And it is the needs of the individual that lead them into the gang in the first place. For while much is made of the “push” or pressure to join a gang, the threats that an “unaligned” individual receives, and the youngster’s ultimate decision to join the gang based upon fear and for his own protection, the more persuasive explanation centers on the “pulls” or attractors that entice the individual. As Eight Tray Gangster Crips member “Monster” Kody Scott states, the gangs exert a “gravitational pull” before which all else pales. The gang allows inductees to feel they belong to something. It provides quick and easy praise. It bolsters self-esteem. Typically joining the gang anywhere between the ages of ten and seventeen, the insecure young person might be mistreated at home, humiliated in school, but on the streets, as long as they stand up for their hood, they are rewarded.
And the rewards are substantial to the teenage mind: the seductions of money, girls, cars, drugs, and above all status, power, and feelings of acceptance. They are now a part of something respected and feared. By creating an alternative universe, based upon youthful fantasies and instant gratifications, the gang functions as a world unto itself, in which the individual role-plays and takes on a new identity. It is liberating, leaving behind the boring world of childish insecurities, failures, rules, and restraints, for the excitement of the streets. Even in particularly gang-infiltrated neighborhoods, on average only one in ten youth join gangs, suggesting that it is youngsters who feel most intensely that the gang will satisfy their needs, and provide them with what they are longing for, who choose to join.
For young men growing up without fathers, raised by mothers and grandmothers, the gang offers the corrective of a tough, macho world. No longer a weak “mama’s boy,” the teen enters a hypermasculine arena in which violence is used to settle scores and exorcise fears and insecurities. They will fight their way into momentary feelings of superiority and dominance. And in the process, the induction myth promises, they will make enough money in the “alternative economies” of drug sales and robberies that they can avoid the mainstream labor markets that have no place for them and return to financially support those mothers and grandmothers who once took care of them.
Once a kid joins a gang, he enters a special teen world. Ironically, this gang world is just as dominated by rules and regulations as the mainstream society it rejects. The key difference is that the gang rules are their own. The youth are in control, imposing the rules on themselves, not taking orders from anyone on the outside.
Upon entry the inductee assumes a new identity, taking on a street name, or gang moniker. The name may be due to a physical attribute, a smile, “Smiley,” size, “Monster,” or a name, Noel “No No.” The name may also come from a street mentor, with the original gangster called “Big,” and then succeeding generations “Little,” “Tiny,” “Baby,” and “Infant.” They learn a particular way to walk; in the Crips this is called the “Crip walk,” shoulders back, knees bent—cool, defiant, uncaring. Members also “dress down,” wearing a uniform, for Crips blue, and Bloods red, including bandanas (originally to cover the face during robberies), baseball hats, sneakers, oversized T-shirts, and baggy pants. They also learn a foreign language. Crips would not use the letter b to start words as this might be seen as legitimizing their enemy, the Bloods. Instead the letter c is substituted to demonstrate their dominance over their rivals; so for example, because, been, and baseball become cecause, ceen, and caseball. Likewise, for the Bloods, Compton, car, Coke, and cigarette are transformed into Bompton, bar, Boke, and bigarette. Each gang denigrates the other’s name in a similar fashion. Crips refer to Bloods as Slobs, while Bloods call Crips Crabs, or more properly Brabs. Each gang also has a special greeting, “what’s up, blood,” to fellow Bloods, and “what’s up, cuz,” for the Crips. Members of the gang are referred to as “homies,” standing for those from the home turf. Each gang has its unique hand signals, or gang signs, which they “throw up” in a greeting or statement of territoriality, twisting their fingers into various shapes and patterns to denote their street or neighborhood: a B for Bloods, a C for Crips, a W for Watts, and the Roman numeral VI representing Sixties.
An individual gains entry through some combination of being vouched for by someone who is “reputable,” an OG, or Original Gangster; by being jumped in, beaten for a period of time to demonstrate strength and a tolerance for pain; or by shooting your way in, establishing your credentials by killing a rival. While most gang members are male, about 10 to 15 percent are female. Females can gain entry by the three means above, but can also be “sexed in,” by having intercourse with male gang members. Once in the gang, members are expected to “put in work,” typically through acts of violence against enemies, or by engaging in other activities beneficial to the gang, such as selling drugs or conducting burglaries or robberies.
This set of codes and regulations refers to members only, and anyone who is not “in the game,” or “banging,” is a “civilian.” And while most gang violence targets rival gangsters, civilians are sometimes caught in the crossfire. This is typically dismissed as “collateral damage,” or a “cost of doing business.” “Civilians” living in gang neighborhoods avoid wearing red or blue, instead dressing in black or other “neutral colors” when walking the streets, and respond, “Nowhere,” when asked, “Where are you from?” a challenge designed to reveal the individual’s gang affiliation.
The gang member’s world is an insular one, beholden to specialized codes within highly circumscribed geographical spaces. Waging wars over tiny bits of inner-city real estate, gangbangers remain largely oblivious to the external world. Like the street youth in A Clockwork Orange, or the stranded boys in The Lord of the Flies, the social order at large disappears, replaced by a dystopic microsubculture.
While the media has exploited the image of armies of blue-clad Crips warring against red-draped Bloods, the reality is more nuanced. The black gangs of Los Angeles are generally disorganized. Neither gang possesses the kind of pyramidal hierarchy associated with the mafia, with a godfather, consigliere, captains, and soldiers. There is no unified Bloods or Crips, as each gang is broken down into myriad “sets,” or subgroups. Each gang has thousands of members distributed throughout the various sets, which exist according to neighborhood. These sets, particularly among the Crips, often war among themselves. Over the years the Crips have killed far more Crips than they have Bloods. Because of their significantly larger numbers, the Crips tend to engage in more internecine killings than do the smaller Bloods, who view intragang feuds as more dangerous to their overall survival.
The nature of the intragang feuds often has little to do, at least initially, with matters specifically gang related. For example, two Crip sets, the Rolling Sixties and the Eight Tray Gangsters, have been “at war” for more than thirty years. The dispute, which began in the late 1970s, was over a stolen girlfriend in junior high. This intergenerational feud has resulted in hundreds killed and injured, as present-day gangsters, most with no clue to the original cause, carry on the bloodshed in the name of the set. In addition to girlfriends, “beefs” have arisen over stolen bicycles and sneakers, as well as dirty looks and other signs of disrespect. These conflicts may stem from individual and personal insults, but in the world of “banging” they ultimately become subsumed under gang business, demanding the loyalties of fellow members, pitting set against set, gang versus gang.
The larger the gang the greater likelihood of breaking down into factionalized sets. These sets, if large enough, will in turn splinter into smaller subgroups, or cliques, which often feud among themselves. As the largest Crip set, with several hundred members and several hundred more associates, the Rolling Sixties break down into several primary cliques. The Sixties have become so big that most members have no idea who their fellow gangsters are.
The gang name derives from the Hyde Park neighborhood where most members live. The streets are numbered in the sixties and take on a rolling quality as one drives south.
For the Rolling Sixties, Hyde Park breaks down into three primary sections: the Fronthood to the East, the Avenues in the middle, and the Backhood or Overhill in the West.
James Kennedy was from the Avenues, and as he lived on Tenth, he belonged to the clique referred to as “the Dime.”
Kennedy was now in police custody and about to enter an interrogation room.
18
LITTLE CAT MAN
FOLLOWING MY CALL to Detective Crews, Robbery Homicide detectives responded to the Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall to talk to James Kennedy.
The detectives had him in an interrogation room at “the Hall,” as the delinquents called it. The room was a tight cubicle, three chairs and a small table, no windows. Gang graffiti covered the walls. Interrogation rooms are psychological mind plays, meant to leave the suspect ill at ease, and stress the power dynamic: the police have you cornered and there is nowhere to go.
As the detectives began to question him, Kennedy claimed he had been a member of the Rolling Sixties for only two to three months. He got in, Kennedy said, when a guy known as Cat Man told him he could be in the gang. When Kennedy agreed, he became Little Cat Man.
The Rolling Sixties initially made their reputation in bank robberies, giving rise to the slogan the “rich Rolling Sixties,” and “rich and rolling, mafia-style.” Gang detectives described them as “a bunch of killers” and “the biggest and most active Crip gang in L.A.” In addition to robbery, they were heavily involved in narcotics, burglary, and an array of violent crimes.
When asked what the gang signified, one Rolling Sixties member responded, “It carries dirt, it carries murder.”
The Sixties were also known for having the highest amount of intra-set violence, leading to the saying “You’re not a Sixty until you kill a Sixty.” Members who kill their own are referred to as “homie killers.”
With the gang’s reputation for drug sales and violence, finding Kennedy guarding a rock house with a loaded firearm was nothing unusual. But the weapon he held was a .30 caliber, same as the rifle used in the murders. And it sounded like he at least had information regarding the killings.
As the detectives sat with Kennedy in the small room, they wondered if they were looking at one of the killers. Not in the gang very long, they thought, certainly no “OG.” And his criminal record at the time was limited to property crimes and minor violence.
But these initiates were always looking for a way to “prove themselves.” What a start—only in the gang a couple of months and you “put in work” with a quadruple homicide.
Besides, these young, newly minted gangbangers were often the most violent and reckless: lacking in restraints and self-control, unable to handle the effects of drugs and alcohol, and eager to make a name for themselves, show they were “down for the hood.”
The police had come across killers as young as eight years old. Gang culture was indoctrinating kids from the crib. Officers had seen three-year-olds throw up gang signs.
When asked where he got the gun, Kennedy answered, “From some dude on the street.”
“Who was the dude?”
“He was just some guy,” Kennedy said, “a basehead,” a street term for a crack addict.
“You’re lying.”
“No, man, I was selling dope and got the gun from a basehead.”
“Stop lying to us.”
“No, this dude said he needed dope and he had the gun. I gave him a fifty of rock for it.”
The detectives didn’t know if the gun fired the bullets found in the house, but they did know Kennedy was not telling the truth, and that he knew more.
Once again they wondered if they were looking at one of the killers who had eluded authorities for the last month. If so, they knew he acted with others. At least three people were involved. Who put him up to this? the officers wondered. Where would this gun lead?
While gang members swore to codes of silence and a refusal to snitch, like the mafia’s omertà, the reality was quite different. Generally, the more of them involved, the greater the likelihood someone could be pressured to talk, to “flip,” and point the finger at his homies.
Kennedy was young, and did not have a long history in the gang. But for the moment he held to the Rolling Sixties motto, “Never Open Up.”
* * *
Jimmy Trahin, a firearms identification expert for the LAPD, compared the bullets recovered from the crime scene with a bullet test-fired into a cotton recovery tank from the .30-caliber M-1 carbine seized from James Kennedy.
The M-1 carbine was a lightweight semiautomatic rifle that became a standard weapon for the U.S. military in World War II. The name derived from the French word carabine, referring to light horsemen and the weapon they carried. Carbines were typically shortened versions of full rifles. The particular model taken from Kennedy was the A-1 model, containing a collapsible wire stock extension and a forearm grip. Made for paratroopers, it was compact and easy to use in close-quarter assault situations such as urban warfare. The rifle could hold up to thirty rounds, with each one fired as fast as the shooter could squeeze the trigger.
In analyzing the fired rounds, Trahin used a stereomicroscope containing two adjacent positions. He placed a bullet in each position, end to end, aligning the marks on the test bullet and the bullets recovered from the house, to see if the stria, or tool mark lines, matched.
Each manufacturer has a certain set of rifling specifications, with the lands and grooves in the barrel of the rifle individual to the particular company. The rifle barrel is bored with tools, which leave their own unique marks in the rifle bore. The bore’s particular tool marks are then transferred to the bullet when the gun is fired. If the lines in the recovered bullets match those of the test-fired bullet, then both were definitely fired from the same gun. The tool marks left on the bullet are like a fingerprint. No two are identical.
As Trahin stared through the comparison microscope he concluded that four of the bullets from the house definitely came from the tested rifle. While the other recovered bullets could have been fired from that gun, they were so damaged—from hitting bone, wood, glass, and concrete—that no comparison was possible.
Trahin also used the comparison microscope to test whether the expended shell casings from the semiautomatic rifle matched those left behind at the crime scene.
The casing is the portion of the cartridge or projectile that contains the powder, primer, and bullet. When the firing pin, which is like a nail, strikes the rear portion of the cartridge, it too transfers individual tool marks to the soft metal of the casing. When the firing pin strikes this cartridge the bullet exits. As the bullet goes forward, under Newton’s law—of equal but opposite reactions—the casing is thrown backward, striking the bolt face, which contains the firing pin. At this point the bolt face leaves unique tool marks on the back side of the casing. Finally, in semiautomatic weapons when the round is fired the casing is ejected from the gun by an extractor, a little claw that grabs the casing and pulls it from the chamber. The extractor also contains one-of-a-kind markings that are left on the side of the casing during the cycling of the weapon.
As Trahin studied the ejected shell casings recovered from the house, he determined—based upon the firing pin, bolt face, and extractor marking—that all seven casings positively came from the .30-caliber M-1 rifle.
The gun seized from James Kennedy was the weapon used by the shooter on the morning of August 31.
* * *
If the LAPD and my family were both at a loss as to what occurred on August 31, the residents of Hyde Park were equally confused.
In the weeks following the crime, the quadruple homicide was a constant topic on the streets. But the gossip regarding the shooting was often conducted in hushed tones. The mood on the streets was described as eerie, with all types of rival rumors circulating.
Some said the crime was in retaliation for a hit that had been carried out weeks before. That hit in turn was rumored to have been payback. If that was th
e case, the hit on my family was revenge for a retaliatory hit, revenge for revenge. But no one seemed to know who the first two hits were waged against, nor any of the underlying circumstances. Another line of thought circled back to the familiar idea that the football player somehow brought this upon his family, either through drug use, drug dealing, or some other shady venture.
Another theory snaked its way along the neighborhood grapevine that the killer was on PCP at the time of the crime, and had lost it. Developed as a synthetic drug, PCP (phencyclidine) has been a street drug since the 1960s. It is referred to with a variety of names, including wet, sherm, bobbies, amp. It is associated with extreme violence, and was highly publicized in the media as an “evil drug” throughout the 1960s and 1970s. Among its many physiological symptoms are a rising heart rate, blood pressure, and body temperature, along with flushing and sweating. Psychologically, its users often feel an immense sense of power and the ability to take on anything. Those who have taken PCP have said, “I would fight anyone who touched me,” “When high, I would attack people. I was extremely violent,” and “I was on the racetrack all the time because the PCP told me we could conquer the world.” The behavior of people on PCP is manic and chaotic. While heroin was popular with inner-city blacks in New York and on the East Coast, PCP remained a drug of choice with blacks in L.A.
Regardless of the theory regarding the crime, and the source of the gossip, a few common threads stitched together in the rumor mill. No one was ever able to link detailed motives to specific names. Something always remained murky and elusive about the facts, with no one quite sure why whoever it was they were secretly discussing had picked that particular house and killed its inhabitants. Additionally, the eerie sense pervading the streets of Hyde Park came from the gruesome nature of the crime, which was ever changed and exaggerated with each retelling: The inhabitants had been dragged down the stairs and into the basement before being executed. Everyone in the house had been killed. The killers were lying in wait as they tracked down other family members.
The Valley of the Shadow of Death Page 13