Word: gangly
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...murder illustrates how Hispanic gangs in U.S. cities are spreading their terror all over Central America. Deported to El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala, these delinquents not only imported the mystique of U.S. gang culture - its neo-Nazi tattoos, rap music, baggy trousers and "homey" slang - but they also brought crack cocaine, semi-automatic weapons, home-made bombs and a level of calculated aggression not seen in the region since the insurgencies and counterinsurgencies...
...Coming from the U.S. gives a deportee the edge over the local gang-bangers. "These kids might have been low-level gang members back in the States, but when they come here, they're like the Nike of the gang world," says Magdalena Rose Avila, founder of Homeys Unidos, which helps deported gang members settle into Salvadoran society. "One guy I know recruited 60 or 70 soldiers to his gang in six months...
...Outgunned and underfunded local police forces are overwhelmed by this lethal American export. Tiny El Salvador has over 55,000 gang members, including some 10,000 deportees. San Pedro Sula, a city of half a million Hondurans, has over 35,000 - and only one police officer who handles gangs. "About all I can do," says Magdalenys Centeno, "is see who shows up at the gang funerals and take their photos." According to Centeno, almost all the leaders of local gangs Control Machete, The Junk, Poison, Crezi Kids, MS and 18 are deportees from the U.S. "They're much more violent...
...wave of returning gang members hit Central America in the mid-'90s, when the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) was given more power to hunt down and prosecute illegal aliens. According to the INS, the number of criminal deportations to Mexico and Central America has doubled since 1995 to 62,359 last year. INS officials concede that many of these "removals" belonged to gangs, either in prisons or in Hispanic neighborhoods back in the U.S. In Florida and New York, aliens in jail for criminal acts are given a choice halfway through their term to either be deported immediately...
...Both the 18th Street and MS were originally started by Salvadorans in Los Angeles to fight the Mexican gangs, and then spread to San Francisco, New York and Washington, D.C. They thrive on robberies, extortion and "taxing" the street drug dealers. Says Russ Bergeron, INS media director, "We have a fundamental obligation to protect our American citizens from the threat posed by gang violence." And however ill-equipped Central American countries may be to cope with these criminals bred in U.S. cities, other governments have an obligation to take back their nationals, says the INS. But as San Pedro Sula...