alex and Christina recently presented two workshops to educators, parents and students at the annual LEAP (Latino/a Education Achievement Project) Conference in Olympia.
That presentation has led to a flood of requests for presentations in communities across the state, including Brewster, Bridgeport, Walla Walla, Moses Lake and Pasco.
“We’re getting calls like crazy,” Christina says. “Everybody is looking for help.”
To address the problems of gangs most effectively, says Christina, communities must come together. Police, city administrators, schools, businesses, non-profit organizations and parents have to work together.
Barrios Unidos, which means “United Neighborhoods,” helps communities understand this concept, but recognizes that’s about as much as it can do.
“This is a community problem,” says Christina. “They have to take their towns back.”
Unlike nine years ago, Pasco schools “have decided to do something about the problem. They have turned it around. Now Pasco has some of the best schools in the state,” Christina says.
On the other hand, there is a lot violence in other schools that have failed to take the necessary steps to maintain control, she says.
WHAT PARENTS NEED TO KNOW ABOUT GANGS
Parents do need to be concerned about their children getting involved with gangs. And not all gangsters are Hispanic, although most of them currently in the Tri-Cities are.
White gangs such as the Hammerskins Aryan Brotherhood and Peckerwoods are inactive in the Tri-Cities now, says Valdez, although there are outlaw motorcycle gangsters still active there.
There are some black gang members in the Tri-Cities who are affiliated with the Black Gangster Disciples (BGD) or the Crips, Valdez says, but Asian gangs have disappeared from that community.
He says there are various white supremacist gangs in the Spokane area.
Former gang member Alejandro (Alex) Santillanes, whose Barrios Unidos, organization operates anti-gang programs in Yakima and Toppenish, says there is now a cowboy gang in the region that encourages white gangsters to dress in Western duds and beat up Hispanics and other kids of color.
Most gangsters in the Mid-Columbia and Yakima Valley are affiliated with either the Sureños or the Norteños -- rival Hispanic gangs that have been feuding since they were established decades ago in California.
Reales 14 and La Raza are gangs affiliated with the Norteños. Affiliated with the Sureños are such gangs as the Westside 18th Street, Mexican Stand Proud (MSP), Florencia 13, Sureños por Vida (SPV), Mexican Pride Sureños (MPS), and Los Cholitos Chingones (LCC) gangs.
Youngsters who hang out with gangsters, dress like gangsters or somehow disrespect gangsters can be in danger even if they are not affiliated with a gang, says Valdez, so no parents can take it for granted that their kids are safe.
“We are trying to build these kids strong from the inside out,” Santillanes says of his Barrios Unidos organization, but he offers the same advice to all parents.
He personally got out of gangs after he had a spiritual experience while in prison. It also required some tough love on the part of his wife, who threatened to leave him and take their child with her.
Especially if parents see any signs that their child may be involved with gangs or drugs, or if they begin getting in trouble at school, they need to begin searching their child’s bedroom on a regular basis, says Valdez.
What a child is doing in school is a major indication of what he may be doing outside school, Dave Reardon, a crime specialist/analyst for Pasco Police Department (PPD), says.
“The gang mentality is totally against education. It is against everything school is trying to do. A teacher really can’t have a learning environment with gang activities going on in the classroom. It is disruptive to the learning process,” he says.
“If you’re not occasionally searching your child’s bedroom, you are being negligent in your duties as a parent,” Valdez says.
Parents should be looking for drugs, along with gang symbols and gang philosophy, according to the experts. These may include:
Other signs a child is getting into a gang is the use of gang slang in every day conversation; increasing secrecy to protect what’s in his room and to keep you from meeting his friends; refusal to tell you where he is going or with whom; large amounts of unexplained cash; and grooming changes such as a shaved head, use of a hair net, or growth of a goatee.
To protect children from gang influences, parents should get their kids involved in school and extracurricular activities, such as sports, Boys and Girls Club, church programs, and Boy Scouts, says Reardon.
“Parents need to be parents. They can choose the kids they let come over to the house,” he says. “If parents don’t approve of the clothing their kids wear, they need to say so. Parents a lot of time let their kids pick out gang clothes. They need to make the decision for them. A lot of this is being a good parent. Loving your child a lot of time is saying ‘no’ to them.”
Things parents can do to keep their children out of gangs, according to Valdez, include:
· Develop good communications with your child.
· Spend time with your child.
· Occupy your child’s free time.
· Set limits for your child, and enforce limits consistently.
· Have a curfew for your child.
· Discourage hanging out with gang members or those “playing” like gang members.
· Don’t let him wear gang-style clothing.
· Don’t allow your child write gang symbols anywhere.
· Keep informed about gang activity in the community, and participate in the community.
Parents need to make their children understand that “gangs won’t help them achieve their future goals,” Reardon adds.
A WARNING TO YOUNGSTERS
“If you hang out in the streets, you don’t know who’s going to grab you,” says Christina Pelayo, whose 13-year-old daughter was molested, beaten and then shot in the head by a Pasco gang.
“Just stay home. Enjoy school,” says the victim’s mom.
Santillanes agrees: “Graduate. Get your profession.”
“The gang lifestyle is disruptive to a person’s own goals,” adds Reardon.
Santillanes especially warns girls from getting involved with gangs. Girls are being recruited more and more, the experts agree. They are considered “gang property.”
Girls are used for “free love,” and drugs and weapons are often passed off to them before police can conduct a search. Gang leaders know male police officers won’t search the girls as closely, and courts will go easier on them if caught, says Valdez.
A lot of men, particularly gangsters, are “perros” (dogs), Santillanes says. “Respect yourselves.”
The Barrios Unidos director also urged youngsters to think of their parents before they get involved with gangs.
“We go to a lot of funerals. We see the tears of pain of the family members,” says Santillanes. “Three months down the road, the homeys aren’t going to visit the grave, and in six months they won’t remember him. But the family is still mourning.
“When one of these young men or women gets killed, who’s going to pay for their funeral?” he asks, noting that the typically funeral costs $6,000-$8,000.
“The family gets a double impact,” Santillanes says. They have to face the tragedy of a child dying, and then they have to pay the bills. And most of the families of gangsters are poor and have to go deeply into debt.
The experts also warn that once a youngster gets into a gang, it’s hard to get out.
If they respectfully ask out, says Valdez, the “jumped out” process is a lot harder than being “jumped in.” The gang leaders will pummel the person for an extended period of time.
Santillanes says broken arms and ribs are not unusual – and that’s if the gang lets the person out at all. Some wanting out, he says, are threatened with death.
The higher up the gangster is in the organization and the more he knows that could incriminate other leaders, the less likely he can leave the gang without leaving the community altogether, Valdez says.
“They have to really want out,” says Christina. “If they want out, they can get out. But we have had to relocate some of them.”
They can move to live with friends or extended family members elsewhere, but Santillanes warns if they are not committed to change, they shouldn’t bother. They need to change their lifestyle totally, stop wearing gang clothing, stop using drugs, etc.
“If not, they are just taking the problem with them,” he says.
“Kids see the gang lifestyle as glamorous, whereas, in realty, it is very destructive,” says Reardon. “Most gang members go to prison. Some get killed. And many of them get addicted to drugs.”