In juvenile facilities across California, youth impacted by gangs are labeled with prison gang terms. For approximately four years, I have worked as a gang interventionist and consultant, and a gang expert in court cases. I was thirteen years of age when I was labeled with prison gang language inside the old Fresno County Juvenile Hall. As a kid, I did not understand what those labels meant, yet they followed me out into the community.
As an adult, I became aware of the harm of using prison gang labels to identify kids while working with at-future youth* in the former Division of Juvenile Justice (DJJ) facilities and county juvenile halls. Youth impacted by gangs are referred to as “shot callers,” “full-fledged gang members,” “gang associates,” “organized,” “criminally sophisticated gang members,” “active,” “nonactive,” and other gang-related names and phrases. Youth who decide to make different decisions and no longer be involved with a gang are labeled “dropouts.”
These prison gang terms, which are deeply embedded in juvenile facilities, are applied to kids as young as thirteen years old. I have seen the use of prison gang labels lead to intensified youth involvement in gangs, conflict, victimization, and loss of life. Youth have no clear understanding of prison gang politics because they have never been incarcerated at a county jail or prison institution. It is in adult facilities where individuals become entrenched in gangs. It is where they first gain awareness of prison gangs, their politics, and their rules.
In my work with at-future youth, the prison gang label “dropout” is particularly harmful. Its use gives youth the impression that they cannot leave their gang and make a different life decision. Adults who were in prison gangs have shared that the “dropout” label in prison results in victimization and even death. Some youngsters also told me of assaults against youth taking place in juvenile settings and when they return to the community over this particular prison gang label. These are the results of prison gang labels becoming ingrained in juvenile facilities and the community. Generally, out in the community, violence against youth leaving gangs is low. For youth afraid of disengaging from a gang due to fear of being labeled a “dropout,” a plan should be created to keep youth safe from potential victimization.
While working with youth who decided to leave gangs, I learned it is normal for youth to change their decisions about what or who they want to become. And, research shows that as kids’ brains develop and mature, they gain the ability to regulate their impulses and actions. In the United States, youth involvement with gangs is rare, and most kids and teens in the community do not get involved with gangs. Gang research also suggests youth gang involvement is temporary. Among the most common reasons for young people leaving gangs are simply feeling tired of gang life and disillusionment. College students often change their decisions about the degree they majored in, and youth impacted by gangs are no different when it comes to reconsidering their choices. A case manager working with youth once asked me, ”If we do not call them by the gang’s name or gang’s nickname, what should we call them?” My advice was to call them by their birth name instead of a gang label.
It is crucial to understand that kids who become involved with gangs have often experienced difficult upbringings and childhood trauma. Youth do not just wake up one day and decide to get involved with gangs. Through my work, many youngsters have disclosed to me why kids become involved with gangs. These are some of the reasons they have shared:
| “To be a part of something.” “Some kids come from troubled homes or don’t have the opportunity to have a mom or dad. The mom is on drugs. The kid sees money, clothes, and girls. He is getting drunk with the homies and feels acceptance.” “Because of a father not being there, family member, or brother.” “Problems and the people they are around.” “To protect the family and to think they are all tough, but some people only join gangs because they have no option, or they are born to it like their family is in it, and so they have to be in it too. “Lost love of parents or parents not being around a lot.” “The gang was my father to me because I didn’t have one.” |
These stated motives for getting involved with gangs are consistent with gang research. In my work, other factors leading kids to get involved with gangs are witnessing sexual abuse, suspensions and expulsions, not attending school, bullying, the death of a parent or family member, and abusive authority figures in the community.
Youth do not get involved with gangs for power, control, and to dominate their community, as these imply a level of organization and sophistication they do not have. Youth gangs are loosely structured and not organized crime. They create myths and make themselves appear more dangerous than they are for protective reasons. In 2023, here is what a group of teens revealed to me about how they feel about family:
| “Family is everything to me. I probably would have been homeless. The bond the family and me share is different than the homies.” “What family means to me is people that care and want you to do better. Family don’t gotta be by blood. It’s who cares and who you are around that makes you feel at home or loved.” “Loved ones who wouldn’t leave you in a ditch, but will pick you up or be there when the time is right.” “Family means everything. I grew up in foster care. I was abandoned as a kid. I’ve created my own family, and I push thru anything to be with my family. I would rip my heart out to be with my family but I can’t so I do what I have to but family is EVERYTHING!” “Family is everything to me. It means people who stay together and love each other no matter WHAT. Family!!!” “What family means to me is the people that are there and the people that love and care for you. And wanna see the good in you.” |
These are the usual types of responses I received from at-future youth impacted by gangs when asked about how they feel about family and about kids getting involved in gangs. The needs and concerns of youth should be the focus of professionals when working with youth impacted by gangs — not prison gang labels.
I was 13 years old when I was asked at a juvenile facility what gang I belonged to. At that age, the only thing I knew about the gang was its color, numerical symbol, and conflicts with other youth with similar traumas. I did not know about prison gang politics because I had never been in a prison. As a kid, I was heavily labeled with prison gang language for wearing clothing, shoes, and a bandanna that was part of my gang’s identity.
Professionals working in communities, schools, courts, and juvenile systems should refrain from using prison gang labels when working with youth impacted by gangs. Instead, at-future youth should be treated with respect, dignity, and compassion and not placed in the same category as prison gangs. Using prison gang labels in juvenile facilities sets kids up for failure and can actually create a prison gang culture where there wasn’t one before.
Kids are not gang members; they are children whose brains are still developing. Those who do end up in a juvenile facility need programming, support, family, and guidance to help them. The cultivation of healthy languages for at-future youth will have a long-lasting impact on how they view themselves as they mature.
*I came up with this term to replace the problematic label of “at-risk” youth.
Sergio Ignacio Coronel, M.S., is the founder of the organization YoungSTers for Change, where he runs a credible messenger mentorship program for at-future youth in the Central Valley. He is also a gang expert and a member of the Juvenile Justice Coordinating Council (JJCC) at the Fresno Juvenile Justice Campus.
This article highlights the urgent need to address the complex factors that drive youth toward gangs. It’s crucial that we focus on prevention and support systems to provide young people with positive alternatives. Change the way we speak and address youth. Thank you Sergio for shedding light on this important issue.
Thank you for bringing light to this issue! Words can be a powerful agent of either creation or destruction depending upon how they are used. No one should be given or called by these names. Not adults, and certainly not kids.
This is so important. Outstanding explanation of why language matters so much…particularly when working with our at-risk youth. Let’s ask our legislative leaders to help move the language in this direction through the drafting of its documents, contracts, and most of all training of our collective social messengers.
Sergio, I am truly impressed by your remarkable contributions, especially in writing articles that address critical issues affecting youth. Your work not only inspires admiration but also serves as a powerful example for both young people and professionals. By amplifying youth voices, you highlight their potential to drive change and challenge harmful labels. You are making a significant impact, transforming lives and perspectives while influencing important policy changes. Your approach to education is incredibly engaging, drawing your audience in a deeply impactful way and empowering the next generation of advocates to speak up for themselves and drive meaningful change.
Excellent point. I was first called a gang member by local law enforcement in the San Francisco Bay Area before I hit puberty. I understood myself to be someone who hung out with my friends in my community and I didn’t get along with kids my friends didn’t get along with. Fast forward, I carried the Norteno label throughout my adolescents so naturally when I was incarcerated as an adult I was identified as a “Northern Mexican”. In CDCR the “racial” classifications were: White, Black, Northern Mexican, Southern Mexican, Mexican National and Other (Asian, Native etc.). Those were not “gang labels” – notice no Blood or Crip or Skinhead etc. but also note that they conflate non-scientific “race” with non-criminal “gang” whereby my demographic identity is criminalized. I was ultimately validated as a Northern Structure / Nuestra Raza Prison Gang member and remanded to solitary confinement for the last half of my sentence, paroling from the Pelican Bay SHU in Dec 2005. The System says because I did Debrief I am a gang member still while teenage gang members question if I am a “drop out” because at 47 yrs old I no longer behave as I did in my youth or incarceration. It is wild as both are wrong. I am not a victim – I made some bad decisions and earned some consequences and I paid the price demanded of me – but language matters and labels matter and you’re absolutely right about the perversion of prison jargon in society. It is not only used by the System. Gang leaders use it too as a form of propaganda and social control. I, too, have worked as a “gang expert” for defense attorneys and served as a mentor / credible messenger for youth and men coming home from prison and I don’t believe the “gang” label has any place in our Justice system. It is a racialized term that does nothing to advance public safety and I love your idea of eliminating in discourse around juveniles altogether. I am interested in helping shed light on this agenda in whatever way possible. Help Others Move In Excellence, that’s what HOMIEs do
Very well said! I became legal guardian to a minor nephew when he went into juvenile hall at age 13. And decision was made that my 89 year old mother was to old to continue being his legal guardian. Yes! She was to old to ever get through the juvenile court system. I would allow them to label him in that manor not matter how much they alleged it. I emphasized he is a young child. Learning who and what type of adult he wants be become. It is our job (family and the system) to teach him and make sure he becomes a successful adult in the community. If he fails now after getting into this court system. Then we failed to provide the programs and services available to him to succeed. The court system now has full control. They in a way controlled what I did too. How they blame him was hard for me to explain when the labeled and controlled his every move. And pretty much mine because I had to make sure he did what they said. The only way I could do that is watch him 24/7. I almost lost my job going to court or take him to appointment every all week.
Sergio, you have your story. Others have theirs. I’ll be very generic. If you are in the juvenile justice system, especially if you are incarcerated, that there are some like you and others who are hardcore gangster thugs who won’t have any street cred or respect until they do their time.
Many join gangs because thats the only family they know. They feel safe and protected. There is a price for that. Jail and juveniles facilities, despite their design to help ar, at the end of the day, failures. They make people worse, not better. Anyone who has been in a unit at Los Padrinos know this.
Sounds lime you shod have been, dare i say l, in the quite imperfect child welfare or foster care system maybe with another caring g family member instead of a carceral setting. But it depends on your crime and all of the players involved, especially the judge.
What I’m trying to say is that despite all of the research and best practices, it has always been a crap shoot and always will be.
I don’t care about labeling. I care about the crimes and victims. Most crimes are committed without remorse and thought no matter what the age. Life of a gang member is nothing positive. It’s all about representing a street or a block that you don’t own, fighting for it till death, causing grief to victims and their families, and so much good stuff. Most gangs are tied to the Mexican mafia and others are now tied to the cartels who push drugs into the streets. It’s all about feeling good, dressing down, getting good tattoos, getting high and partying, marking your territory and always looking for an opportunity.
A switch is flipped with some young gang members/criminals and realize this is not what they want in life ( it can take years, even after 25 yers of age) and others are stuck with the criminal and mischief mindset( most of those people are in prison or in and out).
I commend the individuals who realize that the gang life is not for them, However Above anything, it’s all about the victims.
While I certainly appreciate and laude Mr. Coronel’s noble endeavor and his efforts in concert therewith, I opine that he is somewhat out of touch with the realities as they exist.
Semantics and replacing one designation with another does not and will not alter the realities.
Additionally, his perspective regarding all Drop Outs as victims is way off the mark!
There are so many SNY Gangs, (as they have been designated initially by CDC and thereafter Law Enforcement in general), That are every bit as violent and dangerous as the traditional prison Tips, both in and out of prison.
25 ers are giving La Eme a rune for their money in So. Cal as are the Norther Riders in Nor. Cal waring with the NF & NS. These are facts.
In the first decade of the 21st century, the most violent and murderous prison yard within the entire CDC was the level 4 SNY yard at the California Substance Abuse and Treatment Facility & State Prison in Corcoran, California. The Facility was D Facility at the State Prison part (not to be confused with drug treatment facilities).
There were more violent assaults on staff and prisoners than any other yard in the entire CDC. As for murders, High Desert (active yard) came in a distant second place to D Facility at SATF!
If Mr. Coronel wishesto be truly effective at his mission. Then first he must be in command of the facts and realities.
As for myself, I do not espouse the mantle or designation of Drop Out. I am a DEFECTOR from a prison criminal enterprise which I could no longer support nor condone in addition to them betraying me.
Good enough.
I definitely don’t believe in the term gang or gang member, although I use to use them myself. These labels are imposed onto us young and old(er) to criminalize our lifestyle and ways in which youth are in solidarity. Being part of the neighborhood is not an issues as it clearly brought folks to it for some reason or another to be like a family, cope, make the best of circumstances. The issues are the lack of guidance, policing, criminalization, mental health and other issues that limit our imagination and journey. I appreciate the conversations and peoples perspective but I’m still from my barrio and I call the Homies, Homies. Clearly the youth use this term to refer to themselves instead of “gang member.” To read more on our identity check out the link to I put down or use this: https://repository.uclawsf.edu/hastings_journal_crime_punishment/vol2/iss1/3/. This article I wrote due to gang labels, the STEP act and the need to change the narratives of our people.
We often pass judgement and attach labels without considering the underlying reasons behind people’s actions. Being labeled is more than just a simple title, it becomes an integral aspect of your identity (culturally, emotionally, through family ties etc.) whether you accept it or not. Thank you for sharing and opening up a conversation that many people do not want to have.
If the shoe fits,own it.