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In 1995, a family and addiction counselor named Kate Cavett began working with young gang members inside an adolescent male correctional facility in Minnesota. She was also an experienced oral historian, so in an effort to better understand gang subculture and develop effective programming that might actually help these young teens escape gang life, she began listening to them and recording their stories.
For three years, Cavett sat down with 105 young Minnesota gang members from all walks of life. They were of Black, White, Asian, Hispanic, and Native descent. They lived in places like Minneapolis, St. Paul, St. Cloud and Duluth, but also smaller, more rural locations like Grand Rapids, Litchfield and Willmar.
When Cavett shared her transcribed stories with Sgt. John Harrington from the St. Paul Police Department, he was impressed with the depth of her research and the raw, honest responses that the interviewees had shared with her. It also provided valuable insight into the inner workings of Minnesota’s new, hybrid gangs that were sprouting up everywhere. They began collaborating and formed a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization named Hand to Hand in order to collect the oral histories of past and present gang members for analysis, evaluation, and education.
In speaking to kids and recording their conversations, Cavett learned some key information about why young people join gangs. Some of the reasons were obvious, like family dysfunction, poverty, alcohol/drug abuse, physical abuse, and neglect. But, perhaps the best explanation came from a young, atypical gang member who went by the name Baby Doll. She’s female, white, and, in 1998, was a member of the Gangster Disciples from Grand Rapids, Minnesota, a rural town of about 8,600 residents, located three hours north of the Twin Cities.
“They watch each others back. I mean you are always protected, you will never, ever have to do anything by yourself. You will always feel that you are cared about, special, loved. And parents these days don’t make kids feel that way. They don’t… they don’t take the time, they’re too busy working, providing, whatever. Or too busy being drunk idiots. And that is quite honestly what is going on up north. In rural Minnesota, where everything is peachy keen and lovely and happy and hunky dorie, well you’re full a shit if that’s what you see. Because all those, 95 percent of the kids that were in our crew, had parents that were alcoholics and drug addicts, abusive and… they needed an outlet, where they could find somebody that thought something good about ‘em. And that’s where they found us. That’s how they recruit. That’s how we get our kids, we recruit them, we recruit those kids. The ones that look like they need something and they did, they needed somebody, they needed to feel loved at some point. Gangs are good parents, they really are. They take care a kids better than actual parents do.” (Cavett and Harrington, “G is for Gangsta,” 118)
Among the interviews Cavett conducted, were those of five young gang members from Willmar ranging in age from 15-20. All five interviews were done within months of each other, all during the tense years of 1997-1998 when Willmar was experiencing a slew of drive-by shootings.
“Bill,” age 18, Mexican American, Latin Kings, 11/21/1997
“Jessy,” age 20, Mexican American, Westside/Crips, 11/21/1997
“Bob,” age 17, White European American, 8th Street Thugs, 7/7/1998
“Jimmy,” age 18, Mexican American, Latin Kings, 7/12/1998
“Joey,” age 15, Mexican American, Maniac Latin Disciple, 7/12/1998
All five of these young men told a similar story about gang life in Willmar. It was basically the Latin Kings (the more organized of the gangs) against everyone else. And though the smaller gangs ran their own show and had their own set of “lit” (hand signals, colors, whether they wore their hats to the left or the right, etc.), they often claimed “Westside” and backed each other up against the Kings.
For 18-year-old Bill, it was the summer after they’d first arrived in Willmar, 1993-1994, when he first started noticing graffiti around the trailer park where he lived. He was about 15 at the time and started hanging around with a group of kids that were always together at the trailer park. That’s when he figured out they were part of a gang.
Before long, he was getting high and drinking with them. Then one day, they asked him to prove himself and made him fight one of his friends. He proved his loyalty and became part of their Latin Kings gang. Mostly that just meant hanging out, drinking, smoking some weed, and getting into a few fights here and there. But then other gangs from California and Chicago started coming into Willmar. That’s when they started to get more organized.
“We started gettin some information from prison and started having meetings an talkin about problems that were goin on an… um… jus basically got inta trouble.”
The meetings took place at a friend’s house who was one of the top five leaders at the time. About 10-20 kids would show up and everybody had to bring $5 to turn in each week. They took turns talking about how their week had gone and whether there had been any problems with rival gang members. They took notes, wrote down names, made lists of any violations within the group, then if necessary, they decided who they needed to fight. Afterward, they sat around, drank some “forties” (40 oz. bottles of malt liquor) and got high.
Before long, the rules started to get stricter. Newcomers had to be “beat in” or “jumped in” to become members of the gang. Often this meant fighting a fellow gang member for a minute and a half, then having four others join in for the final minute. Other times, initiation meant taking 25 punches to the chest—five blows by five different people. The number five was important to the Latin Kings because it represented the 5-point crown.
But, that wasn’t the only time you might get beat by your own fellow gang members . If you stepped out of line, didn’t show up for meetings, didn’t take part in a planned fight, or some other violation, you went through the same punishment. Whoever brought in the violation would fight you for 15 seconds, then be joined by four other people for the last 15 seconds. The 5-point crown again.
When asked why he stayed with the gang, Bill said, “I just basically wanted respect. I wanted ta fit in with everybody else. Money, women, ya know, having a car and having money, that was it.”
So, how does all of this fit in with Angel’s story? Because just two weeks after Angel, Luis, and J.T. were arrested after police found them with a stolen van and two stolen shotguns (see Chapter 3), oral historian Kate Cavett found herself at the Prairie Lakes Juvenile Detention Center in Willmar, interviewing none other than J.T himself.
According to Cavett’s interview, “Jimmy” (not his real name) was nine years old when he and his family arrived in Willmar in 1989. At first, he thought it was quiet and peaceful, especially compared to some of the larger cities he and his family had lived, like New York and Chicago. But when he was around 10 or 11, Jimmy said people started fighting, shooting and doing drive-bys in Willmar. And that’s how he grew up—seeing people fighting and shooting at each other.
By the time Jimmy was 11 or 12, he started getting into the gang scene, mostly because of all the violence that was going on around him.
“People beating up people, people backin-up people, ya know. And I decided well, if my friends are backing up each other ya know, I feel like I needed backup too, cuz I had different kinds a people that try ta jump me ya know. I use to be a little scrawny kid. So, I got in it and I guess that I’ve been in it since I was 12 or 13.”
When asked who was trying to jump him, Jimmy said it was mostly homegrown gangs back then. Just kids throwing names and gang signals around without any real organization. But then, after about three or four years, real gangs started coming into Willmar: Westside Crips, Gangster Disciples, Vice Lords, Latin Kings, and more. At the time he gave this interview in the summer of 1998, Jimmy estimated there were between 8-10 gangs in Willmar.
Angel and Jimmy grew up together in Willmar and had been friends since third grade. They were in the same grade at Lincoln Elementary and often hung out with Jimmy’s older brothers who were also members of the Latin Kings. They all grew up in the gang together.
Cavett asked Jimmy how many people he supposed were in gangs in Willmar. From his perspective, he estimated about half the White kids and almost all the Mexicans were in gangs.
“So you think half of the Mexican population here is in gangs?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“All the same gang? Different gangs?”
“Same gangs, different gangs, but all tryin’ to back up each other. Until one day, they tried to conquer this little place, ya know, Willmar.”
“Why are the Mexicans fighting each other?”
“I dunno. that’s what I’m thinking, too. Every time I seem ‘em, I’m always tryin’ to be at peace with ‘em. But they say naw, cuz you’re claiming this and that, ya know. I’m just telling’ em, hey we just brown. We’re suppose ta be backing each other up, ya know. Bu then people try ta say, naw, we’re tougher. Like, we’re Chicanos or like that… different kinds. So… then break the peace until one day someone settles down or maybe somebody gets hurt.”
After a while, Cavett got right down to it.
“You said you just got arrested for these guns. What did you have the guns for?”
“I had the guns just ta sell em, ya know, get money. Pay for my… well my debts I had, ya know. Gotta pay for whatever I owe in court or whatever. So I got these guns to try to sell em, but I guess they caught me before I sold em all.”
Jimmy went on to explain that sometimes the guns come by “delivery” from different kinds of angles, from the south or north or east.
“So, some Kings might come in from St. Paul to help you out and they bring some guns so that you’d have them for protection?”
“If we need em, yes. If not, we just call. Not our King friends, but friends of friends, ya know. Friends that we knew from a long time ago People that got the time, and people that have been through what we been through.”
Jimmy explained that he was ranked third in his Latin Kings gang, a Warlord. His job was to be an enforcer of sorts. If somebody in the gang wasn’t following the rules, he brought the violation to the person above him, the Inca, to determine whether that person should be punished (violated). He described the main structure like this (again, the 5-point crown):
Meta Inca - highest ranking officer (age 27 at the time)
Inca - second in command (age 21 at the time)
Warlord - an enforcer who makes sure everyone follows the rules (Jimmy, age 18)
Guards - “bone crushers” that violate the violators
Soldiers - lowest rank in the gang
As Cavett began to wrap up her interview with Jimmy, she asked him about his arrest and his impending court appearance. He’d been in and out of Prairie Lakes Detention Center since the age of 12, but this time was different. He would turn 18 in just eight days and prosecutors were hoping to try him as an adult.
“Are you in deep trouble this time?”
“Yes, I am.”
“What’s going to happen?”
“I dunno. On this Tuesday, I gotta go to court. They’re trying to certify me [as an adult] this Tuesday. And then on July 29th I’ve got to go again for receiving stolen property (firearms), and for the benefit of giving it to a gang. And, for theft of a motor vehicle, and damage to property, and curfew, and house arrest. I ran way from house arrest, but all that is misdemeanors.”
“Whoa. Lots of stuff. What do you think is going to happen?”
“Well, we’ll see. I’m gonna fight it, try to take some time off or something. At least get half of it, or cut into one year. I dunno.”
And so, while Jimmy was awaiting his court date, Angel and Luis were also awaiting theirs.
Much more on that next time.