{"code":"26933","sect":"Central America","sect_slug":"central-america","hits":"5516","link":"https:\/\/elfaro.net\/en\/202308\/centroamerica\/26933","link_edit":"","name":"How Los Angeles Taught the Mara Salvatrucha to Hate","slug":"how-los-angeles-taught-the-mara-salvatrucha-to-hate","info":"In the early 1980s, one of the world\u2019s most dangerous gangs was a group of young rockers who had recently arrived in southern California. How were the Mara Salvatrucha formed? What does the 13 mean? How did the war against 18th Street start? The answers are on the streets of Los Angeles, along with the history of the first truce.","mtag":"Gangs","noun":{"html":"Carlos Mart\u00ednez and Jos\u00e9 Luis Sanz","data":{"carlos-martinez-and-jose-luis-sanz":{"sort":"","slug":"carlos-martinez-and-jose-luis-sanz","path":"carlos_martinez_and_jose_luis_sanz","name":"Carlos Mart\u00ednez and Jos\u00e9 Luis Sanz"}}},"view":"5516","pict":{"cms-image-000039219-jpeg":{"feat":"1","sort":"39219","name":"cms-image-000039219.jpeg","link":"https:\/\/elfaro.net\/images\/cms-image-000039219.jpeg","path":"https:\/\/elfaro.net\/images\/cms-image-000039219.jpeg","back":"","slug":"cms-image-000039219-jpeg","text":"<p>Members of the Western Locos clique of the Mara Salvatrucha in the mid-80s in Los Angeles. One of them, Puppet, returned years later to El Salvador and lived in the Amatepec colonia in San Salvador, where he was eventually murdered.<\/p>","capt":"\u003Cp\u003EMembers of the Western Locos clique of the Mara Salvatrucha in the mid-80s in Los Angeles. One of them, Puppet, returned years later to El Salvador and lived in the Amatepec colonia in San Salvador, where he was eventually murdered.\u003C\/p\u003E"},"cms-image-000039220-jpeg":{"feat":"0","sort":"39220","name":"cms-image-000039220.jpeg","link":"https:\/\/elfaro.net\/images\/cms-image-000039220.jpeg","path":"https:\/\/elfaro.net\/images\/cms-image-000039220.jpeg","back":"","slug":"cms-image-000039220-jpeg","text":"<p>Members of Los Angeles Playboys gang. In the eighties, the oldest southern gangs sported \u201cpachuco\u201d style at parties. On the bottom right is El Flaco, an elder palabrero of the Normandie Locos clique.<\/p>","capt":"\u003Cp\u003EMembers of Los Angeles Playboys gang. In the eighties, the oldest southern gangs sported \u201cpachuco\u201d style at parties. On the bottom right is El Flaco, an elder palabrero of the Normandie Locos clique.\u003C\/p\u003E"},"cms-image-000039221-jpeg":{"feat":"0","sort":"39221","name":"cms-image-000039221.jpeg","link":"https:\/\/elfaro.net\/images\/cms-image-000039221.jpeg","path":"https:\/\/elfaro.net\/images\/cms-image-000039221.jpeg","back":"","slug":"cms-image-000039221-jpeg","text":"<p>Mural painted by the Leeward Locos clique of the Mara Salvatrucha on the back end of Leeward Avenue in Los Angeles, between Westmoreland and Hoover Streets. Photograph taken in the second half of the eighties.<\/p>","capt":"\u003Cp\u003EMural painted by the Leeward Locos clique of the Mara Salvatrucha on the back end of Leeward Avenue in Los Angeles, between Westmoreland and Hoover Streets. Photograph taken in the second half of the eighties.\u003C\/p\u003E"}},"pict_main__sort":39219,"date":{"live":"2023\/08\/23"},"data_post_dateLive_YY":"2023","data_post_dateLive_MM":"08","data_post_dateLive_DD":"23","text":"\u003Cdiv\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cspan style=\"color: #888888;\"\u003E\u003Cem\u003EThis piece on the origins of MS-13 was published by El Faro\u00a0\u003C\/em\u003E\u003C\/span\u003E\u003Ca href=\"https:\/\/salanegra.elfaro.net\/es\/201208\/cronicas\/9301\/I-El-origen-del-odio.htm\"\u003E\u003Cem\u003Ein Spanish\u003C\/em\u003E\u003C\/a\u003E\u003Cspan style=\"color: #888888;\"\u003E\u00a0\u003Cem\u003Ein August 2012.\u00a0Read chapter two \u003Ca href=\"\/en\/202308\/centroamerica\/27034\/13-the-Mark-of-the-Mexican-Mafia.htm\"\u003Ehere\u003C\/a\u003E.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003C\/em\u003E\u003C\/span\u003EIt\u2019s not that the young\u00a0\u003Cem\u003Epalabrero\u003C\/em\u003E\u00a0from Fulton was much of a peacemaker. In fact, he did not earn the nickname Satan for promoting truces with his enemies.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EHe was leader of the Mara Salvatrucha clique in the San Fernando Valley, which borders the city of Los Angeles.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EHe had received elite training from the Salvadoran army; it was precisely these military skills which turned him, after just one year, into leader of one of the most powerful Mara Salvatrucha cliques in the United States \u2014 no small feat. Within gang protocols, almost nobody goes from being a wriggling sack on the floor, during initiation rites known as\u00a0\u003Cem\u003Eel brinco\u00a0\u003C\/em\u003E(the jump), to being the one who decides who is a punching bag and who is not.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EHe knew how to load and unload handguns and rifles, strategies for withdrawal, how to conduct an ambush, the purpose of small units, and the importance of holding onto certain territories. Probably, he knew how to kill. Satan knew all about war.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EBorn Ernesto Deras, Satan was no Hollywood-style Rambo, except for perhaps his voice \u2014 tired-sounding, almost a whisper, making him seem infinitely sad. And except for the fact that those who know him say they\u2019ve never heard him shout, nor cackle with laughter. And his Green Beret training, which he received from U.S. advisors as part of a rapid response battalion during the civil war in El Salvador.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAside from that, Ernesto could have been the clich\u00e9 Salvadoran migrant who arrived in Los Angeles in 1990; a skinny twenty-something, tough like the branch of a guava tree, clean-shaven and shy. He was fleeing civil war and had found his way into the United States, stealthy as a nocturnal animal.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIt\u2019s worth repeating: Ernesto was Satan, and he was not fond of making peace with his enemies.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003ESo in 1993, when a pair of mediators tried to convince him to attend peace meetings, they had to mention the unmentionable: they told him it had been given the go-ahead by the Mexican Mafia \u2014 men who, in those walks of life, it\u2019s better not to cross.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003C\/div\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cdiv\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp align=\"center\"\u003E* * *\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003C\/div\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cdiv\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe gang that Satan joined in 1990 was a group of outcasts.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EWhen Salvadorans arrived en masse to California at the end of the 1970s and start of the 1980s seeking refuge from the horrors ravaging their homelands, Mexicans and their descendants, known as\u00a0\u003Cem\u003EChicanos,\u00a0\u003C\/em\u003Ehad decades of gang organization behind them, as a way of protecting themselves from white scorn. They were not ready for new arrivals to receive the kind of welcome they never got.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003C\/div\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cdiv\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003ESo Salvadorans established their own gang in order to face Black, Mexican, and their descendants\u2019 scorn. It\u2019s not easy being the new kid on the block who hopes others will invite you to play, even if the game in question is war.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAs in all ecosystems, survival requires learning the pecking order. When the Mara Salvatrucha appeared, it had been clear in southern California for some time that any gang could be targeted by another, and at the top of the food chain there was only the Mafia, alone and insatiable, the final voice in deciding who could play.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe Mara Salvatrucha, for example, could not.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe clique that Satan began to lead in 1991, known as the Fultons, was the only Mara Salvatrucha cell throughout the San Fernando Valley, south-eastern California, where at least 75 other gangs were at war at the time. For them, the Mara were a common enemy.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003C\/div\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cdiv\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe Fultons knew they were everyone\u2019s prey, which made them fierce, standoffish, and extremely violent. Years as a common enemy taught them not to trust anyone; this is why in 1993, when Satan was approached by two men in order to invite him to a potential trap, the young man\u2019s military instincts told him to have an escape plan, or at least a plan which \u2014if needed\u2014 would mean that the Fulton\u00a0\u003Cem\u003Ehomies\u00a0\u003C\/em\u003Ewouldn\u2019t be the only ones killed that day.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp align=\"center\"\u003E* * *\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAt this point in the story, all we\u2019ll say of former Kickboxing champion William \u201cBlinky\u201d Rodr\u00edguez, and his business partner Big D, is that the two childhood friends, born-again Christians, had embarked on a quest that may seem like the foolish delusion of a zealot: a peace agreement between all the gangs in the San Fernando Valley.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIt might sound far-fetched, if it weren\u2019t for the fact that they had been given the green light from the Mafia; this guaranteed the crusaders, at a minimum, the attention of every gang leader.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EOn the day of Halloween 1993, the two mediators managed to gather dozens of gangs together for the first time in Pacoima Park, in one of the districts of San Fernando Valley. No violence broke out. They spoke to them about God, inviting them to reach out and settle their conflicts through dialogue. And that is what happened; the California press watched in surprise as what had previously been thought impossible unfolded right in front of their cameras. Subsequent meetings took place every Sunday. As was expected, the Mara Salvatrucha were some of the last to be invited.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003ESatan knew what was going on, and he also knew that the invitation would not take long to reach him:\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003C\/div\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cdiv\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cThey came looking for me. I was interested, so I told them we\u2019d go. Not to make peace, but we would go, because if we didn\u2019t they\u2019d say we were chickening out. I said I\u2019d go the next Sunday, but they told me to wait so that they could lay the groundwork. They told me they were going to prepare the others for the Maras\u2019 arrival. We had a meeting and I told the homeboys: \u2018it seems like the Se\u00f1ores are on top of things, but bring any weapons you might need because we\u2019re going to see the enemy face to face, we\u2019re going into the lion\u2019s den\u2019. We were the last to get to Pacoima park. 30 of us went in and about 10 stayed outside, armed. They knew what they had to do if anything happened, whether we came out or not.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cThere were reporters there, and the park was full of gang members. They all got up. Some of them started looking for a fight, but nothing happened. When the reporters realized it was the Mara who were arriving they ran out to look for us. But the homeboys told them to get lost, and didn\u2019t give them interviews or let them take photos. One of the organizers came over to ask me to take off my cap to show respect.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003ETo make it clear who they were speaking to, Satan had dressed for the occasion: baggy\u00a0\u003Cem\u003Echolo\u00a0\u003C\/em\u003Eclothes, and a cap that said \u201cFuck y\u2019all\u201d. The Fulton\u00a0\u003Cem\u003Epalabrero\u003C\/em\u003Ewent into the park looking for trouble, and the ex-kickboxing champion, Blinky Rodr\u00edguez, feared that the cap would lead to all out war. He asked Satan, in the most polite way he knew how, to take it off to show his enemies respect. Satan was unperturbed, and took off the hat. That was the Mara Salvatrucha\u2019s first gesture toward peace.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EThe Last Migrants\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThere are those who believe that the Mara Salvatrucha were born on \u201c13th Street,\u201d in south-east Los Angeles. The former president of El Salvador Mauricio Funes even made this claim in public without a hint of embarrassment. The problem is that the street doesn\u2019t exist. In its place, in this city of star-studded avenues and streets plagued with gangs, is the spotless Pico Boulevard, a showcase for Latino businesses running parallel to 12th Street, which heads northwards towards the now revitalized Downtown, and to 14th Street, which disappears and reappears from maps one block to the south.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThere are also those who think that the Mara Salvatrucha emerged from a split in the 18th Street Gang. Such things do happen, in the gangs\u2019 world of fragile loyalties and outsized promises of street glory: 18th Street themselves were born at the end of the 1940s as the result of a split from the veteran Clanton 14 Gang, who have roamed the city streets since the 1920s, probably the oldest Latino gang still in existence in California.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EBut the MS didn\u2019t come from the 18th Street Gang. The 13 is in fact an homage to bigger criminal forces, to the Se\u00f1ores, the Mexican Mafia who rule southern California. It would take the MS some years to need, want, and deserve this friendship and those numbers.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIn late 70s Los Angeles, the Mara Salvatrucha were just a bunch of scruffy teenagers and heavy metal fans. They were dubbed \u201cstoners\u201d, a translation of the word \u201crocker\u201d, and because of the influence of The Rolling Stones. Like many other groups of youths \u2014the Mid City Stoners, The Hole Stoners\u2014 they consumed rock and marijuana on the corners and in the parks of their neighborhoods.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003ENone of the Mara Salvatrucha\u2019s members were older than 18. Most were recent arrivals to the United States, their parents fleeing poverty in El Salvador. They were the last migrants to arrive, and none of them could yet claim even a shred of territory in that complex urban patchwork of African Americans, Mexicans, and Koreans.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EEven so, today among the Mara Salvatrucha, to speak of the Stoners is to invoke the pure, the radical, the authentic. The Maras look back with the blurry gaze of oral history, and it is usually said that none of those pioneers are still alive. But there are still gang members who casually attest to having entered the game in those days, knowing the prestige that comes with such a claim. Hazy pasts proliferate amid the constant war waged for respect in gangs.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe Los Angeles police remember the existence of groups of Mara Salvatrucha Stoners in 1975. Researchers such as Tom Ward, at the University of California, have confirmed the formation of small cliques or nuclei of MS stoners in 1978.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe location of their first headquarters cannot be said for certain, but some veteran members in Los Angeles say that at the end of the 70s a dozen Stoners began to regularly meet in the Seven Eleven that still stands at the intersection of Westmoreland Avenue and James M. Wood Street. The Seven Eleven was probably the first Mara Salvatrucha clique. Nowadays, in Los Angeles and El Salvador, there are still gang members who were initiated years later and belong to the Seven Eleven.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe Mara Salvatrucha felt demonized. They wore tight jeans, ripped at the knees, black band shirts with cover art from ACDC, Led Zeppelin, and Kiss. Their long hair exuded rebellion. They got into fights with rival groups, stole tape decks from cars, and demanded respect at schools like Berendo Middle School, four blocks from the intersection of Normandie Avenue and Pico Boulevard. Some were even accused of Satanism when they sang the Judas Priest song,\u00a0\u003Cem\u003EHell Bent for Leather.\u00a0\u003C\/em\u003EBut it only made them stronger, more ambitious, ready to go to the next show and raise a fist with devil\u2019s horns, as was all the rage.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E \u003Cfigure class=\"pict pict_land pict_move_posc 0 cs_img cs_img--curr rule--ss_c\" data-shot=\"pict\" data-hint=\"pict\"\u003E \u003Cdiv class=\"pict__pobj text-overflow\"\u003E\u003Cimg src=https:\/\/elfaro.net\/get_img?ImageWidth=4000&ImageHeight=3113&ImageId=39219 class=\"pobj\" style=\"max-width: 100%\" rel=\"resizable\" alt=\"Members of the Western Locos clique of the Mara Salvatrucha in the mid-80s in Los Angeles. One of them, Puppet, returned years later to El Salvador and lived in the Amatepec colonia in San Salvador, where he was eventually murdered.\" \/\u003E\u003C\/div\u003E \u003Cfigcaption class=\"pict__text cs_img_caption folk_content typo_buttons line--ss_s0c line--ss_s0c--auto block full-width text-overflow rule--ss_l relative\"\u003E \u003Cdiv class=\"__content block-inline full-width align-top tint-text--idle relative\"\u003E Members of the Western Locos clique of the Mara Salvatrucha in the mid-80s in Los Angeles. One of them, Puppet, returned years later to El Salvador and lived in the Amatepec colonia in San Salvador, where he was eventually murdered. \u003Cdiv class=\"photographer text_italic rule--ss_l tint-text--idle\"\u003E \u003C\/div\u003E \u003C\/div\u003E \u003C\/figcaption\u003E \u003C\/figure\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp align=\"center\"\u003E* * *\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIn the spring of 1984, with the Olympic Games\u2019 opening ceremony drawing near, the Los Angeles mayor decided to rid the streets of everything, and everyone, who might tarnish this demonstration of sporting prowess, and social superiority of the West against the Soviet enemy.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIn the midst of the Cold War, four years after the U.S. boycott of the Moscow Games, Ronald Reagan not only wanted the Los Angeles Olympics to be the first in history organized by a private corporation for profit, but also a showcase for the kind of social harmony that only the capitalist model could provide.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EWith the planetary threat of nuclear weapons, Los Angeles had to be a safe city. And this safety meant purging the gangs of south-central and west Los Angeles from the streets, even if just for a few weeks. The streets were militarized. There were raids and planned mass arrests. The usual suspects were imprisoned. The heads of the city\u2019s main gangs \u2014Latino, Black and Asian\u2014 were among them.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EChele was already a member of the Mara Salvatrucha at this point, and she dressed as a Stoner. Although she was born in El Salvador, she was raised in Los Angeles. As an 8 year old she put up with other girls making fun of her because she didn\u2019t know how to play Four Corners, a typical children\u2019s game in the United States \u2014 despite the fact she spoke better English than Spanish. At 11 a school friend tried to convince her to join 18th Street, but she didn\u2019t want to. When she was 13, tired of being beaten up and feeling trapped by the Chicano gangs at school, she joined the Mara.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cFor the 1984 Olympics the police took all the heavy-duty Cholos from the big gangs, and the Mara filled the void,\u201d she recalls.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cWhy only the Mara?\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cIt wasn\u2019t just the Mara. Throughout all of Los Angeles the number of gangs increased, and more people joined.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003ELeft without leaders, many cliques of Angeleno gangs went through violent internal battles in 84 and 85 to redefine their leadership. The Mara were still strangers to internal battles for a power they didn\u2019t yet have, and they dedicated themselves purely to growth through attracting ever-younger Salvadorans who were arriving in Los Angeles with their families, escaping civil war. They fought for territory with their fists and knives.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cSam the Eagle \u2014the Olympic mascot for those games\u2014 was responsible for what the Mara is today,\u201d Chele says, laughing.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe details of how the Mara began to wrestle territory from the Chicano gangs\u2019 grip depend on who you\u2019re talking to. Today Los Angeles gang members tell you what they want to remember, or what they heard from the veteran homeboys: that, armed with youth and Salvadoran rage, they fiercely took over street corners from men who were less crazy, less tenacious, or simply less manly.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EBut there are less epic versions. One veteran of the Playboys gang says, for example, that in the early 80s El Flaco,\u00a0\u003Cem\u003Epalabrero\u003C\/em\u003E\u00a0of the Playboys clique Normandie Locos, who controlled the intersection of Normandie Avenue and 18th street, had to be operated on multiple times after he was shot in the back and seriously injured. A few months later, he was discharged from hospital, now wheelchair-bound, but his homeboys had scattered across the city and his clique had fallen apart. The Mara Salvatrucha, who had previously been subordinate to the Playboys, a guest in their territory, inherited this now-ownerless intersection. They even took the name of the disappeared Playboys clique, to form one of the most powerful cliques of their own: the Normandie Locos Salvatrucha.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EFor the Salvatrucha these were months of rapid growth and change. People who joined the Mara in the second half of the 80s say that most of the Chicano gangs did not accept the new arrivals and subjected them to constant harassment. They made it clear they were enemies \u2014 as if by discriminating against new arrivals, new migrants, they might themselves earn the status of non-immigrants. As if you could become an American through discriminating like one.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIn the prisons and on the streets the Mara were ridiculed for using words like\u00a0\u003Cem\u003Ecipote, cerote, vergo,\u00a0\u003C\/em\u003Eand\u00a0\u003Cem\u003Emara,\u00a0\u003C\/em\u003Ewhich the Chicanos considered vulgar. But in reclaiming their origins they found a means of consolidating themselves. Alone, they became more united. Beaten, they grew stronger. The Mara Salvatrucha were not popular, but they were becoming notorious. Soon their fame for brutality grew. While other groups fought with chains and knives, the MS began using machetes; former Playboys members say they have met Maras who armed themselves with axes.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EWith some of their members arrested and sent to juvenile prison for petty crime, their identity as metalheads was taking a backseat, while their street gang identity took shape. In prison they were defenseless and isolated; forced to lose their long hair and confronted by numerous enemy groups, the Salvatruchas began to learn how the prison codes of southern California worked. They realized they would need to adopt the\u00a0\u003Cem\u003Echolo\u003C\/em\u003E\u00a0aesthetic to blend in with the crowd.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIf in the early years the streets were relatively clear for the Salvatrucha to make their way, prisons became the real place where these new migrants were socialized. Like a meat processor that turns people into what the system says they are, prison is where the Mara learnt the ways of California gangs.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIf the system tells you you\u2019re the same as the rest, a Latino gang member, you accept that and dress like what they\u2019ve convinced you that you are: a Latino gang member.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EBy 1985 most MS cliques had left the Stoner aesthetic, identity, and name behind. Over the following years petty drug dealing became routine, as did extortion of local dealers. It made no sense to control an area if there was no economic gain. Competition with other gangs meant needing to beat them in every sense: presence, control, violence\u2026 Money. Chele remembers how homies who came out of prison began teaching new members the arts of intimidation and control, studied through long conversations inside. She herself remembers how after a short stint in prison, she set about getting her clique in order. According to her, they were losing money from only demanding payment from drug dealers once a week.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cThe homie in charge said to me: \u201cYou think you know things \u2018cause you\u2019ve done time. You got a better idea?\u201d and I said to him: \u2018Yeah man, the rent comes due every day. And also, the dealers see you coming from a mile off with that red truck. They hide from you and that\u2019s why you get nothing.\u2019\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cDid you explain the new rules to the dealers?\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cThey already knew the score. But we let them decide: if they wanted to sell drugs in the gang territory they should pay rent, or go somewhere else. There should always be more than one option; without that people have no free will, let\u2019s say. And free will is what makes us human, not animals.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cWeren\u2019t there people who refused to pay daily?\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cThere always are, but if someone opens an unregistered business, sooner or later the tax collectors will come for your payment. Of course there had to be some kind of exemplary punishment, like how a pimp might hit a prostitute to set an example, or a nun in an orphanage beat an orphan\u2019s hands with the Bible\u2026 Believe me, everything in gangs is a reflection of a society.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cDid the Mara kill anyone to set an example?\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cThe police could tell you that. Violence is bad for business, but no-one said those fools had an MBA.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe Mara had kept the metalheads\u2019 symbol of devil horns, which the Salvatruchas now call \u201cThe Claw\u201d. But there was no time left to enjoy their adolescence; they were a fully-grown gang now. There were at least 12 cliques in west-central Los Angeles; the main ones were the Normandies, the Hollywoods, the Leewards and the Westerns.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIn the neighboring San Fernando Valley they had cultivated another clique, the Fultons, a group of defiant hotheads who grew rapidly and gained respect among their peers. It was the clique that, years later, Ernesto Deras \u2014Satan\u2014 would come to lead.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe Salvatrucha had even had their first martyr, murdered that same year, 1985, in the parking lot behind the Seven Eleven on James M. Wood Street. In this world, killing someone is a kind of acceptance, a way to make clear you consider yourself part of the game, the battle for territory. The first member killed in the gang war still had a Stoner nickname: Black Sabbath.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E \u003Cfigure class=\"pict pict_land pict_move_posc 0 cs_img cs_img--curr rule--ss_c\" data-shot=\"pict\" data-hint=\"pict\"\u003E \u003Cdiv class=\"pict__pobj text-overflow\"\u003E\u003Cimg src=https:\/\/elfaro.net\/get_img?ImageWidth=4000&ImageHeight=3500&ImageId=39220 class=\"pobj\" style=\"max-width: 100%\" rel=\"resizable\" alt=\"Members of Los Angeles Playboys gang. In the eighties, the oldest southern gangs sported \u201cpachuco\u201d style at parties. On the bottom right is El Flaco, an elder palabrero of the Normandie Locos clique.\" \/\u003E\u003C\/div\u003E \u003Cfigcaption class=\"pict__text cs_img_caption folk_content typo_buttons line--ss_s0c line--ss_s0c--auto block full-width text-overflow rule--ss_l relative\"\u003E \u003Cdiv class=\"__content block-inline full-width align-top tint-text--idle relative\"\u003E Members of Los Angeles Playboys gang. In the eighties, the oldest southern gangs sported \u201cpachuco\u201d style at parties. On the bottom right is El Flaco, an elder palabrero of the Normandie Locos clique. \u003Cdiv class=\"photographer text_italic rule--ss_l tint-text--idle\"\u003E \u003C\/div\u003E \u003C\/div\u003E \u003C\/figcaption\u003E \u003C\/figure\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EA Trip through Gangland\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe Curacao building will never feature in any architectural magazine. Or at least, not in any that are about beautiful or decorative constructions. It\u2019s a huge cement monster with dark windows, with the same charm as the statue of a coup leader that stands in the middle of the Pico Union neighborhood, on the southern border of West Side Los Angeles.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIts only virtue \u2014at least, if you don\u2019t have to spend eight hours a day inside\u2014 is the unique smell wafting into the lower floors from a nearby Pollo Campero. This Guatemalan fried chicken chain has become the focus of Salvadorans\u2019 nostalgic appetites; this scent of the left-behind homeland may lightly coat the building with tenderness.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EDowntown Los Angeles is still unable to shake its bad reputation from the 80s and 90s. It was seen as an area full of lowlives and nerdowells; it conjured images of homeless Black vagrants pushing shop carts full of bin bags that smelled even worse than they did; of hordes of crazed Latinos killing each other on any filthy street corner; a place of drug dealing, robberies, and shootouts. In other words, the gringos assumed it to be a place full of illegal immigrants \u2014 and they were right.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAs new waves of migration came, neighborhoods with high numbers of undocumented people began to spill towards the periphery of Downtown, sweeping along with them the angry sound of the arrival of the dispossessed. One of these locations is the Pico Union neighborhood, which was the focus of Salvadoran immigration at the time. It was also the site of the Curacao building, with its Pollo Campero scent.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EOn the seventh floor, in the middle of a corridor of cramped offices with one bathroom, is the headquarters of United Homies, overseen by a short, Salvadoran man with a paunch, called Alex S\u00e1nchez.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAlex S\u00e1nchez\u2019s unofficial resume would go something like this: He came to the United States aged seven, fleeing civil war. He joined the Mara Salvatrucha young, and claims to have Stoner ancestry. He was deported to El Salvador in 1994. He came to the United States again illegally a year later in order to establish the organization for youth prevention and social reintegration that he still runs today.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EHomies United are highly respected in Los Angeles, something that their Salvadoran counterpart has lost in recent years.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIn 2002 Alex S\u00e1nchez managed to convince an American court that his life was endangered in El Salvador because of his gang past, becoming one of the few cases of humanitarian asylum granted by the Bush administration. But he was caught up in a 2009 FBI operation against the MS: Alex was taken from his home and accused of leading a double life between gang rehabilitation and as a Mara leader. Together with 24 other people, he was accused of a long list of crimes including murder and conspiracy to murder. He remained in prison for two years, and after a huge mobilization by local activists he was freed under the condition that he would not leave the state of California, would not drink and would have no relations with \u2014including speaking to\u2014 members of the Mara Salvatrucha.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIt\u2019s worth mentioning that after speaking to public administration employees, active and retired gang members, academic researchers, and experts, we found no-one in Los Angeles who believed Alex S\u00e1nchez to be guilty of these charges. He tells whoever will listen that he was the victim of a vengeful police plot.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003ETo sum up, the life of Alex S\u00e1nchez has been traversed, like a scar across a face, by gangs; when we asked him to explain something important about that world, he told us the following:\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cThe gang world is a game where, from the moment of your initiation, you authorize the enemy to kill you the moment they see you, just for being from the gang you\u2019re from. The truth is that being a gang member is essentially an act of self-destruction.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAlex left the gang ten years ago. In his words, ten years ago he stopped committing suicide daily.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cWhy do you think Latino gangs kill each other? Look into the face of a Mexican, a Salvadoran, a Honduran, a Guatemalan. What do you see? The same skin color, the same Aztec or Mayan features. You don\u2019t see Latino gangs killing white people, nor fighting for territory with African American gangs, despite being enemies.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cWhat do you mean to say?\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cThat gang violence is born from the desire to be something other than yourself. It\u2019s a struggle against yourself, against your reflection.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp align=\"center\"\u003E* * *\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIn the 80s, the clearest reflection of the Mara Salvatrucha were the veteran gang 18, who had been around for 30 years. While other gangs with Chicano roots rejected non-Mexican migrants, or sometimes even refused a welcome to migrants born in Mexico, clinging solely to the Chicano flag, 18th Street defined themselves as a gang open to Latino migrants from a range of places. This allowed them to rapidly become one of the biggest gangs in Los Angeles. Even today their members refer to 18 as \u201c\u003Cem\u003Eel grandote\u003C\/em\u003E\u201d (the big one).\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe geographical overlap between cliques from both gangs, the 18\u2019s slightly paternalistic view of the recent arrivals and the strong presence of Salvadorans in their ranks created an easy affinity between the 18 and the Mara Salvatrucha. The two gangs were fellow travelers; their members went to the same parties and fought together against common adversaries.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003ESome members of the 18 with Salvadoran blood held a secret admiration for the Salvatrucha identity, who claimed they were different from the rest. They would think: if there had been a Salvadoran gang like the MS when I arrived, I wouldn\u2019t be in the 18 now.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EFor years many had hidden \u2014and continued to hide\u2014 that they were from San Juli\u00e1n, Chinameca, or Santa Rosa de Lima, in order to join gangs like the Playboys. Others, even in the pluralistic 18, had masked their accent to fit in and not be considered inferior. The Salvatruchas didn\u2019t force themselves to talk like Chicanos, nor renounce their origins, present in the name of their gang.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EA former gang member from 18 remembers that in the early 80s she regularly went to the same parties as MS members. As a joke she would order them to cut their hair, dress better, and leave behind their slacker aesthetic with their ripped trousers.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cI used to tell them they smelled bad, and if any of them tried to win me over I\u2019d say he shouldn\u2019t even\u003Cem\u003Ethink\u003C\/em\u003Ethat I was going to get together with one of them. But we were allies, and even though girls from 18 were forbidden to go out with guys from other neighborhoods, various of my homegirls ended up in relationships with homies from the MS.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe barriers between both gangs were as porous as human skin. Even now that the MS and 18 are deadly rivals, there are cases of 18 members who form families with girls with MS tattoos, and vice versa. In those days it was normal to swap glances. Affection was tolerated.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003ECliques from both gangs came to share territory. The MS from Leeward and the 18 from Shatto Park even fought for a neighborhood together, and would make a hand gesture which merged the E from\u00a0\u003Cem\u003EEighteenth Street\u00a0\u003C\/em\u003Eand the devil horns of the young MS. The Salvatrucha and Barrio 18 together on one hand in a gesture that united what in gangs usually provokes the saying: kill or be killed.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIf the Mara Salvatrucha ever had a brother in Los Angeles, it was 18th Street. Maybe that\u2019s why the two gangs hold their enmity above those they maintain with other street groups. Hate is always deeper when you have loved, when you have been close, when the feeling of betrayal hides a more intimate pain: the shame of having trusted.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp align=\"center\"\u003E* * *\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAlex S\u00e1nchez learnt the rules of primal hate the hard way, as a boy recently arrived in a jungle where the rules were already set: if your accent and words sound weird, you're the fool \u2014 unless you have the balls to fight and draw a line.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EWhen he was eight years old he carried out his first beating: A\u00a0\u003Cem\u003EChicanito\u00a0\u003C\/em\u003Ehad broken one of his paper airplanes. He was suspended from school, but his father had two jobs and his mother worked full-time in a factory. In any case, neither of them spoke English, so when the news arrived from the school he himself signed it. Problem solved.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EOver the years his Salvadoran accent faded. He learnt to disappear, to camouflage, to feel that what he inherited from his parents was a burden: a shitty accent, ridiculous words, a country that was just a vague shadow bent on pursuing him. Over time he discovered he wasn\u2019t the only Salvadoran who went through life disguised as a Chicano; there were other young men who had managed to slip through into the few gangs who allowed people of dubious origins to join, like Eighteenth Street or the Playboys.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EUntil he met Cuyo.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAlex was 14 years old when Cuyo introduced him to the Mara Salvatrucha, a group of teenagers. The word \u2018gang\u2019 still didn\u2019t fit, like when children dress up to play in the ties and shoes of adults. But for Alex S\u00e1nchez, the group of youths shone true, and was welcoming: they spoke in their natural voices, a handful of Salvadoran kids standing up to the world of the Chicanos and winning the right to be there, to raise their flag without hiding from anyone. Of course, he joined. Soon he, himself, was putting together the first child cliques with students from Berendo Middle School, surrounded by the streets Berendo and Catalina. He was part of the Catalinos Locos clique who had to join a bigger gang, the Normandies, once they found themselves in conflict with other gangs. In the Normandies there were a couple of boys a few years older than him.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cAlex, how did the war against 18th Street start?\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cThese first MS cliques were defending themselves against other gangs in the area, but there was always a friendship with the 18. 18 came from before, and for many, before the MS existed the 18 was the only gang who would accept Central American immigrants. So they already had Salvadoran gang members. They kept up relations with the 18 for many years. Sometimes problems happen because the guys here start to fight, then you start having disagreements, misunderstandings, and from one fight an enmity develops. Someone ends up dead, and that\u2019s where it all starts.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cBut, how did the war start?\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cThey had a close relationship with the 18.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cClose?\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cThe 18 and MS had a lot of enemies and friends in common, with some exceptions. For example, the Easy Riders gang who always got along well with the MS but not with the 18. But in general we would defend ourselves together, the MS and the 18. And sometimes in prisons we would defend ourselves against other gangs. But the problem was that there was a clique in the MS called the King Boulevard Locos, and that was where the fight began.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cWhat happened? Did an 18 come and kill them?\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cNo\u2026 Well, no because they\u2026 It seems like what happened was there was a fight over a girl, and the guy lost the fight, the guy from 18, and he wasn\u2019t satisfied\u2026\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cWas that in the street?\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cIt was in an alleyway, right where the MS used to meet between King Boulevard and Normandie.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E(Writes in notebook) \u201cBet-wee-n Ki-ng Bo-u-le-vard and Nor-man-die.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cLook, if you want we can go see it.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp align=\"center\"\u003E* * *\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EWe leave the Curacao building in the compact, recently-rented Mazda, with Alex S\u00e1nchez as copilot. We go down West Olympic Boulevard, which connects Downtown with the West Side. We carry on until Alvarado street and turn left. We pass the intersection with Pico Boulevard, legendary in gang lore. Right on the intersection there is a very well-to-do restaurant, which at first seems like a branch of any American fast-food chain, with\u00a0\u003Cem\u003Epupuser\u00eda\u003C\/em\u003E\u00a0in big red letters.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EWe carry on down Alvarado Street until it becomes Hoover, which runs parallel to Bonnie Brea Street; we cross Venice Boulevard \u2014at the intersection is another ostentatious pupuser\u00eda\u2014 and over to the right onto the wide Washington Boulevard. The whole way we pass signs in Spanish, and with each\u00a0\u003Cem\u003Elavander\u00eda\u003C\/em\u003E,\u00a0\u003Cem\u003Etaquer\u00eda\u003C\/em\u003E\u00a0or\u00a0\u003Cem\u003Eventas de autos\u00a0\u003C\/em\u003E\u2014no cars, no vehicles\u2014 Alex S\u00e1nchez announces, like a lottery, the names of the gang who claims each block: \u201cDrifters\u201d, \u201cPlayboys\u201d, \u201cMid City\u201d, \u201cHarpies\u201d, \u201cEasy Riders\u201d...\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIn the Angeleno ecosystem gangs have more than one concern. Territories are generally narrow, divided up by thin alleyways or, if you\u2019re lucky, by boulevards or avenues that allow more certainty regarding who each sidewalk belongs to. Sometimes, two neighboring gangs put signs up on the same corner, with arrows facing opposite directions so that there is some clarity to the border. Other times \u2014most times\u2014 they simply live amid potentially fatal disputes with their closest neighbors. The 18 aren\u2019t always the MS\u2019 main concern, and vice versa. They fight with whoever\u2019s closest.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThis mix of gangs have heterogeneous origins: some were car clubs, or a neighborhood American football association, or a graffiti crew\u2026 It\u2019s estimated there are currently 300 Latino gangs in Los Angeles. More than 700 in southern California, which is without counting the Black gangs, Asian gangs, white gangs.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAs we carry on down Washington Boulevard, 18th Street appears intermittently, running parallel. A traffic light forces us to stop alongside the vast Angelous Rosadale Cementery, where four of our guide\u2019s brothers are buried. All four were Easy Riders. All four died in gang wars of the past. A blue sign just after the cemetery tells us that this wide street that crosses Washington Boulevard is Normandie Avenue. We\u2019re in Mara Salvatrucha territory. We go down Normandie, which leads us to a residential area of quiet streets.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIn the 80s and 90s real wars were fought here. Streets were signposted by their owners, and the youngest homeboys patrolled the streets with guns, ready to defend their territory from others who claimed it. There were two kinds of outsiders: people buying drugs, or enemies. In both cases one had to be ready to respond adequately.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThis whole scenario changed with the introduction of laws known as \u2018gang injunctions\u2019, which still today prohibit three or more gang members known to the police to gather in the street. Police have powers to arrest, and the fine is one thousand dollars. On top of that, of course, is the risk of deportation. From the late 80s and more than ever during the second half of the 90s, gang injunction laws forced gangs to change their ways.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003ENowadays, the streets of southeast Los Angeles appear as any other peaceful town, where residents walk tiny dogs and the elderly chat on the sidewalk. From time to time you see the initials of one or another clique tattooed onto a tree or, timidly, onto the ground. There are no gang members on street corners, but locals watch with distrust from the balconies.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EOur journey through the streets belonging to various cliques is coming to an end. We leave Normandie to descend Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, where Alex S\u00e1nchez tells us to pause and turn into a narrow alleyway, where our small Mazda just fits. In Los Angeles it\u2019s rare to come across an unsurfaced alleyway such as this one. Muddy puddles pock the ground and scrub bush grows at the foot of wooden fences along both sides. Some homeless people have built a plastic structure next to a wall where once was written \u201cRest in Peace Shaggy\u201d. Here is where it all began.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E \u003Cfigure class=\"pict pict_land pict_move_posc 0 cs_img cs_img--curr rule--ss_c\" data-shot=\"pict\" data-hint=\"pict\"\u003E \u003Cdiv class=\"pict__pobj text-overflow\"\u003E\u003Cimg src=https:\/\/elfaro.net\/get_img?ImageWidth=4000&ImageHeight=1913&ImageId=39221 class=\"pobj\" style=\"max-width: 100%\" rel=\"resizable\" alt=\"Mural painted by the Leeward Locos clique of the Mara Salvatrucha on the back end of Leeward Avenue in Los Angeles, between Westmoreland and Hoover Streets. Photograph taken in the second half of the eighties.\" \/\u003E\u003C\/div\u003E \u003Cfigcaption class=\"pict__text cs_img_caption folk_content typo_buttons line--ss_s0c line--ss_s0c--auto block full-width text-overflow rule--ss_l relative\"\u003E \u003Cdiv class=\"__content block-inline full-width align-top tint-text--idle relative\"\u003E Mural painted by the Leeward Locos clique of the Mara Salvatrucha on the back end of Leeward Avenue in Los Angeles, between Westmoreland and Hoover Streets. Photograph taken in the second half of the eighties. \u003Cdiv class=\"photographer text_italic rule--ss_l tint-text--idle\"\u003E \u003C\/div\u003E \u003C\/div\u003E \u003C\/figcaption\u003E \u003C\/figure\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EShaggy\u2019s Revenge\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe intersection of Normandie Avenue and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard is the territory of a Mara clique, the Western Locos. And the long alleyway, just a few meters away but concealed, was the site of regular MS meetings. Still today, each house on the block has two floors with wooden doors, a garage, and a small garden backing onto the alley. They say the party, that night in late 1989, was in one of these houses.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIn meetings like the one that night, members of the Salvatrucha and multiple 18 cliques would share beer and liquor while the scent of marijuana wafted through the air. People would come and go, and there was always someone new to meet amid the spider\u2019s web of relations that made up the cliques across the width and breadth of all Los Angeles. Loud music echoed through neighboring houses: rock and hip-hop, broken up with classics by James & Bobby Purify, or Mary Wells. The 18 insisted on song requests from the 60s, and zoot suits, typical of Mexican\u00a0\u003Cem\u003Epachuco\u003C\/em\u003E\u00a0style, worn with a sombrero and carefully coiffed hair. Their aesthetic reflected a real, old-school gang history, which they could claim because they had it.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe Salvatrucha were only starting to write theirs, so they lived in the present.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003ENobody seems to remember the girl the fight was over, but most versions coincide in saying that that night the party was broken up with a fight between Shaggy, from Western, and a member of the 18 who ended up getting an UZI machine-gun and settling the argument in the alleyway, with bullets. The story is told with no elaboration, as if murders can happen any time, and memory has reduced events to the image of a gun being fired. As if there is no need to explain the explosion, because it is taken as understood that the party was covered in gunpowder. They say Shaggy\u2019s body was left lying in the earth where today the homeless people make their bed.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EBut not even that is known for sure. The genesis of hate\u2019s creed is muddled.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003ETwenty years ago, the American researcher Tom Ward began to ask members of both gangs how the war began. He has collected other testimonies of a machine-gunning from a moving car where MS members wanted to kill members of a rival gang, the Harpies, but mistakenly killed a member of the 18 who was among them. According to that version, the 18 asked MS for financial compensation for the death of their homeboy \u2014 a common gesture among gangs to demonstrate regret or ask for forgiveness. But the Mara did not want to pay. They saw it as a humiliation and criticized the 18 for allowing their members to meet with the Harpies, enemies of their friends.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIn none of the versions does anyone say who fired the first shot. The name of the person who triggered the war between the Mara Salvatrucha and Barrio 18 has disappeared, even from rumor.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp align=\"center\"\u003E* * *\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAlex S\u00e1nchez says that the night that Shaggy was killed he was with friends on his\u00a0\u003Cem\u003Ecancha\u003C\/em\u003E, or turf, near the corner of Normandie and 8th, when someone came to break the news. \u201cEverything\u2019s going to kick off,\u201d they told him.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIt didn\u2019t surprise him. In recent years, scuffles with the 18 had been increasingly frequent. They fought over businesses, personal feuds, and because the street breeds hate. But above all, the slow but constant migration of Salvadoran members of the 18, anxious to stop presenting as Chicanos, into the Salvatrucha ranks. At first it was tolerated, but it made the leaders of 18th Street increasingly uncomfortable to see their younger brother grow up; it was at their cost, and this made them angry.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cThey felt that the Mara Salvatrucha were disrespecting them,\u201d Alex S\u00e1nchez says.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAnd in the gangs\u2019 world, when respect has gone there is nothing left to preserve, and any brotherhood vanishes. Once that symbolic dam has burst there is only the blunt and brutal language of violence.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe way Alex tells it, the night they killed Shaggy there were those who immediately proposed trying to make a deal, to stifle the echo of bullets already fired before they drowned out the sound of bullets fired in return.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cWe said we should talk about what happened and try to find a solution. You couldn\u2019t start a war like that, with those people, because\u2026 because you couldn\u2019t.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cYou won\u2019t believe me, but in the Normandie we were different, because the Playboys were still around in the Normandie area. In those years my clique got along with the Playboys, even though they were enemies of the 18. And we kind of didn\u2019t get along that well with the 18. But other cliques were really attached to them, and that was the relationship that had to be maintained.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cAnd what did you do to resolve it?\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cNothing. We were going to try but there was no time. The guys from Western and Shaggy\u2019s close friends didn\u2019t give us the chance \u2014 the next day there were already, like, four people dead.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAfter what happened, it was easy to grease the wheels of vengeance. 18th Street and the Mara Salvatrucha were so close that each gang knew the other\u2019s hiding places and where their members lived. Over the coming years when one enemy gave the green light, someone\u2019s death sentence, there was always someone who knew how to find them. And the names of the newly dead made forgetting the first ones easier.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cGang members don\u2019t care about history. If they did, they would be at school studying it,\u201d says Alex S\u00e1nchez. \u201cI knew Shaggy. When they killed him he was more or less the same age as me, 17. I used to see him all the time, spending the afternoon in a Taco Bell near that alleyway with his girlfriend. But now almost no-one in the Mara remembers him. People come, people go\u2026 only legend is left.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp align=\"center\"\u003E* * *\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cDo you really think all that began over a woman?\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EChele is sitting on the terrace of a bar in San Salvador, her second eer in front of her. She gives a tired look, and repeats what she has told us before: people invent stories, they take the facts and dress them up. In the world of gangs, homies talk like they know everything but almost no-one really knows who or what happened in Mara history. Chele is a proud feminist and has pointed guns at the heads of men who disrespected her, but she tells us again that the war between the Mara Salvatrucha and 18th Street began because of something more important than a girl\u2019s affection.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cWell, that\u2019s what they say: that the row began that night, and the next morning there were four dead,\u201d we insisted.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cYeah, but things didn\u2019t happen overnight. They went way back. What happened was that around the day of the party three Salvadorans from the 18 had joined the Mara. But they hadn\u2019t left the 18 first. And two of those had joined the Western Locos clique.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cAnd they were at the party?\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cIt seems like it. There was an argument about that, and that\u2019s when the UZI came out. The bullets blew up Shaggy\u2019s hand and they killed him. But it wasn\u2019t planned. The next death wasn\u2019t that night, it was a few days later, that same week.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cWho was it?\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cFunny, from 18. Funny was going through Normandie territory and didn\u2019t know what had happened. The Mara homies called him, kept him for hours in a house doing all kinds of things to him until they killed him.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cTo get revenge for Shaggy?\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cYes. They went one by one. Now they\u2019ve lost count. But it wasn\u2019t over a woman.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIn a gang, a woman is an insignificant person. There are veteran female gang members in Los Angeles who say they\u2019re respected in their neighborhood, treated as an equal, that their neighborhood is different from others\u2026 But in most Los Angeles gangs, and especially in their Central American counterparts, a woman is an unimportant, worthless person.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EFor years in Los Angeles, Mara Salvatrucha cliques like the Fultons \u2014Satan\u2019s clique\u2014 don\u2019t initiate women as gang members, relegating them to a lower role. They fear that women are more likely to rat on their homies or cause internal conflicts. In El Salvador the 18 don\u2019t accept women into their ranks either. Women are for logistical support, they collaborate on business, they\u2019re partners to one or multiple gang members. But they have no vote nor say, nor do they have the prideful place that would warrant vengeance in the same way as when a homie is killed. Women are disposable.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThere are seasoned exceptions. Like Chele herself, who gained and held onto respect in Los Angeles. Or like The Queen, an aggressive Mara Salvatrucha leader in Honduras to whom gang members from various countries attribute control of a large part of the drugs and arms business in San Pedro Sula. Women who are more men than men themselves. But that\u2019s what they are: exceptions.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EFor that reason it seems strange, almost twisted, that members of both gangs in Los Angeles as in Central America\u2014 claim that the hate between the Mara Salvatrucha and the 18 started as a fight over a girl.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cThe real reason is that they didn\u2019t want Salvadorans from the 18 to join the Mara,\u201d Chele insists. \u201cThey wanted us to forever be in the shadow of the dominant Hispanic group.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201c...\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cDo you really think someone would be tortured for hours because of an argument over a woman? That they would put a broomstick up someone\u2019s ass, like they did with Funny, because of a woman? No, man\u2026 it was something more important than that.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp align=\"center\"\u003E* * *\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIt changes nothing to know if this Helen of Troy of the Los Angeles streets, who unleashed war between MS and the 18, really existed. It doesn\u2019t matter if she had a name that was forgotten. There are even gang members who say that Shaggy was not the first killed in the war; that a short while before, the 18 had killed another MS homie nicknamed Boxer. It doesn\u2019t matter. Twenty-three years after the party in King Jr. alley, the bitterness between the Mara Salvatrucha and Barrio 18 no longer depends on who you recall.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EEspecially in Central America, where both gangs landed at the beginning of the 90s, when they already hated each other. There have been so many deaths \u2014tens of thousands of them\u2014 that each gang member has their own motive for vengeance, and the boundaries and limits of what is considered \u2018respect\u2019 have become warped.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EA former member of 18th Street says that in Mariona Prison in El Salvador, in 1995, there were IT classes for prisoners which had to be suspended because his former homeboys from the 18 were refusing to use computers whose operating system was MS DOS. And that\u2019s not a joke. The poisonous fibers of the conflict are increasingly unpredictable and ravenous. One bad look can contain enough to kill someone, or a life may be so empty as to warrant trading on a bad word.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EOne veteran member of MS-13 in El Salvador, with more than fifteen years in the gang, remembers drinking with some homies in late 2011 when someone else joined the group. They offered him a drink and he turned it down, saying: \u2018No, I don\u2019t want to drink, I got really wasted (\u201c\u003Cem\u003Euna gran peda\u003C\/em\u003E\u201d) yesterday\u2019. Most of the group reacted violently, to the extreme. One told him: \u2018What do you mean, \u201c\u003Cem\u003Euna gran peda\u003C\/em\u003E\u201d? Only the\u00a0\u003Cem\u003Echavalas\u00a0\u003C\/em\u003E(18th Street members described in feminine) use that word\u2019.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cAnd they beat him. They killed him,\u201d he says, with some repugnance. A decade ago he believed he was part of a brotherhood united by tradition and common enemies. But one homeboy used a word in the feminine gender and his brothers from the clique, his friends, called him a traitor and beat him to death. It disgusts him. But it does not seem to surprise him; in Salvadoran gangs, when someone dies in the name of a diffuse hate, with no origin, it is not surprising.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp align=\"center\"\u003E* * *\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAlejandro Alvarado, 38, was a member of the 18. He\u2019s Guatemalan, but he\u2019s been in Los Angeles so long he struggles to speak Spanish. He\u2019s been\u00a0\u003Cem\u003Ecooled off\u003C\/em\u003E\u00a0for years; he has put distance between himself, guns, and the streets. He works in Homies Unidos, like Alex S\u00e1nchez, trying to get other gang members to\u003Cem\u003Ecool off\u003C\/em\u003Eas well. That\u2019s what he talks about as he reluctantly eats a sandwich on the ground floor of the Curacao building; how to break the cycle of violence that gangs get you into.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003EWe tell him how, in El Salvador, the Mara Salvatrucha and the 18 agreed a truce last March, promising not to kill each other. They have managed to achieve a drastic reduction, almost incredible, of homicide statistics. He doesn\u2019t seem surprised. It seems like nothing we say or show to Alejandro Alvarado comes as a surprise. He speaks slowly and looks as if he is just minutes back from the exhausting journey of a lifetime.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cWell, you can reach an agreement, but you need there to be more people, too. What\u2019s the point of peace if there are no resources, no alternatives, you know?\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cOf course.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cThere was a while here, too, around 1993, when they tried to make peace. You know, to not go around shooting each other, and all that. For a while it worked. But the old ways crept back, saying that it can\u2019t be like that with enemies, and that there\u2019ll always be something really deep inside that won\u2019t let it continue. It\u2019s as if the truces are a respite, like if you put glasses of water in the desert. Do you see what I\u2019m saying? But if someone comes and takes those glasses of water away, you\u2019re going to go back to the same thing, because your life depends on drinking water. The gang ends up being like the water that gives you life.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cHas that peace already been broken?\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cYeah, it\u2019s already gone. Yes.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cWhy?\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cBecause there\u2019s always someone who starts something. Because in the gangs, just because one person changes doesn\u2019t mean everyone has to. I stopped drinking twelve years ago. I don\u2019t drink, I don\u2019t smoke \u2014 and I smoked my whole life. Two police officers killed my brother and cousin, and look, I don\u2019t think now that every police officer is bad. I\u2019m testimony to the fact that a person can change, even at their most extreme. But everyone has their point, their\u2026 you know, their checkpoint\u2026 where it\u2019s like, this is as far as I can go.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cSo no-one can order you to\u00a0\u003Cem\u003E\u003C\/em\u003Ecool off?\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cHow? If you\u2019re wounded, if they\u2019ve treated you badly, violated you, harmed you physically and mentally? How are you going to accept all that, you know? It\u2019s like saying to an alcoholic, \u201cyou can\u2019t drink anymore\u201d. As if! They\u2019re going to carry on drinking. They\u2019ll find a way to drink. You feel me?\u201d\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cem\u003E\u003Cem\u003E\u003Cspan style=\"color: #888888;\"\u003EThis piece, translated by Ali Sargent, is chapter one of El Faro\u2019s 2012 special, \u201cThe Journey of the Mara Salvatrucha.\u201d Read\u00a0\u003C\/span\u003E\u003Ca href=\"\/en\/202308\/centroamerica\/27034\/13-the-Mark-of-the-Mexican-Mafia.htm\"\u003Echapter two\u003C\/a\u003E\u003Cspan style=\"color: #888888;\"\u003E:\u00a0\u201c13, the Mark of the Mexican Mafia.\u201d\u003C\/span\u003E\u003C\/em\u003E\u003C\/em\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003C\/div\u003E"}