Julia Reynolds - Blood in the Fields. Ten Years Inside Californias Nuestra Familia Gang

S alinas, California, is the birthplace of John Steinbeck and the setting for his epic masterpiece, East of Eden, but it is also the home of Nuestra Familia, one of the most violent gangs in America. Born in the prisons of California in the late 1960s, Nuestra Familia expanded to control drug trafficking and extortion operations throughout the northern half of the state, and left a trail of bodies in its wake. Prizewinning journalist and Nieman Fellow Julia Reynolds tells the gangs story from the inside out, following young men and women as they search for a new kind of family, quests that usually lead to murder and betrayal.

Blood in the Fields also documents the history of Operation Black Widow, the FBIs decade-long effort to dismantle the Nuestra Familia. The questionable operation frequently engaged in turf wars with local law enforcement agencies and compromised the safety of its informants. In this work of narrative nonfiction, journalist Reynolds used her unprecedented access to gang members, both in and out of prison, as well as undercover wire taps, depositions, and court documents to weave a gripping, comprehensive history of this brutal criminal organization and the lives it destroyed.

Copyright 2014 by Julia Reynolds

All rights reserved

Published by Chicago Review Press, Incorporated

814 North Franklin Street

Chicago, Illinois 60610

ISBN 978-1-61374-969-2

Cover design: John Yates

Interior design: PerfecType, Nashville, TN

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Reynolds, Julia.

Blood in the fields : ten years inside Californias Nuestra Familia gang / Julia Reynolds.

pages cm

Includes index.

Summary: The city of Salinas, California, is the birthplace of John Steinbeck and the setting for his epic masterpiece, East of Eden, but it is also the home of Nuestra Familia, one of the most violent gangs in the United States. Born in the prisons of California in the late 1960s, Nuestra Familia expanded to control drug trafficking and extortion operations throughout the northern half of the state, and left a trail of bodies in its wake. Award-winning journalist Julia Reynolds tells the gangs story from the inside out, following young men and women as they search for a new kind of family, quests that usually lead to murder and betrayal. Blood in the Fields also documents the history of Operation Black Widow, the FBIs questionable decade-long effort to dismantle the Nuestra Familia, along with its compromised informants and the turf wars it created with local law enforcement agencies. Reynolds used her unprecedented access to gang members, both in and out of prison, as well as undercover wire taps, depositions, and court documents to weave a gripping, comprehensive history of this brutal criminal organization and the lives it destroyed Provided by publisher.

ISBN 978-1-61374-969-2 (hardback)

1. Nuestra Familia (Gang) 2. GangsCalifornia. 3. Mexican American gangsCalifornia. 4. Prison gangsCalifornia. 5. Gang members California. I. Title.

HV6439.U7C258 2014

364.106609794dc23

2014010689

Printed in the United States of America

5 4 3 2 1

To Lucille,
my Virgil in the forest dark.
And to Johnny Angel, who showed
me how life should really be.

To see the worldor more important,
to make the world see itself.

John Steinbeck,
unpublished notes to The Long Valley

Index

NOTE: This has traditionally been the gangs official structure. However, after Operation Black Widow split the gangs leadership, there are now two functioning Mesas, one in Pelican Bay State Prison and the other at the USP Florence ADMAX prison in Florence, Colorado. Neighboring street regiments may answer to either of the two Mesas, causing new friction within the gang.

To add to the confusion, the names of the gangs subgroups have changed since much of this story took place. Nuestra Raza members are today known as Norteos, while Norteo street gang members are now called Northerners. Some say this change was deliberately concocted to confuse law enforcement, while others say the Mesa feared Nuestra Raza was gaining too much power. In this story I chose to stick to the old names as seen in this chart.

THE MESA

GENERAL OF THE PINTA | GENERAL OF THE STREETS | GENERAL ADVOCATE
Generals and captains are supported financially by all below them, often amassing tens of thousands of dollars in prison trust accounts.
CAPTAINS
Cats I, II, and III. Number varies. Cat III members are part of the Mesa.
NUESTRA RAZA Runs the gangs business inside prison. Functioning outside prison is optional.	COMMANDER OF THE STREETS Functions outside of prison and oversees all regiments. He can be a specific regimental commander in addition to serving as overall commander.
REGIMENTAL COMMANDERS One for each regional regiment (i.e., Salinas, San Francisco, Stockton)
REGIMENTS
Crews made up of NF and NR members and up-and-coming Norteos. They earn the bulk of the gangs income and send a percentage up the chain of command. Members can be in charge of security, administration, weapons, and other specific functions.
NORTEOS
Gang members who commit crimes and are often taxed by NF regiments but are not obligated to function under them.

As an investigative journalist, I spent the past twelve years of my career documenting the growth and criminal cases of the Nuestra Familia prison gang and its street-level subset, the Norteos. News versions of many of the events in this book have appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle, the Monterey County Herald, the Oakland Tribune, and on PBS television, National Public Radio, KQED-TV, and MotherJones.com.

I recorded hundreds of hours of interviews with subjects in the book and have hundreds of pages of notes from interviews, prison visits, and trials. I am extremely fortunate to have had access to documents never seen by the public, and these papers, especially the transcripts of informants live recordings, paint a solid picture of the Nuestra Familias time under Rico Garcias reign. A number of scenes are based on FBI transcripts of undercover audiotape that recorded events as they occurred. In addition, I obtained tens of thousands of pages of discovery documents relating to Operation Black Widow, the federal governments seven-year investigation and prosecution of the top Nuestra Familia leaders. These documents include police reports, FD-302 reports by FBI agents, video and audio recordings by undercover informants, transcripts of those recordings, and copies of letters from the defendants written while they were in federal custody. I also reviewed the cases federal and state court files, including exhibits, that filled several shopping-sized carts.