State of War by William Wheeler

Author:William Wheeler
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Columbia Global Reports
Published: 2019-03-19T16:00:00+00:00

“It Was Like an Army”

In the wake of the truce, the police once again entered red zones like Manuel’s neighborhood shooting first and asking questions under torture, unleashing the worst tactics of the civil war years. On one such occasion, he said, police held him on the floor of an interrogation room and tortured him with electric shocks. Then his interrogators squeezed his fingers with pliers while asking about a list of names of suspected gang members. Manuel was left to languish in an overcrowded cell, where inmates defecated on the floor. They led him outside daily to be subjected to stress positions, naked, and doused with liquid tear gas. He broke down crying. Some of the other inmates were “disappeared” after authorities transferred them to prisons controlled by rivals—a death sentence. When he was finally released, all Manuel could think about was killing the officers who had put him there. In El Salvador, he concluded, human rights don’t exist.

His enmity was amplified by the knowledge that some of those abusing him were complicit in the crimes of which they accused him. In the years since Mano Dura, the gangs had grown more powerful along with the ranks of their new allies eager to profit from them. At El Paso, a restaurant outside Santa Ana, Manuel had dined with judges, lawyers, and investigators willing to resolve their criminal cases for a hefty fee. On one occasion, after most of his clique was picked up, the arresting officers told them the names of the gang members who had ratted them out. The clique decided to kill the informants and their families—the police had used them and then released them on the streets to the lions.

But worst of all was the fact that he had left the gang and became calmado in 2008. He was embarrassed at the way his son looked at him, always hiding out on the heels of a drug deal gone bad. He made little money. And he was tired of worrying that any moment he could be killed in a shoot-out or murdered by his own gang. One night, he was partying with his friend “El Loco” when he finally broke down. They were surrounded by women, with money and guns on the table. But Manuel felt empty and alone. He picked up his guns—a .38 revolver and a .45 semi-automatic—and said he was leaving. He said he would shoot anyone he encountered on the street and that he hoped it was a cop. El Loco told him he was crazy. When Manuel got home, he called another homeboy and asked him to come pick up the guns—he was done. The voice on the other end of the phone asked him what he would do for a living, but Manuel had no answer. He knelt, put his forehead to his hands, and asked God for a job. A few days later, an intermediary who knew he was looking for a way out found him one—a job program in a new factory that was hiring former gang members ready for a second chance.

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