FEATURE
A GANG APART
Text and Photos by Alvaro Lopez

A faraway explosion ripples through the world, shedding light on the largest gang war in history. This is a story of territorial battles, indiscriminate violence and childhood lost.

The blast of the fragmentation grenade was deafening and spread panic among those who dared walk the fetid alleys of Comunidad Iberia, a slum located to the west of El Salvador’s capital, San Salvador.
Panicked screams and cries for help were quickly drowned by the sirens of the approaching ambulance. Paramedics rushed to the scene, but it was too late. Surrounded by curious bystanders lay the dismembered body of Leonel, a member of the 18th Street gang known locally as Pandilla 18. Spectators gazed with a mix of pity and resignation.
In a single blow, torn up by shards, Leonel, also known as El Baby Chico, had become one more casualty in a community ripped apart by violence. Here, the Mara Salvatrucha and 18th Street gang, archrivals waging a territorial war, set the rules.
Leonel was one of the most respected members of the 18, not just in El Salvador, but beyond its borders—his reputation stretching as far as the gang’s birthplace in Los Angeles. The city, known as the home of supergangs such as the Bloods and the Crypts, also gave birth to Mara Salvatrucha in the 1980s and 18th Street in the 1960s. Since then, their expansion has been quick and astronomical.
In its early days, the American prison system served as fertile ground for the recruitment of gang members, many of which were undocumented immigrants. Through deportation and criminal extradition, many were sent back to their home countries of Honduras, El Salvador, Mexico and Guatemala, where they set up local cells. Those who were not caught or were U.S. citizens spread eastward, establishing a presence in cities such as Dallas, Oklahoma City, Atlanta and even in places as remote as Omaha, Nebraska. Some news outlets report their activities as far as Alaska and Australia.
While most Maras and 18th Street members are Hispanics, whites, blacks and Asians are also recruited­—the writing on their skin more important then its color. Be it an MS or an 18, gang members pledge their allegiance with ink, in the form of body art.
Like most gang members, 90 percent of Leonel’s body was covered with tattoos, making him easily recognized among those who traverse the Comunidad Iberia’s narrow alleys. Most were souvenirs from his prison days, others where inked in memory of his departed homeboys, as they call their comrades.
Leonel was 22 years old, an age when many are considered veteranos or veterans, at the time of his death. Not atypically, he joined the gang at 14. In some circles, the 18th Street gang is known as The Children’s Army for its constant recruitment from elementary and middle schools. At such a young age, Leonel committed acts of violence, extortion, revenge and an endless list of offenses—crimes he committed in cold blood.
Back then he would say that he had joined the 18 just for the hell of it; because it was fun, because he liked the way the women flirted with gang members, unlike the hundreds of young men who join gangs looking for what they lack at home—warmth, a family and a sense of belonging. But, what started as fun quickly turned into active militancy, especially after the attacks of the Mara Salvatrucha took the lives of friends and comrades during territorial disputes.
“There’s no other way,” he is remembered as saying. “We have no choice but to respond.” And so, by force of beatings, stabbings and shootings, he quickly became an innocent-faced murderer. “If I don’t kill one of them when I get the chance, he’s going to kill me, or another homeboy,” he said with a sly, menacing smile. “That’s the way gang war goes.”
But this isn’t just El Baby Chico’s line of reasoning. It is prevalent among gang members. The crazier and more violent your behavior, the stronger your reputation for being a loco, a crazy, one who should be feared. In El Salvador, this violence and the sheer numbers of gang members who perpetuate it has largely grown beyond control of the authorities, in spite of operations designed to stop them.
In the majority of murders that take place in El Salvador—sometimes as many as 15 a day—the finger points in the same direction: gangs. They kill citizens who refuse to pay “rent” (extortion), kill over territorial disputes, or those who simply refuse to give them a cora (quarter). Of 1,456 crimes recorded between January and May of this year, 906 were gang-related.
Leonel’s death was felt throughout the gang, as evidenced by the constant calls from various penitentiaries to “Goofi,” the leader of one of the gang’s cliques. Surrounding the body of their comrade, grief-stricken members of 18th Street sought explanations and, above all, revenge. “We have to find out what happened and who’s responsible,” they said as they handled their weapons.
The calm during the funeral disguised the gang’s heightened state of alert. Anyone arriving or leaving was suspicious. As always, the enemy could strike at any time, so attendees and passers-by were subjected to searches.
Out of touch with his everyday activities, his mother wept in a secluded corner, mourning the death of her beloved Leonel, the name she gave him at baptism. His sister, however, knew of his activities and remembered that once, at another gang member’s funeral, she told her brother to be careful. He looked at her and said nothing. Now, it was his 22-year-old body resting in a brown coffin. The same color as the one he had recently carried at the funeral of his friend who had been shot twice in the head.
The procession that mourned Leonel’s body that day consisted of his family members and more than 100 homeboys, for whom Leonel was also a brother. However, when they reached the grave, the “civilians” had to leave—the burial is a gang affair. By means of a radio-equipped cellphone from a prison in the northern region of Chalatenango, where many members of 18th Street are incarcerated, the voice of one of the leaders remembered “the fallen” and demanded an investigation into his death.
Running gang cliques from prison, or “the inside,” is no small feat, but ironically tougher enforcement and zero tolerance policies have only strengthened the criminal networks. Packed into prisons, and often segregated from other gangs or inmates, the gangs have time to organize and build relations with other cliques, becoming more cohesive overall. Those in prison for life have little to fear from the judicial system and have few qualms about ordering about such investigations and retributions that will eventually lead to more deaths.
Immediately afterwards, the remains of Leonel, El Baby Chico, were buried, and gang members quickly scattered in every direction, well aware that they could be next to enter the ground in a coffin. That is the way of la vida loca, the crazy life. It’s the way of the gangs and of a cyclical war with no end in sight.

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