No 100 in LA this year. Some remarkable developments in LA over recent months indicate that for gang members the way out is not necessarily in a coffin or doing 25 to life. Just down the street from where the music of Pepe Aguilar is blasting out of Casa del Musico, and across the road from where La Pacita is offering its speciality of cocteles de camaron , is the little office from which G-Dog and his crew operate. One young man is waiting for Father Greg to write a note so that he can visit a surgery - the note is to reassure the doctor that the consultation fee will be paid. Another needs a cab fare for a job interview.
Life is miserable already.
It's not so much a question of what pulls them into the gangs as what pushes them out of the house. These kids are my heroes. They show great courage in facing the obstacles in front of them. There was a time when you could conjure up a future, get out and look back on your gang days, but crack changed all that. Father Greg's crowded office is the home of Jobs for a Future, the attempt by him and his team to address the lack of prospects for young men with records as long as their tattooed arms.