By JOSÉ-IGNACIO CASTAÑEDA PEREZ, MATTHEW HENDLEY, BYRON MASON II, and BRAELA KWAN on October 23, 2020 for Slate
Ruben Saldaña was 12 when he joined a gang after moving to a part of Homestead, Florida, that he called a ghetto. By 13, he was leading his “junior gang.”
“I became a gang member before I even hit puberty,” said Saldaña, who now runs a mixed martial arts diversion program for kids in high-crime areas in central Florida.
Saldaña said the crimes committed by juvenile gangs had little purpose.
“It wasn’t even like Chicago organizations who were fighting over millions of dollars of drugs,” he said. “It was foolishness. Children who were misguided by misguided kids. The blind leading the blind. And then that’s what I became, a blind leader.”
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