What is a “mole”, as it pertains to this movie?

Agustine Lizama and his long-fourth dimension girlfriend

On Sun, the New York Times ran an interesting and alarming story about a human who was a witness to a gang murder and, at first testified as to the shooters' identity in front of grand jury, then got spooked and—to use the term favored by frustrated cops and prosecutors—he pissed backwards.

But when the case came to trial, with a phalanx of gang members glaring at him in open court, Mr. Roe inverse his story, testifying that he had heard the shots but never saw who fired them. The ii suspects were acquitted.

Now Mr. Roe is the criminal defendant, facing up to 3 years in prison for the sin of being scared silent…… His is one of a small but growing cadre of cases nationally in which angry and frustrated prosecutors are turning the tables on witnesses who recant.

Getting witnesses to testify in gang trials has become a huge problem nationwide, and nowhere is the trouble greater than in Los Angeles.

The subject came up in a dramatic way just terminal week when I guest lectured at a form at the UCLA School of Public Affairs taught past my friend, Jorja Jump who, in addition to being a terrific pal, is an international practiced in crisis intervention and trauma response—and Antonio Villaraigosa's policy adviser on gangs.

Anyway, Jorja made her form read my gang volume, and wanted me to give her students some kind of follow-up talk. To make things a bit more than interesting, I asked three of the guys I know who work at Homeboy Industries to show up likewise and exist part of the lecture.

The three men—Joseph Holguin, Agustin Lizama, and Luis Perez—are all in their early 30's and all former homeboys with fairly harrowing personal stories to tell. I also know them to be extremely dynamic and clear. And then when they arrived at the lecture hall, I merely turned the flooring over to them, and stood back to scout the show.

They got up and talked, i after the other, virtually their respective pasts—about horrifically traumatic childhoods, most the lure and familial comfort of the gang, nigh when they'd been shot, or shot at. They described the horror of seeing young friends shot and killed, talked about fourth dimension spent in jail or prison house, about struggles with drugs and/or alcohol….and and so they each explained how and why they'd been able to climb out of the downwards trajectory their gang pasts had predicted, to finally begin to build lives with promising futures.

All three spoke with passion, intelligence and artlessness about where they've been, what they've washed wrong, and how expert it feels to finally be doing things right.

The last of the three to speak was Augustine—a vivid, gentle man who'd been i of the stars of the poetry projection I wrote about before. (Actually all three were involved, in one way or another.) Agustine talked about how he'd had his paw shot off at the forearm when he was 12-years quondam. How he'd been stabbed at 13.

And then he told a story I'd never heard before.

Agustine told how when he was xvi, he'd happened, purely by accident, to be in the general vicinity of a gang murder. The police never found the real shooter but instead arrested xvi twelvemonth-old Agustine for the law-breaking.
Agustine said that, although he had nothing any to do with the murder, he'd been close enough to see who had actually done the shooting.

"But I couldn't snitch," he told the lecture hall full of UCLA students. "And they were going to try me as an adult. Then," he said softly, "at historic period 16, I was prepared to go to prison for the balance of my life for something I didn't practise, rather than talk. That'due south how it is when you're in a gang."

Agustine was locked up for ii and a one-half years while he fought the case, eventually taking information technology to trial. As luck would have it, he drew a decent public defender and beat the murder example. Obviously, it could have easily turned out otherwise.

After the guys finished their personal accounts, the spellbound UCLA students peppered them with questions for another half 60 minutes. Finally, when the grade was well-nigh over, a young woman stood up and asked the grouping one last question:

"What if a homeboy came to you for help and advice," she asked, "and, like Agustine, he was accused of a murder he didn't commit? What would y'all tell him to do?"

The three homeboys glanced at each other. Information technology was Joseph who stepped forrard first. "Unless I knew I could motility that person out of land to a, similar, really safe place, similar Missouri or something, I don't call back I could advise him to talk." The others nodded. "I'd say the same affair," said Augustine. "I'd try to find a mode to become him very far away, or it but wouldn't be safe. Seriously. Information technology just wouldn't."

What the guys didn't say is that, when information technology comes to a homeboy—or a one-time homeboy— being a witness—"snitching"—isn't only a adventure, it something that is almost guaranteed to have mortal consequences. And the scariest threat of retaliation isn't from the homeboys or the gang members on trial. The real fear, for someone who'due south ever been in a gang, no affair how peripherally, is of retaliation from the Mexican Mafia.

To illustrate, let me tell y'all ane more story.

About ten or 15 years ago a immature homeboy I knew quite well—a 16-yr-one-time— was shot in the back in a gang incident, and it appeared that he was going to die. Since he figured he was dead anyway, and he was pretty unhappy about dying at such a young age, when LAPD officers came to interview the homeboy, he blurted to them the name of the gangster who'd done the shooting.

But then he didn't die. He recovered.

Naturally, the cops and the D.A. dragged the young man to trial to testify against his attacker. But at that point, he did what the guy in the NY York Times story did,. He said he couldn't call back. And the shooter beat the case.

But the damage, from a "snitching" perspective, was already done.

Eventually the paperwork from the original law investigation filtered into the jail system (as, for some reason, it always does)…and the EME put what is called a "greenish light" on the young homeboy— meaning a capital punishment. Worse, they told his own homeboys it was their chore to carry out the deed, and if they didn't there would be….consequences. The whole gang would take a "low-cal."

Father Greg Boyle heard through the grapevine about the male child's dilemma so (with my help, every bit it happens) conspired to get the kid away from East LA to stay with a centre-class family in another part of Los Angeles. Eventually he managed to get out Southern California altogether. After a few years, the issue blew over. Now he has three kids, a swell wife, a fabulous job and has recently purchased a business firm.

But, as with Agustine, the story could have gone a very different direction. I yet remember the times when information technology was unclear if the child would alive through the weekend—just for saying who tried to kill him, and then retracting it.

So, as I listened to the pretty college girl enquire the sometime homeboys that very smart question, I couldn't help only silently plow the same question on myself: If young homeboy I knew and liked was arrested for a murder he didn't commit, and he knew who actually did the deed, what would I suggest him to practise?

Sadly, I didn't have to deliberate for even a second.

I'd tell him I'd help him find a good lawyer.

pughmigge1948.blogspot.com

Source: https://witnessla.com/gangs-and-the-terrible-politics-of-snitching/

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