Gang Truce in El Salvador Reverberates in Los Angeles

Two of El Salvador’s most notorious street gangs got their start in California.

The Mara Salvatrucha – or MS-13 – and its rival the 18th Street Gang were both created by immigrants who had fled El Salvador’s civil war decades ago.

This past March, the Salvadoran branches of the gangs brokered a truce with help from the Catholic church.

Since then, El Salvador’s murder rate has gone down.

Alex Sanchez is a former member of MS-13. He directs Homies Unidos.

It’s a Los Angeles-based group that works with Salvadoran gang members.

Sanchez says the truce back home has reverberated in Los Angeles.

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Lisa Mullins: Two of El Salvador’s most notorious street gangs got their starting at California. The Mara Salvatrucha, or MS-13 and its rival, the 18th Street Gang were both created by immigrants who had fled El Salvador’s civil war decades ago. This past March, the Salvadorian branches of the gang broke into truce with help from the Catholic Church. Since then El Salvador’s murder rate has gone down. Alex Sanchez is a former member of the gang MS-13. He now directs Homies Unidos, it’s a Los Angeles based group that works with Salvadorian gang members. Sanchez says that the truce back home has reverberated in Los Angeles.

Alex Sanchez: It had a psychological impact, because many individuals from those gangs that are immigrants that might be facing deportation or are currently in process of deportation, they are looking at this as an opportunity for them to be able to go back to their country without fear of persecution by rival gangs or vigilante groups.

Mullins: Does this mean that there are gang members in Los Angeles who now feel it is safer, regardless of the story that we just heard, it is safer to go home?

Sanchez: In some ways, it is. Many individuals that are being deported, they apply the fact that, in their home countries, you know, they can walk peacefully or at, least right now, you know, there is this truce.

Mullins: What did the two gangs agreed to and how are they standing by their promises?

Sanchez: They have agreed to maintain lines of communication with each other and also stopping force recruitment as well as violence around the school area.

Mullins: So why would the gang organizers and the gang members from the upper rank to the lower agreed to something like this?

Sanchez: Well, this has happened really organically. At the same time, there’s been a harsh oppressive policies implemented throughout Central America. The zero tolerance initiatives that basically put many of these individuals in prisons for basically just having tattoos. And you’ve seen the massacres of recently in February in Comayagua in Honduras where 354 members of gangs were burned to death in a cell block.

Mullins: When you were a member of MS-13, how long were you part of the gang?

Sanchez: Since I was 14, and I’m 42 now, so you can say over 20 years. You know, it’s been a long halt and I’ve gotten to realize that, you know, I can bring back something to the community and that’s why I’m part of this organization called Homies Unidos.

Mullins: Now Homies Unidos, which is the organization that you run right now, so you work very closely with Salvadorian gang members. I don’t know to what extent you tell them about your own experience, but did you leave the gang when you were still in El Salvador or after you got here to the U.S.?

Sanchez: The misconception is that these gangs started in El Salvador. These gangs originated in Los Angeles, in the streets of Los Angeles, by immigrant kids from the most part being Central American, primarily Salvadorians. I did get deported to El Salvador in 1994. I came to the United States back and that’s when, you know, I was able to talk to some of the folks that I knew in the gang and they gave me the pass to be able to not be engaged in all of their negative activities, because I was also a single father and was taking care of my son. And then eventually I was introduced to a gang intervention worker.

Mullins: You said that you wanted to get out of the gang because you had a son. I wonder what it’s like to other gang members, because it’s so much a part of their identity, it is power, in some cases it’s kind of everything that you have. What do you say to gang members in LA who are reluctant to get out, because they don’t have anything else to go to?

Sanchez: You know, we have hundreds of kids that come to our office every year, you know, seeking tattoo removal, seeking different opportunities. Some of them…

Mullins: Actually that is a good point right there, because the tattoo identifies you as a gang member in some cases and I saw this when I was in your office in Los Angeles. There are people who are tattooed throughout their body with gang insignias. And so what you’re doing is to helping to fund the removal of those tattoos.

Sanchez: Yes, and you’re not just sharing your skin, you’re sharing the inside of your heart, you know, because you believed in something so much that you were willing to give your life or kill for letters and numbers. And now you’ve gotten into a place where you realize that what that meant wasn’t who you are and you need to be guided to understand the process that it takes to change your mind setup about what you believed so much in.

Mullins: Alex, do you mind my asking how old your son is now?

Sanchez: My son just graduated from High School. I have three other children, you know. One just turned one year old.

Mullins: To what extent, I wonder, do you feel like in LA the lure of gangs is still there for people like you kids?

Sanchez: I had to fight all the time with my sons, you know, because they were so attracted to the music, the movies, the glamour rising of gangs. And, you know, I really had to be on top of it and, you know, always had to tell them my experience in it. Even playing with guns, toy guns, was forbidden. And sometimes they hated me, you know, I hated those violent video games, you know, that puts ideas into the kids’ heads, you know. And I think I might have been too harsh on them, but it was my fear of them making the same mistakes that I did.

Mullins: Alex Sanchez, executive director of Homies Unidos, which is a Los Angeles based group that works with street gangs from El Salvador, he’s a former member of the gang MS-13. Alex, good luck.

Sanchez: Thank you and good luck to you.

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