Madrid - They call themselves kings and queens. They rule
over streets they have named the Inca, Aztec or Hispanic kingdom.
They believe in God, honour and brotherhood. And whoever breaks the
code of silence, does so at his own risk.
The Latin Kings are the best-known among the Hispanic youth gangs
that have formed in Spain among the immigrants from its former
colonies.
Gradually, Spanish police experts are beginning to understand the
mentality of the street gangs born or based on models in poor and
crime-infested neighbourhoods in the Americas.
The Almighty Latin King and Queen Nation was initially formed to
help and defend Latin American immigrants in the Chicago area of the
United States in the 1940s. Its members later became involved in
violent crimes.
The Spanish branch of the Latin Kings was launched in 2000 by the
young Ecuadorian Eric Velastegui, known as King Wolverine, who is now
serving a prison sentence for rape.
US leaders of the Latin Kings visiting Spain, however, have
downplayed the group's violent reputation, and evidence from the
north-eastern region of Catalonia suggests that such gangs have the
potential of being transformed into constructive social forces.
The Latin Kings' big rival in Spain are the Netas, a gang founded
in the prisons of Puerto Rico in the 1970s.
Other gangs include Dominican Don't Play (DDP), many of whose
members come from the Dominican Republic. The Madrid DDP has begun to
sell drugs and acquired firearms, the daily El Pais reported.
Recently, evidence has even emerged of the presence in Catalonia
of the Mara Salvatrucha and the Mara 18, Central American groups
known for their extreme violence.
In the Madrid region alone, the number of gang members tripled in
three years to about 1,300 by 2007, police estimated. Nearly 300 of
them were regarded as violent.
The main gangs, which are present in several cities across Spain,
are hierarchically structured, tribe-like organizations.
They are characterized by mystical symbols, an ethos of
religiosity and machoism, and an ideology of defending the Latin
American identity against an environment perceived as racist and
hostile.
The Latin Kings, for instance, wear rap-style clothes and
black-and-gold bead necklaces. Their symbol of a five-point crown
represents respect, honesty, unity, knowledge and love.
The gangs tend to place women in a secondary role, with the Latin
Kings as the only one to have a female section.
Many of the gangs have a double nature, with leisure activities
such as football alternating with robberies or extortion which new
members can be ordered to commit as a kind of initiation rite.
Dozens of gang members have been detained on charges ranging from
kidnappings and threats to attacks and killings. Most of the violence
takes place between rival gangs, but former members have also told
courts about the beatings faced by those who break the internal
rules.
'We were told to pay 1,200 euros (1,700 dollars), or we'd be
burned alive,' two girls who had tried to leave the Latin Kings told
a Madrid judge.
The growth of the gangs is based on the rapid increase of Latin
American immigration to Spain.
The overall number of immigrants has soared from 1.8 per cent of
the Spanish population in 1990 to more than 10 per cent. The largest
groups include 420,000 Ecuadorians and 260,000 Colombians.
'Immigrants never see their children, because they work 23 hours a
day. The kids are on the street, in search of a (new) family,' King
Mission, a US representative of the Latin Kings, explained during a
visit to Spain.
Gangs like the Latin Kings also give a sense of purpose and
self-esteem to youths who may come from neighbourhoods riddled with
gang violence in their own countries, grew up without their parents
who emigrated before them, and who are now struggling with the
difficulties of adapting to a foreign culture.
In 2007, Latin street gangs did not commit any killings in Spain
for the first time in several years. The decline was attributed to
police crackdowns and, in some regions, to attempts to integrate the
gangs into Spanish society.
While the conservative Madrid authorities outlawed the Latin Kings
in 2007, liberal Catalonia took the opposite approach, giving them
the status of a cultural association.
Representatives of the Latin Kings and Netas even visited the
regional parliament, explaining to legislators that they were
planning to make joint musical recordings to bury their hostilities.
International experts on street gangs have hailed Catalonia's
ground-breaking approach, but it has not entirely eradicated
inter-gang violence.
USA
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