Central America's Increasing Gang Problem: A Comforting Handshake Needed as Much as a Tough Fist to Fight Crime Epidemic

Another Report in COHA’s Series on Violence and the Immigration Issue

After over a decade of violent internal civil conflicts, in which the U.S. has played an important, if often wrong-headed role, Central America has now become a breeding ground and field of battle for violent criminal activity. After experiencing a short-lived peace at the conclusion of their individual civil wars of the 1980s and into the early 1990s, El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala are now plagued by a new form of warfare: a gang epidemic that originally had its roots in Los Angeles. As a consequence of the belated and ineffective past responses to what must be seen as a massive failure in dealing with the criminal justice problem, both in Central America and in major metropolitan centers throughout the U.S., notorious gangs like Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) and 18th Street Gang (M-1 are virtually in armed rebellion against civil authority.

Characteristically, well organized and heavily armed as a result of practical gangland training picked up on street corners and in pitch-battles in the U.S., the gangs have become a serious match for authorities and a drain on their resources. Coping with these criminal organizations will continue to be a difficult task which requires dedicated social reformers as much as an exclusive heavy handed law-and-order approach that is being favored today throughout Central America. With no abatement in scale, the uncontained growth and influence of these gangs have reached the point of unverified ties with al-Qaeda and other international terrorist groups trying to exploit the porous Mexican-American border to facilitate what could be their own extremist plots.

The Crisis
During the recent Gang Enforcement Conference (Tercera Conferencia Antipandillas) co-sponsored by El Salvador and the FBI, Jose Chavez of the Los Angeles Police Department declared that “In the world of Hispanic gangs, all roads lead to LA.â€