"Social Cleansing" -- a Path to Gang Violence?

One of the "solutions" we often heard in Guatemala to the growing gang violence there was "social cleansing." Repeated by officials and common people alike, this literally means what it says: the active and violent removal of alleged gang members, including by murder. In their view, courts and jails are not quick or harsh enough for them. In fact, this has also been true in El Salvador and Honduras. Cases include the vigilante murders of street kids as young as seven years old. Most of the cases, however, involved tattooed teenagers.

In Central America, tattoos for many people represent gang involvement. Of course, those of us in LA know better. When I was involved in gangs in the 1960s and 1970s tattoos were mostly gang affiliated--primarily the Chicano gangs of the time. Not even African American gangs sported tattoos like the Chicanos did, which they had been doing since the Pachuco/Zootsuit days of the 1920s to the 1940s. Chicanos perfected the "fine line" jail-house tattoos that were soon sported by Anglo bikers, prisoners, and even military personnel. In the 1980s and 1990s, Hip Hop artists and sports figures, mostly African American, popularized this style in music videos and movies (as they did other Chicano artistic expressions like lowriding). Well known Chicano street artists like Mr. Cartoon became famous placing ink on people like 50 Cent, Eminem, Cypress Hill, and others.

Now tattoos are used by actors, singers, rich people, jet setters, and coffee house afficionados. It's not a big thing. Meanwhile, Chicanos and other Latinos, including the Central Americans who came to LA in the 1980s escaping war and poverty, continued the extensive use of tattoos. Gang members in LA (and most of the Southwest) are known for tattooing every part of their body -- something that also now includes African Americans, Cambodians, Armenians, Anglos, and others.

"Smile Now, Cry Later," crosses, chains, spider webs, cholas, area codes (like 213 or 818), gang affiliations, placasos (gang nicknames), Aztec and Mayan motifs, song titles, the Virgin of Guadelupe, LA (Dodger style), and such all became popular among gang youth. Anything and everything.

So when the US deported tens of thousands of alleged gang members to Mexico and Central America beginning in 1992 (after the LA Rebellion) and then going strong in 1996 after the changes in immigration law emphasized the deportation of felons and gang members, tattooed youth flooded these countries that for the most part did not sport tattoos for fashion or otherwise.

In El Salvador and Guatemala, the two countries in Central America I've visited since the early 1990s when LA-based gangs like the Mara Salvatrucha (MS) and Eighteen Street (called Mara 18 in El Salvador) were first introduced, I saw heavily tattooed youth (including on their faces, necks, heads, hands, arms, backs, stomachs, and elsewhere) in prisons and in the streets.

You can imagine the impact they've had on countries not familiar with this kind of style or substance. But also the impact it would have on the tens of thousands of homeless, abandoned and glue-sniffing kids (most of them orphaned by war and poverty). In time, many of these joined MS or 18 Street (many home-grown gangs have also been absorbed by these two gangs).

Today death squads and other vigilantes, as well as police, have unfairly targeted tattooed and US-raised or influenced kids as gang members. Many youth have showed up in hospitals beaten and tortured. Others are brought into morgues with their hands tied behind their backs. And still many more are warehoused in the overflowing prisons--some of the most stark, inhumane and overcrowded places you'd ever want to see.

For example, in 1993, I visited two prisons in El Salvador that housed many gang youth: Mariona (the main prison in San Salvador) and San Vicente de Gotera (interviewing gang youth and officials). And I did the same thing this past week with Fabian Montes and Pascual Torres of Homeboy Industries. We entered two Guatemalan prisons: Centro Preventivo Para Hombres, Zona 18, Sector 11 (a maximum security men's prison with over 1,000 inmates) and Centro Preventivo Para Mujeres, Zona 18, Santa Teresa (a maximum security women's prison with 160 inmates).

In Guatemala there are 19 prisons housing more than 7,000 prisoners. MS and 18 Street are housed in separate facilities. While most of the prisoners in the two places we visited were not in gangs, they did have a cell block solely dedicated to alleged gang members. We were able to go into this cell block, past the locked bars, and hang for a couple of hours with the inmates there.

The gang members were leery of us at first, but as we talked (and I showed them copies of my books in Spanish), they opened up. Fabian, Pascual and I told them about our concerns to bring a new vision and imagination to working with gang youth in Guatemala--including more resources, jobs (getting companies to hire gang members), training, education, and other meaningful & effective means to incorporate these young people, tattooed or not, into the country. Incipient efforts of rehabilitation was being done there--including painting (inmates were working on murals as we talked), religious studies, and silk screen.

In the women's prison, we went through several barred gates to the deepest sections where the most violent and alleged gang women were being held. We saw women learning theater, dance, and religion (Christian). Others were making bags (from plastic-like thread), amazingly beautiful candles, and household cleaning solutions that had odors of fruit, flowers, and even bubblegum.

We spent all day in the two prisons, including talking to the rehabilitation counselors and arts volunteers.

In the end we were able to meet and talk to intelligent, artistic and articulate young people (including with tattoos all over their faces).

Our message to the country--to say no to "social cleansing" and instead focus on social healing. To help bring real jobs, training, understanding and a human face to the issue of gangs in Guatemala. We left the mud-strewn colonias and open-air jail blocks (as well as the community centers, universities, and other places we talked at) with much clarity on the extremely difficult situation that places like Guatemala are facing today. But we also left with the need to help provide whatever experiences we've gained working with gang youth (which I have been doing for 30 years, and Homeboy Industries has done for 20 years).

ALSO--for those who are up and about, I'm on the air this whole week from 4:20 AM until 6 AM on LA's KJLH Radio, 102.3 FM. I'll be guest hosting again (it's truly an honor to be invited back) with "Front Page" host Dominique DiPrima. Please tune in if you can.

Guatemala--the Time is Now

Guatemala is a country about the size of Tennessee in Central America, surrounded by Belize, El Salvador, Honduras and Mexico -- with coasts in the Pacific Ocean and the Caribbean Sea. Its name is Mayan -- Coactemalan -- and means "Land of Forests." An estimated 13 million people live in Guatemala. More than half are so-called mestizos (often called "Ladino," mixed indigenous & Spanish or "hispanicized" indigenous). The rest are relatively traditional Mayan tribal groups speaking in more than 20 different languages and dialects. There is also an important Garifuno group on the east coast, descendents of African slaves who were shipwrecked here during the Spanish colonial period.

An amazingly beautiful country, Guatemala has 18 of the world's ecosystems, the largest cloud forest in the world, and 37 volcanoes. It also has a violent and turbulent history. Most recently the country ended 36 years of civil war with peace accords in 1996 after more than 100,000 people were killed (mostly poor and indigenous people) and a million people were forced to leave.

Like the refugees of poverty and war in El Salvador -- and poverty and political upheaval in Mexico and Honduras -- during the 1980s, Guatemalans arrived to the United States in large numbers, landing in barrios of Los Angeles, Houston, Chicago, and even in states like Delaware and North Carolina. I know because I've spoken in those areas and found many Guatemalans among new migrants from Mexico, Central America and other Latin American countries (once hearing Quiche Mayan being spoken in a laundromat in a rural part of Delaware).

Unfortunately, in the past 15 years Guatemala has been beset by a terrible increase in violent crime, gangs and drug wars. Presently Central America, including Guatemala, is reportedly a major transportation point for the huge drug cartels of Mexico and Colombia to US drug markets (which continues to be the largest in the world).

The United States, while always a major drug market, became known as the multi-billion dollar drug market it is today during the 1980s (ironically, soon after President Reagan initiated his so-called War on Drugs, which continues failing despite a constant influx of tax dollars). This happened at the same time that most industrial centers of the US lost massive steel, auto, stockyards, and aerospace industries.

The de-industrialization of US inner cities and the vast increase in the drug trade coincided to help create the most violent period in US history. Traditional street gangs--some, like in LA's Chicano communities, have been around since the 1920s--and new crews popped up as the most cohesive organized means to deal drugs (in some cases, becoming the main economic life) in their communities. In LA alone from 1980 to 2000, some 10,000 young people were believed killed in gang and drug violence. In fact, the largest manufacturing cities of the US--LA and Chicago--also had the greatest levels of gang violence.

Mexicans, Central Americans, Dominicans and other immigrants (including in smaller numbers from Southeast Asia, Eastern Europe, and the Mideast) became integral to the rise of violence--although the media continually made this out to be a largely African American "problem." The fact of the matter is poor Latinos (including many immigrants) and poor whites also took part.

By the end of the 20th century, law enforcement agencies claimed there were 800,000 gang members in the country, most of them in Chicago and LA, and growing by leaps and bounds. In reality, the majority of poor communities, although racked by drugs and crime, were not involved in the drug trade. Many tried to survive by working whatever menial means existed (or creating their own micro-businesses to clean homes, sell food or CDs, and similar endeavors).

Also, by the late 1990s, crime began to come down (actually up and down, but mostly down in comparision to the growth in population). Yet, the media perception persisted in promoting the idea that crime and gangs "ruled" the mostly black and brown urban centers.

Because of this, the US government initiated some of the most draconian laws against gangs and youth, leading to the greatest growth in a prison population in the history of the world. Presently, the US incarcerates more people than any other country. And poor Latinos and African Americans are disproportionately represented in these institutions. California, for example, in the early 1970s had a prison population of 15,000 in nine prisons. Today there are around 175,000 prisoners in 33 prisons, 80 percent of which are prisoners of color.

In addition, Latino immigrants in the past ten years have been deported in vast numbers, including those allegedly in gangs and those convicted of crimes. Immigration prisons now dot much of the US Southwest. Some 700,000 so-called criminals have been deported, mostly to Mexico and Central America (but also Cambodia, Armenia, Dominican Republic, and other countries). This has completely altered the cultural and social life of countries like El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras that do not have the resources, capacity or, in many cases, the political will to adequately integrate such an influx of mostly US-raised (and for many, US prison-raised) deportees.

This leads me to my trip to Guatemala. Although there were street gangs in the country before 1996 (mostly called maras in Central America), the influx of US-based (mostly from Los Angeles) gangs like Eighteen Street and Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) has become the most talked about concern of the people. Violence attributed to these gangs in Guatemala, like most of Central America, is quite horrific: grenade attacks, machete murders, devastating prison riots. But so has been the response. Presently, vigilante groups and death squads are hunting down and killing the highly tattooed and conspicuous-looking US-based gang members. Police have beaten, arrested, and even killed many so-called gang youth. Even ex-gang members are in danger.

I came to Guatemala as part of an independently organized effort by Homeboy Industries of Los Angeles (one of the leading gang prevention/intervention programs in the US). I was invited by Homeboys' staff members Fabian Montes and Pascual Torres, who have already visited Guatemala and other Central American cities. We came mostly to connect across borders and barriers to help provide a new vision and sense of hope in working with gangs and maras. We did not come to give the people here "the" solutions. In fact, the people of Guatemala are quite capable of providing their own solutions.

In our travels so far, we talked with and heard from various "Centros de Alcance" in extremely poor colonias in Guatemala City -- many of them in tin-roofed shacks along mud roads and sewer creeks. We found former gang members, including many US-raised youth, trying to change their lives in a "reality" show called Desafia Cien (Challenge 100). We visited a plastics factory owned by a far-sighted businessman that includes a non-profit Asociacion Manos Que Te Ayuden (Hands That Help Assocation), which hires former gang members and provides services to them when no one else will.

We spoke on TV and in various print media, including on two radio stations, about what Homeboy Industries does, but also about the need to see the humanity of these youth; what poverty, war and trauma can do to people; and how we should all cooperate to help them heal, find skills and work; and in the long run help them tap into their own innate purposes and gifts so they can contribute positively to their communities and country.

We also spoke to university students and participated in a memorial for a former gang member named Daniel "Panadero" Ochoa who was recently killed in a marketplace, although he was married and worked in his own micro-business.

In Guatemala, like many Central American countries, there are many people accepting "social cleansing" (in effect, the killing of homeless, troubled and gang youth). Many of these are Christians and decent people. The fears and confusions they face are often exploited by political forces.

We hope to reach out to them as well, to help provide a new vision and imagination to integrate and train the displaced youth--many of whom can be the new leaders, business people, fathers, mothers, and teachers in a country in need of these resources.

Guatemalans have so far been receptive, even in their disagreements. This is good--to spread the dialogue and provide a space for such concepts to be aired and related. We will visit a prison today and hope to go to other parts of the country tomorrow and on the weekend.

Meanwhile, we are here with many good prayers, thoughts and enormous respect of Guatemala and its people. The time is now for real change, balance, healing, and peace.

Off to Guatemala to continue my talks, readings and workshops

Well, I'm on my way to Guatemala in a few hours. I'll be catching a "red-eye" that takes off from LAX at 1 AM. I'm going with Fabian Montes and Pascual Torres, two young men I helped mentor over the years and who are now leading staff members for Homeboy Industries, one of LA's pioneering gang intervention organizations (besides many direct services of jobs, counseling, arts, tattoo removal, treatment, and more they have Homeboy Industries that includes a bakery, T-shirt production, and Homegirl Cafe, among other components).

We'll be in Guatemala until October 28--doing presentations, meeting with community organizers, government officials, non-governmental agencies, and gang youth. Guatemala is one of the three Central American countries most hit with gang violence over the past 15 years. Most of this is due to the mass deportation of LA-based gang members in Mara Salvatrucha and Mara 18. The deportations began in earnest after the LA Rebellion of 1992. Then in 1996, a new immigration law opened the flood gates of deporting undocumented immigrants with US-based criminal records, including many gang youth--some 700,000 were deported from the US since then.

Most of these were sent to Mexico, where many gangs amassed at the border, often returning. Presently, Mexico has many LA-based Sur Trece and 18th Street gang members, among others, in various poor barrios and urban centers. Tens of thousands also ended up in El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala, recruiting the thousands of homeless, abandoned and glue-sniffing children in those countries who were victims of civil war and poverty. Now there are an estimated 150,000 gang members--mostly MS-13 and M-18--in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras.

This past week, I was able to visit Bakersfield College in the Kern County city of Bakersfield, an hour and a half up the road from LA. I spoke to students (who packed the Fireside Room) as well as counselors, librarians and community activists in another gathering. Then in the evening some 400 people showed up to a public event at the Bakersfield College auditorium where we talked about poetry, writing, gangs, rehabilitation, social justice, and personal and social change. There were amazing questions and comments in all the groups. People seemed hungry to interract and dialogue--but also to share and learn.

Last Monday, I was part of the "Skin Festival" in the city of Pasadena, CA that included speakers, performances, discussions and more. I spoke at the Pasadena City College's Forum to some 70 people. Again, we had a lively discussion and Q&A. I talked about the various "skins" that people put on just to survive in this culture--just to be seen or unseen, as the case may be.

The week before, I did a keynote speech and book signing at the Washington Library Media Association Annual Conference (mostly school librarians) in Yakima, WA. This was well received--being that librarians are some of my favorite people of all time. I went there after spending some time in San Luis Obispo on California's Central Coast, a wonderful serene and green space of earth (the weather was wonderful). There I did a breakfast talk as part of Cal Poly's Provocative Speakers series and then another talk to students and community. Again, the audiences were very kind, informed and engaged.

And the week before that, I did another event for the Puente Project in East LA College (a kind of alma mater for me), my second time this year. I spoke to 300 students, teachers, high school students, and others. I read mostly from my poetry book, "My Nature is Hunger," and discussed the struggle to become a person of language & poetry in this largely practicality-minded, business-oriented and unpoetic culture.

Speaking of East LA, my wife Trini and I attended East LA's Garfield High School benefit event on October 14 to help raise funds to re-build their historic auditorium that burned down this past spring in a suspicious arson fire. Some 7,000 people piled into the Gibson Amphitheater at Universal City in Hollywood to hear Old School Chicano bands like El Chicano, Tierra, War, Lil' Joe and La Familia, Los Lobos (with Lil' Willie G and members of the classic Thee Midniters band playing some of their hits). Starting off was Garfield's own Upground band that has been knocking people off their feet with their mix of Chicano ska/soul and barrio boogie.

Needless to say, I went through memory lane listening to these bands. War in particular--one of my favorites--I recall in the early 1970s when they did amazing (and raunchy, at least from some members of the audience) sets downtown and other venues. I also saw them live at the Bumpershoot Festival in Seattle a few years back when Lee Oskar was still their harmonica player. And in Japan, I read poetry with Tex Nakamura playing "jarana" and harmonica--he was one of War's best harmonica players--last November.

I also saw Los Lobos play at Seattle those many years ago. In fact, I've seen them play live many times, including at Lincoln Park in East LA and several gigs in Chicago where I used to go backstage to visit with my East LA "carnales" (brothers) during the years I lived there.

It was also amazing to hear Lil' Joe, one of the best Chicano singers from Texas from the 1960s (the other was Sunny Ozuna of Sunny & the Sunliners and "Smile Now, Cry Later" fame).

But I was particularly partial to hearing a few of the old Thee Midniters hits. In the 1960s and 1970s, Thee Midniters were East LA's most popular band. They had hits like "Whittier Boulevard," "Love Special Delivery," "Chicano Power," along with the ballads that made their singer, Lil' Willie G, famous: "Sad Girl," "That's All," and "Are You Angry?," among others.

For us die-hard Chicanos from those days that benefit event for Garfield High was a shot in the arm. I was also Mecha Central organizer of East LA high schools in the early 1970s, linking me to all those schools, including meeting my first wife at Garfield. I've since spoken many times to all the East LA high schools--Garfield, Roosevelt, Lincoln, Wilson, and Franklin--and many in the surrounding area (Montebello, Shurr, Century, Vail, Alhambra, among others).

So I had a great time.

If you all can, please get a copy of Bello Magazine, the October issue, which has an article by me on the Japan-Chicano connection through the music producer and promoter Shin Miyata, with side stories on Hector Gonzalez of Rampart Records and the East LA band Quetzal (most of this was based on my trip to Japan last November to see upfront the growing Lowrider/Chicano culture & music scene there). For more information go to www.bellomagazine.com.

And an amazing photo book just came out called "Mugshots: A Celebration of the Journey from Ruin to Redemption," written by Jason Porath, with photos by Jonas Mohr (Real Deal Media). It has the stories and quotes from various former drug addicts/alcoholics/prisoners--including yours truly--who have now turned their lives around and are involved in music, movies, literature, Hip Hop, dance, and more. Included are the stories of Coolio, Danny Trejo, Edward Bunker, Mr. Cartoon, Eric Roberts, Kim Minter, and others.

You can order by going to www.mugshotsthebook.com or calling 1-888-443-1442.

I'll keep you all posted on my travels through Guatemala. Meantime, stay strong, passionate and awake. A new world is possible, but first you have to dream.

Healing Work and Public Art with Gangs and in Prisons

I returned to Chicago last week to do a workshop and a keynote speech at the "Stronger Roots, Stronger Branches" conference (September 27-28) of violence prevention/intervention professionals at the Wyndham O'Hare Hotel in Rosemont, Illinois. Leading practitioners involved with troubled youth, gang peace, and prevention/intervention programs from all over the state took part. Friends of mine from Chicago--including Freddy Calixto of BUILD, Myrna Torres of Gad's Hill, and Frank and Lou Blazquez of Youth Struggling for Survival, among others--attended and also helped shape the conference. I also saw my old friend, Steven Guerra, who was once director of Illinois's Prevention First and Jane Addams Hull House (among other jobs); he's now Deputy Chief of Staff for Social Services in the office of Illinois Governor Rod R. Blagojevich.

The conference addressed the holistic, comprehensive, and spiritual-based practices that must now be addressed in truly stopping gang and other violence in our mostly poor and working class urban core and rural communities. Workshops included indigenous practices, mentoring, and restorative justice. I feel that the work I helped shaped many years ago when I lived in Chicago, including helping found Youth Struggling for Survival and the Increase the Peace Collaborative, is now reaching new heights and audiences. Some of what was said at the conference would have been unheard of a few years ago--it's clear to me that the time has come for a new paradigm, new visions, and new root-based strategies in helping curb violence in our economically and socially neglected communities.

The power is in our hands--this is the same message we must give to young people, regardless of their mistakes, crimes and traumas. We must stop the enshrining of the worse aspects in our communities, with prisons but also deficit-based programming, and replace them with projects, programs and organizations that draw on the very gifts, talents, intelligences, and capacities that young people and the rest of the community already possess.

The Friday night of the last day of the conference, a sweat lodge ceremony (Inipi in the Lakota language) was held in Dekalb, IL, about an hour's drive from Chicago, at the home of Frank Tekpalzin Blazquez and his wife Lou Xochimeh Blazquez. Led by Lakota teacher/elder Ed Young Man Afraid of His Horses, from the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, several members of YSS, other organizations, and conference participants took part--a few for the first time. It was an amazing ceremony. Ed surprised everyone, including Frank, by offering a brother-adoption ceremony. Frank is now a spiritual brother to Ed. The sweat lodge, as most people who read my blog know, is also used in the Northeast San Fernnado Valley with gang youth, people on recovery, and battered women. My wife Trini, myself, and our brother-in-law Hector Herrera pour water for this lodge, which has become well known throughout the LA area, but also among Native peoples in the US, Mexico and Central America (where the sweat lodge is known as temescal).

On Saturday, September 29, I also spoke at Northern Illinois University's Latino Resource Center to an engaged group of young people, parents, professors, and others about gangs, mentoring, street peace, and relationships. Frank, Lou and Ed also showed up, which helped some of the audience members link up with YSS and the sweat lodge. One of the youth mentors that helped pull this dinner and talk together is a YSS member.

On Sunday, I visited with my 12-year-old grand-daughter, Amanda May Rodriguez, who lives in Sterling, IL, a couple of hours outside of Chicago. She's grown into a smart and beautiful young lady. It was great to see her--I had not seen her in a couple of years; my hope is that we can do this every time I come into the area. I went with my former wife Camila and her husband, Alvin. We have grown together as friends and always try to unite our energies for the benefit of my two grown children (Ramiro and Andrea, who are 32 and 30 respectively) and our four grand-children.

That evening, I had dinner with my friend James Lilly, his wife Nora, and their two young sons. James is a former Chicago gang member who was shot and paralyzed when he was 15 years old. He's now in his mid-30s and is known as one of the leading wheelchair racers in the world. He participants in marathons and other races all over the country--and has taken part and even won the grueling Alaska wheelchair race that covers more than 240 miles.

Film maker Izumi Tanaka of Los Angeles has made an amazing film of Jame's life called "Pushin' Forward" that I recommend for anyone needing an inspiring story to share with troubled youth, including gang members. James has overcome extremely difficult odds to become an athlete, a popular speaker to kids in schools, and a wonderful father.

To get a copy of this film, please go to:
http://www.fanlight.com/catalog/films/463_pf.php

On Monday, I traveled to Pontiac, Illinois to again visit with my son Ramiro, who's incarcerated there. He is doing very well--trying to stay out of trouble, working (he's a janitor in the prison's psych ward), and preparing for a parole release in three-and-a-half more years (he's already done ten-and-a-half years of his 28-year prison sentence; he can get out in half the time with good time).

He's also doing a mechanic's correspondence course and trying to stay in touch with his children. That evening, I had a nice dinner and visit with another grand-daughter, Anastasia Horkay, who lives in Morton Grove, IL--she's one of two teenage grand-children I have, if you can imagine that.

I also hooked up with my friend Zorayda Ortiz, a rugby player and revolutionary activist in Chicago's Pilsen barrio. Tuesday morning, I spoke at Telpochcalli School, a specialized school in the Little Village neighborhood (the largest Mexican community in the Midwest). I spoke to eight graders who had intelligent questions and comments.

I left for Philadelphia on Tuesday, October 2 to attend the Arts in Criminal Justice National Conference sponsored by the city's uniquely potent Mural Arts Program, led by Jane Golden and a wonderful staff of organizers and artists.

I took part in a panel with an old friend, Judith Tannenbaum, who has been doing arts/writing workhshops in various institutions, including San Quentin's Death Row. I was also the keynote speaker for dinner on Wednesday night, where I received a wonderful response from the audience. It was great to see a number of old friends in the arts in prisons movement from the Bay Area, San Diego, Hartford, CT, Chicago, and other areas (I've done workshops and talks in prisons and juvenile facilities for more than 25 years). I also met other fantastic teachers and activists in this field, which is growing.

The next day, we were all invited to Graterford Maximum Security Prison more than an hour away. I met a number of prisoners and community people who took part in the Healing Walls project that brought victims of crime and offenders together in dialogue and in art. A documentary about this process called Healing Walls is also currently in production--we saw a version of it at the conference. This is another film that people should look out for and get. It's quite inspirational. At the prison a panel with prisoners and community members was held, and another talk with Restorative Justice pioneer and advocate Howard Zehr was held in the gym (along with lunch). I was given respectable recognition by the organizers and the prisoners during my visit there--a TV crew even came in and interviewed me and others during our visit. A number of the prisoners had read my book and came up to talk.

I returned back to LA a little jet-lagged, but also energized by the great visits I had in Chicago and Philadelphia.