How US Prison Gangs (Nuestra Familia) Actually Work | How Crime Works

My name is Juan Mendoza. I am a former member of the Nuestra Familia

prison

gang. I was a Category III and was a regiment commander in different parts of Northern California. And that's how

crime

work

s. I've been to San Quentin, Pelican Bay. In the early '90s, we were put alongside the Southern Mexicans and the Aryan Brotherhood, the Nazi Lowriders. Those were our enemies. They were putting us together in the yard and we were going to fight. If you were clever enough to pull out a gun, we'll try to kill each other. I went to

prison

in 1988 when I was 18 years old.

Some of my older friends who were with me in the county jail basically told me that when I get to San Quentin, the NR will approach me about committing me. I knew who to look for. The first time I went out to the playground, there was a group of guys standing in the corner who were covered in tattoos. Those were the NR members. From that moment on I was put on a 90-day trial period. It's like you're functioning within that movement, but you're not an actual member. You can do anything they ask of you. Stabbing someone, keeping someone safe, withholding documents, holding a weapon.

A lot of guys commit because they want the status, they want the title. Those guys will end up being eliminated because they don't commit for the right reasons. They are not true believers. I was a member of NR for about five or six years. People notice when you are functioning for so long and you are not questioning authority, but you are becoming a leader. Over time, the FN will come to you because the NR, in essence, is like the FN's training camp. I think it was 1994, two high-ranking members of the NF approached me, Smiley from Salinas and Mikey O. from Salinas.

The induction process is similar to NR. You go through an indoctrination process where you learn some of their concepts, their statutes. You have a sponsor and you have the guy that you are really attracted to. They are responsible for you. When you make a commitment to NF, it is a lifelong commitment. They asked me things like, "Are you willing to kill your own flesh and blood? Are you willing to put the organization before everything else in your life?" Everything else you were loyal to becomes secondary. They write down everything. There are 14 bonuses, I mean, I used to call them my little toolbox.

Everything I needed to know how to function within that movement: conduct, discipline. They encourage you to study things like Middle Eastern philosophy, Socrates, revolutionary literature like George Jackson, Che Guevara. And then there's everything you need to know about making weapons. I can make a sharp instrument with 15 pieces of paper. It's all about how you roll it and then how you tip it. When your membership is approved, there is no big ceremony. They will meet you perhaps in a group sitting on the patio. They'll say something like, "Today we welcome Brother Boxer." I was there in San Quentin, in the courtyard, and something similar was done. "Hey, this brother is carnal now.

He's a Familiano as of right now. He's a member of the mafia." It's like he had reached a pinnacle, a point in my career where I had really accomplished something. Everything I've done was worth it. When a newcomer arrives, we'll get their information, we'll get all their vital signs, we'll get their name, their CDC number, we'll get a little bit about their history. We'll get things like his alias, his age, his neighborhood, what they called him. We will search the BNL to make sure he is not in the BNL. So the BNL, the Bad News List, is that we keep a list of everyone who enters and leaves that home.

I'm going to send a filter to all the members that are in that house and ask everyone, "Have you done time with this guy? This guy just came in. Do you know him?" Any good or bad information will be filtered. If nothing comes back, you will be welcome to the house. Then, at that point, they'll give you a care package, soap, shampoo, coffee, toothpaste, things like that. When you first enter an advertising segment or even a mainline, they give you what's called a 114 blocking order. That's like your passport. The

gangs

are going to ask you for that, but the only way to get a confinement order is if they freely waive it.

That's the only way we're going to get it. That confinement order will say which gang you are affiliated with. He'll say things like, if you have an S on your jacket, like a sex

crime

or something, he'll say it right there. So someone like that, you know, you get an S, they probably wouldn't even waive their 114 lockdown order because they already know what time it is. If you refuse to provide that information, that's it. He is someone who refused to comply with the program. Someone like that will not be welcome in the yard. If you try to go out into the yard, they will knock on the door.

I mean, there are obviously a lot of advantages to becoming a member that way. You'll get that kind of rock star treatment from a lot of young people who are on the streets and in prison. They see you as an example. They call NF members, just like they call members of the Mexican mafia, great friends. You're going to have a lot of access to money. I have learned many things that I still have to this day, although I am no longer a part of it. Things like behaving a certain way. The FN is built, is built or constructed under a paramilitary structure.

Many of the former members of the NF came from the Marine Corps. They're former Marines, so they

actually

took a lot of the military leadership structure and brought it to the NF. You have captains, lieutenants, commanders, an I-er category. Or for members who are new to the organization, they have no status over others. Then you have a cat II. They have shown that they have leadership potential and can give a correct interpretation of the constitution. You will become masters of cat Is. Now, to become cat III, it is the best of the best. They need to vote for you.

Then you have the internal council and the general council that basically make decisions for the entire organization. You have a general for the prisons, you have a general for the streets, and then you have a general that is basically like internal affairs. He handles investigations, internal disputes, things like that. When you're in the SHU, you can be in charge of about 200 guys. You're not

actually

running the entire prison. There are guys on the main line, regiment commanders who are doing that. But on the streets, if you're a regiment commander, it might be 20 or 30 guys. I was a regiment commander throughout Northern California.

Different parts. Each time, there were probably 10 to 20 members under my command at that time. One day for me, well, it depends. For example, San Quentin, you are running Unit H in North Block, West Block. I would have to sit there and answer some research. So you get daily filters or weekly filters from all these different blocks. All day long I was inundated with kites. San Quentin is the worst place to be a leader. The NF's main rivals are the Mexican mafia, who follow the southerners, and then there is the Aryan Brotherhood, who follow the whites. But overall, the situation is mixed.

Everybody's mixed up out there. The northerners, the southerners, the blacks, they are all mixed. If we're talking about an ad-seg type environment, a SHU program, everyone is a little bit segregated. I spent the entire 90's in the SHU program. When you see us in the yards and we're doing burpees and doing exercises, we're not doing that because we're just trying to get karate bodies and just trying to look good. Good? We are training for a war. That is what it is. They are getting ready to go to SHU programs. They are going to be involved in a conflict.

So the SHU program is like a prison within a prison. They put you in a cell and you stay there for about 23 hours a day. You'll leave the cell for half an hour to take a shower, and then you might go out into the yard, and you'll come out into a yard where you have four concrete walls and a chamber. That's all there is out there. You have plexiglass on top. If you see a bird fly, you're like, "Damn, I saw a bird today, man." Go back there and tell the module people. In the SHU program, they got what's called a nervous system.

Everything is electric up there in Pelican Bay. They sit there and push buttons all day. You know, you've got a cop up there who's in charge of six different groups. Then you might forget that someone is in the shower or you might forget that a door is open and you'll press another button and someone else will come out. You could be there watching TV or

work

ing out one minute, and the next minute you'll be in the stands fighting for your life. It will happen that quickly. So, we as northerners, you know, all day we had our mattresses rolled up and we were sitting by the door.

I mean, I get up and work out, I watch my TV, but for the most part, whenever there was movement or activity in the stands, I was placed at my door, ready, in case my door opened. . Because many times the COs said it was a mistake, but it wasn't a mistake. You know, they open certain doors for different reasons. I used to see them. I used to watch from my cell phone. There are many different places in the yards to bury weapons. Inside the buildings, above, in the small beams. We obviously know where they are. Under sinks or in walls, buried.

They drink it. You know, to move a gun from one place to another, they put it in their anal cavity, that's how it moves. I don't know how you want to put that, but. So, I went through wars in the Corcoran SHU in the early '90s. We were doing it with the Mexican mafia and the Aryan Brotherhood. You know, they knew we were mortal enemies, that we would kill each other if we had the chance, but they would throw us out into the yard. And they knew it. The administration there knew it. You would have to have the light on and that meant you wanted to go to the garden.

The kids used to turn off the lights because they didn't want to know anything about it. But those of us who remained active turned on the lights and went out. It's like a small enclosure before you go out to the patio, and the patio is like a small, it's shaped like a piece of cake. When you walk into that little enclosure, you can see through the patio door who you're going out and about with. Then we would go out, we would fight. Always try to position yourself so that your back is to the gunner so you can see what he is doing.

Because we were the ones being attacked. It was northerners and blacks who were gunned down there. There are no warning shots, per se, but what they have is like... it's called bertha or knee knocker. It's like a gas gun that shoots small blocks of wood. Sometimes they shoot once, twice, and then grab the real gun. But yeah, they don't give warning shots. Now, the other thing too is that the COs are making bets. They'd say, "Hey, we've got money for you, man. You better go out and do your thing, man." You know, sometimes they would take their best fighters from one building and they would take the best fighter from another building and take them out there.

When I first entered the system, I was young. I used to assault them. I used to have bad taste for certain people. And I didn't even know why I hated them. It was because I was supposed to. That's the mentality that was instilled in me. But being around them, many of them were like us. They were solid guys. If there's a Southerner and he needs toothpaste, or I have a book and he wants to read it, you know, we pass literature to each other. We can play chess in the stands. It does us no good to make that environment more stressful than it is.

Now, like I said, if the door is open, we were basically ordered to launch torpedoes and engage whoever was in the level. If we were to take off the staff, the guards, our politics could be put aside for a greater purpose where, yes, we could come together to go against the administration. You might see something like a small uprising within an ad-seg unit or something where they are not feeding us well, they are destroying our cells and disrespecting our personal belongings, like photographs and things like that, where all the world says, "You know?" That? We've had enough.

Block your window so they can't see inside, which basically forces them to come in and take your phone. It's something I was personally involved in before, in Susanville. You know, when we were going through the Corcoran SHU wars, people could debate this, but many of the COs were divided as to who they favored in that war. Even some of the female officers. It's just that you could tell that they sympathized with the north or sympathized with the south. A lot of this is just geography. Where is that prison, whether or not they have family that could be connected.

So it depends. Corruption is widespread in county jails. I mean, you see a lot of relationships happening where female officers are forming relationships with inmates. Next thing you know, they're bringing in drugs. They don't get that kind of thing through the visiting room. They obtain it through corrupt conscientious officers. In prison, one of the things that is a big problem is cell phones coming in. But it's big business for conscientious objectors. They can earn between $1,000 and $4,000 by bringing a phone, a mobile phone. Have the phonesbook is called "Our Family: A Broken Paradigm." So I started making a YouTube channel, Paradigm Media News.

I have a series on my channel, one is called "Inner Demons" and the other is called "War Stories". It's also therapeutic to talk about it, you know, try it. To help some of these young people who might be headed toward that type of lifestyle, I give them the fine print that they don't find out about until it's too late, until they commit and find themselves in that situation. I have seen many of my friends die over the years. Most of them are gone. There are only three paths you will take in this lifestyle: or you will spend the rest of your life in prison.

Die trying to advance the organization, or you'll turn your back. There is no pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.