U.S. Street Orgs Going South of the Border (And Then Come Back)

Wed26Dec2007

U.S. Street Orgs Going South of the Border (And Then Come Back)

10:26 H | Topics: Crime - El Salvador - Mexico

It's not something you hear about often. How street organizations, aka gangs, move their industry to Latin America making them even bigger and transnational. What results is that neither the U.S. or Latin American nations are equipped to deal with the results. Personally, I know of a friend of mine who was recently killed by a gang member in El Salvador after being deported from the U.S.

Two gangs that originated on the streets here have grown so large in El Salvador that there are two prisons in that country devoted exclusively to their members, one for each gang, according to officials who traveled there recently to meet with the local authorities.

So what to do. No one wants crime, here or there and how to do it without resorting to racial profiling.

Certainly don't look to the U.S. for any proactive answers that deal with the whys of street organizations. What the U.S. has opted to do is to create local and national joint task forces looking at the already incarcerated population.

Last week the federal government and Los Angeles County undertook a joint attack on transnational gangs by charging 23 incarcerated gang members with the felony offense of re-entering the United States after being deported. The men, in their 20s and 30s, had been awaiting release from state prisons or city jails where they were serving time for a variety of offenses. They now face up to 20 more years in federal prison if convicted.

So what problem exactly does this solve (besides feeding the growing prison industry)? Are we still under the idea that deterrence works instead of prevention?

Via / The New York Times

Image Via / The Connection