Tell
who they are and where they live
SUNNYSIDE
(6-10-98)---Individual criminal thugs--ages 10 to 17--are
virtually anonymous today.
That's
because well-meaning mainstream institutions keep them
out of the public eye. We invite schools, newspapers,
politicians, and Mr. and Mrs. DSHS to listen up.
Known
gangsters are coddled by one or more institutions until
age 18 or until they kill someone. Whichever comes first.
Only after that can we let 'em have it. But by then it's
often too late.
Witness
the two 14-year old
"youths"---Joel
Lemos
and Miguel
Gaitan---
who used knives and baseball bats to wipe out the Skelton
family in Granger in 1993. No one heard of these "youths"
until the sonsabitches bashed in the head of
wheelchair-bound Michael Skelton and his little wife,
Lynn Skelton, in their trailer home.
YVN
talked to the fire chief who arrived first on the scene.
He said he found Lynn Skelton's brains all over the
shower curtain.
Then
these "youth" stabbed the two terrified young Skelton
boys to death as they tried to hide. Not satisfied, they
reportedly cut off the testicles of Jason Skelton, 12,
and his little brother, Brian, 6.
It was
a gangland initiation: "Hey, whack somebody and you're
in, baby!"
A
Granger school official who knew these Granger "youth"
(how bureaucrats love that term) told us "their eyes are
dead-looking, like a snake's. They don't care about
anything. They don't listen to what you say. If they do
look at you, it gives you a chill. They'd just as soon
kill you as look at you."
Killers
Lemos and Gaitan are locked up for life. Lemos got 82
years in the pen; the earliest he can get out for "good
behavior" is 2061. Gaitan got four consecutive life-terms
without possibility of parole. Today (2004), the
sonsabitches are both age 25, and believed to be rotting
in Walla Walla State Prison.
One
Yakima Valley resident, a newspaper librarian, will never
forget Gaitan: "As he was being sentenced, he turned
around and grinned at the camera," she said of this
goddamned snake.
Though
the Skelton family killers are locked
up,
many more young gangsters remain at large in the Yakima
Valley and harbor the same philosophy. We heard a young
reporter (Craig Galbraith) on TV the other night
interview a former gangland leader. This great "leader"
said, "Gangs will always be with us. YOU can't do nothin'
about it."
Maybe
so, maybe not. In any case, a first step is not letting
these poor, misunderstood, mostly Hispanic "youth" enjoy
anonymity.
We
don't say that naming violent juvenile offenders,
publishing their mugs and addresses, and by extension
their family affiliations, will stop gangland crime. All
we can say is it will help the general public--who
outnumber cops about 1,000 to 1--to see thugs
coming.
We
believe that, if we know WHO violent young thugs are and
WHERE they stay, we can be on the alert to protect
ourselves and our loved ones. All of us can isolate and
ostracize the violent, and hold them up to the contempt
they deserve.
Perhaps
their families--who will also be in the public eye--will
be motivated to turn these bad kids around (and maybe
not). In any case, they'll be publicly
involved.
"Gangs
will always be with us," said the former head of the
200-member Yakima County rat pack we mentioned. "You
can't do nothin' about it."
That's
a challenge. We're going to start answering it by shining
a light on who you are and where you are.
According
to School Resource Officer Jim Rivard, some gangsters do
infest Sunnyside Schools. School officials keep a lookout
for backpacks, clothing and notebooks scrawled with
graffiti. They look for items marked with eight balls,
joy/grief masks, known gang brands, numbers 13, 14, and
21, and Roman numeral counterparts XIII , XIV and XXI.
They also look for lettering LVL, BGL, and
WSOS.
