Episode 14

The area that Luis Miguel Salinas grew up in is Westlake Los Angeles. In this episode of CRASH Luis talks takes us through the streets of his old neighborhood highlighting where the crime took place, were his chase with the police went and he explains the various gangs in that neighborhood.

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
Those guys were constantly coming. Theywere constantly coming constance cost you know.
Uh, right before this happened,a couple of guys that got killed.
Right after this happened, a coupleof guys that a lot of a lot
of guys that I know, Igot called like the most Okay, So

(00:32):
the intersection of the third and Whimmeron the corner of Third and Wimmen,
there's a school. It's a littlemiddle schools. It takes up a pretty
big chunk of of of that block, right, it's a good size.
And then there's there's another there's abuilding right there. I want to say,

(00:56):
like I was like maybe the thirdor fourth building from that school.
Right, So if let's just say, if you cut the block into four
quarters, like I was basically inthe first quarter of the block, so
I'm closer to Third Street, SoI'm I'm all the way, I'm all

(01:18):
the way closer to Third Street wheremy car was in the driveway. Because
another thing about that street, right, it's a narrow street. It's a
narrow street, like two cars don'treally fit right at a two lane You
kind of got a maneuver your way. Like if if one car is coming
one way, the other car iscoming the other way. You guys can't

(01:40):
pass each other. You guys kindof kind of got a maneuver where you
could pass, you know, becauseit's a very densely populated area and there's
no parking. So that whole entirestreet is full of cars, and there's
people that double park, and there'speople park in the driveways blocking the entrances

(02:04):
to their parking from the majority ofbuildings don't have a parking area. Some
of them do well, I wouldsay like ninety percent of them don't have
a parking area. You have topark on the street at all hours of
the day. It doesn't matter whattime it is. It's gonna be very
difficult for you to find a parkingspace. Like people literally will pay somebody

(02:30):
to sit on that parking spot.They'll pay you, And that's a lot
of things that we used to do. The guys will come up to us
and ask because they even hold thespot for us, and we'll hold the
spot. You know. They'll giveus like five bucks or whatever and we'll
hold the spot for them. Soit was packed in another thing too,
Like that street, it's a veryactive street. There's so many people living

(02:53):
on that street, so many thingsgoing on, ice cream trucks, full
trucks, taco trucks, kids,doctor, kids running around this, so
much going on. You know,it doesn't matter what time it is.
You know, they're there all daylong, all night long. You know.
Um, so on that night therewas people out there. You know,

(03:16):
there was a lot of people outthere. It was. It was
around two in the morning, youknow, and you're used to that where
not everybody kicks it in the samelocation that You'll have some guys in the
beginning of the block, in themiddle of the block, in the end
of the block, you have someguys up in the rooftops, up in

(03:38):
the balconies. You know, everybody'sspread out. What these costs are saying
that it was completely dead. Therewas absolutely nobody out there, no cars
moving, no nothing. But thentheir own testimony they say the same thing,
that this is a very active street. There's constant costing movement, there's

(04:00):
always people out there at all hoursof the double day and night. They're
saying that, and then they're saying, oh, but on this right,
there was nobody out there. Itwas completely empty. That's why I want
to go to here to see howfar you can see you when you're standing
up Fifth Street, because you can't. I don't think you can't see to
the end of the clock, that'sfor sure. So you can't. You

(04:21):
can't because okay, so these copsare saying right that once they're on Windner
Street, okay, from fifth tosix that's a very small, very small
area, like it's you could youlook at look at the Memphis they're looking
at it. Feel like as soonas that's from Sixth Street, as soon

(04:44):
as you get onto to Windward,all there is is like maybe one building,
and then you see that little timingstreet, which is Fifth Street.
So you're at the very beginning ofthat built of that street, like you're
barely getting onto that street, andthere's that the fifty right there. So
they're saying that from that, fromthat point right there, they were able

(05:08):
to see all the way down supposedlyto the middle of the block, not
to the end, but to themiddle, and that that's where they saw
my car. But you can't,man, like I'm telling you that that
that street number one is dark,right because they don't have like the lights.

(05:30):
Those lights are most of tender shotout you know, they're broken,
they're not working. And even thelights that are in front of the buildings
right to to eliminate the entrances,majority of those lights are busted too.
So it's it's a dark street,you know. And now you're trying to

(05:50):
look at this long distance. You'renot going to see clearly. Even if
this dude had a like this hugelight, it's still gonna be difficult because
you have all these cars, youhave all these trash cans, you have
all these trees. I mean,you can see her, you can see

(06:14):
yourself, like you can see allthat stuff. Yeah. Well, they're
saying that they saw me and thatthey followed me. The changes the line.
What I think, what I thinkhappened was that these guys the prede
the entrance is closer to Lucas fromthe from the from the park team up
for the hospital, it's more closerto Lucas. So I'm thinking, what

(06:41):
I do these dudes win up Lucas. They're my thinking, Okay, we're
gonna go straight up Lucas and thenunless we hit third, we'll see if
we see anybody. And they probablykept going straight up because that little intersection
where had first seen them. Lucasgoes to the intersection. So that's why

(07:03):
I think that's what what they actuallydid was when they hit Lucas, they
went Lucas and they hit Second Street, they made that they made a lift,
and that's where we made up inthe interstection. You know. So
then from from there, where didyou went up to? Uh? Like

(07:24):
once once they were changing, youwent up to to Beverly and then because
you were trying to get on aunion right onto the highway Union. Yeah,
so okay, So if if you'relooking at the if you're looking at
the map, right where I polledover, it's directly in front of Elmar
High School. It's a very smallstreet and it kind of curves. And

(07:48):
then so if if you go,if you keep going straight on that little
street, I mean, you're notgoing straight, you're going in a curve.
But you're on that street. Soyou follow the street, there's a
curve and then it curves into Colombia. Right you go, you can go

(08:09):
straight on Colombia and his third Street. So they're trying to they're trying to
say that I went straight down Colombia, down towards sixth Street, and then
I came back. But that's that'snot what happened. That's not what I
did. When I there's a ifyou're looking at the fact, there's a
baseball field, can you see abaseball field. It's right on Colombia.

(08:33):
It's a baseball field. Okay,So there, and it curves right,
it curves around, and I wantto say that that's Loma Street is Norma.
So what I was trying to dois I trying to go back towards
Everly. So when I curved aroundand I went towards Loma and then I

(08:56):
went up, I want to sayit's a union play because there's two unions.
You're a Union place and you're aUnion Avenue, Union place to to
Beverly. Once I hit Beverly,I made I made a lift, and
then I hit Union Avenue and Imade a riot and I went straight.

(09:20):
I went straight on Union. Andwhen you go straight on Union, you're
gonna hit the one on one freeway. There's an exit and an entrance,
and there's a little tiny uh dividerthat separates the exit and the entrance.
So I'm going down this street andthen there's a dip. There's a dip

(09:43):
right there's it's it's kind of adeep dit once you get the Temple.
Temple is the main street. Onceyou get the Temple, there's there's a
there's a very deep dip right there. So I was kind of going fast
already, So when I hit thatdig, my car jumped up and and
I went across the street, andthen the entrance and exit are right there,

(10:11):
and I hit I hit the embankmentright here as a little divider.
I hit it with my wheels rightand that caused my card to spin and
I spun and I ended up facingthe opposite direction. So I was going
northbound right and I kind of Ispun out, and now I'm facing south.

(10:33):
So I go south and I makea last on Temple going downhill.
It's going downhill. It's it's asteep hill. You're going downhill. And
I'm trying to try to make theturn onto Glendale right that's the very first
street right there. I make theturn onto Glendale, and I ended up

(10:56):
skidding over onto the sidewalk and slammingtoa light post right there. M h.
If you look at the map,it's it's not that far aways.
Maybe I don't know it's not thatmany blocks, you know, because you
got Third Street, then you gotBeverly, then you got Temple. Those

(11:20):
three are the main streets Third,Third Street, Very Street, Temple Street.
So I basically made it two intersectionsaway. My dad actually lived right
there, right up like right nextto Temple. Temple and Glendall not that
far away. Um, So,I mean, I knew the little area,

(11:41):
so I was just trying to getaway from there. But as soon
as I crashed, you know,I'm thinking that these foods are gonna start
shooting my car, like they're gonnastart shooting me up. So I jump
out. I jump out, andI throw my hands up and with my
hand with my right hand, andI just grabbed my collar to grab my
collar, and I pulled it overmy head, and I saw my jacket

(12:07):
came off and my shirt came up. I was wearing a blue jacket with
white stripes, and I was wearinga black a black collar shirt. In
the report, the officer says too. He says the driver is wearing a
blue jacket with white stripes. Andthen William when he gives the description of
the person who shot him, hegives the description of hector. He says

(12:28):
he's wearing a gray a gray shirtwith some gray pants, and he doesn't
He never says that a guy withthe blue jacket or a guy with the
black shirt went up to him.He never says that. He says,
a guy with the gray shirt isthe one who went up to him shot
him. Where you saying your dadlives over like at the time, wasn't

(12:50):
your dad living over on Thanks Soby Virgil Middle School at that time in
the in the late nineties, therewas the mid nineties, because the late
nineties to till like uh, Iwant to say like two thousand, two
thousand and one or two to likeI want to say about two thousand and

(13:11):
two or two thousand and three,two, I want to say two thousand
and two. They lived on overthere by Virtual Middle School, right,
which was a block. There's thisblock called Commonwealth, and there's a school
if they're also there's an elementary schoolCommonwealth Elementary School, and then there's a
hill. You go up the hill, and that's where my apartments were at.

(13:37):
And the reason why we lived inthose apartments. We moved around a
few times, right, but themajority of the time we lived there my
step mom, her her sister wasthe manager of those apartments, so they
were able to get an apartment rightthere. But that's where I grew up

(14:00):
in They was behind Virtual Virtual MiddleSchool, and there's a dead end right
there, and that's very much whereI grew up. But over there on
Sixth and Union and Wimmer and allthat stuff up there. You know,
that was also where I grew upbecause what I would go back and forth

(14:20):
m the gang was in those locations. The high school was right there.
I went to Dollar High School,So I mean I grew up on all
that from from downtown all the wayto Hollywood. You know, I would
walk. I would walk all thosestreets. I would walk from downtown LA
all the way to Hollywood, orderby Sunset, where the where the Chinese

(14:43):
theaters at where you know Hollywood Walkof Female that stuff because my aunts lived
over there, so you know,I was pretty familiar with the whole area.
There's a lot of there's a lotof gangs in that whole entire area,
so a lot just like they're aloneright on where that where the shootings

(15:05):
occurred. Um that used to beeighteen Street, you know, it was
controlled by eighteen streets. But theylost control of it. They lost that
territory, and you know, somebodyelse took over. They took over,
and so that was the area thatI was um with, right that,

(15:26):
that's why I would go and takeit and all that. Right. Um,
So the borders are eighteen Street.Then you got um crazy riders.
Then you the crazy writers is mostlyMacArthur Park. Then you got like wanderers.

(15:46):
You gottah. You gotta got drifters, you gottah, or you got
uh yeah, you got Temple Street, you gotta a big top. You
the staff that uh. I mean, there's there's so many gangs and man,
it's just all right there. Youknow. But you aren't like like

(16:10):
I just like questioned about it.You aren't like when you were growing up.
You aren't like because I kind ofpicture because you're like being like stranded
in this like one block area,you know what I mean, where like
you know, get you get youdon't really want that when you grow up,
when you grow up in an arealike that, when you grow up

(16:30):
in an area like that where whereevery other block is a different game.
I mean, you're you're kind ofthis block is your is yours, don't
go out of this block, becauseif you go out of this block,
you're gonna get shot. You knowwhat I'm saying that that's the kind of
mentality. You know, So people, if you're gonna go into somebody else's

(16:51):
area, there's gonna be problems regardless, you know. So that's the type
of mentality that you had, waslike, Okay, this is this is
the whole world, man, likethis streets. No, there's nothing beyond
it. This is it right hereand that's it, you know what I
mean. Yeah, I mean,of course, of course I went to

(17:14):
I went to all that area.You know. Of course I went.
I was all up in everywhere.Man, I was holding all those streets,
you know. But yeah, andit came along with with that,
with that danger, and you know, I had a lot of close calls
that you know, at the timeof the shooting. Are you still thinking
about that? Are you? Imean, because you've you've been out of

(17:37):
it Las Vega for six months.You've been out of it, like thinking
about territories or where you're going.No, I mean, okay, so
you're gonna know regardless, man,you know, if you leave Even though
I left the gang and all that, it doesn't matter. Like I'm still
I'm still a young Mexican, youknow what I'm saying, Like, regardless

(17:59):
if if I'm not a game member, you know, people are gonna look
at me and they're gonna hit meup because I'm in the area full of
games, right, so they don'tcare if I tell them, oh,
no, I'm not from nowhere,they don't care about that, right,
I mean, depending on who theperson is too, because you know,
some people might just be like whateverand let you go, and some people,

(18:21):
to put in mind, be likenot fuck that and still fuck you
up or shoot you whatever you so, if it depends, So regardless of
my status, I'm living in thisarea, so I have to be mindful
of where I am at, youknow what I'm saying, Like, like
I gotta I gotta understand that ifI walk into this building, if I

(18:44):
drive into this street, I gottaunderstand what's there and what are the possibilities,
you know what I mean. Soregardless, I was mindful of that.
So my father he was, Imean, right there on a court
street, which is a whole,it's a it's another game right on that

(19:07):
street. It's another game dying thestreet but I'm not that far away,
like where I grew up, soonly a few blocks away. So I
get out of area, like that'sthe first place I go, because when
my mother leaves to Texas, Imean, I got nowhere else to go,
right, So I go straight tomy dad's and I'm staying at my

(19:29):
dad. I'm sleeping on the floorin the living room. And I didn't
have a job. So, youknow, the very first thing as soon
as I get to to LA's likelooking for a job. And one of
my one of my homeboys, dudesthat I grew up with, he tells
me he lived I worked at theStay Smarter Final distribution center and they're always

(19:52):
hiring, so you should come checkit out. So I did, right.
I got to la in like theend of November, but all the
beginning of November. I got therein the beginning of November, and by
the time I got this job,it was like the end of November.
It was like right after right after. I gotta tive right away. It

(20:15):
was it only took me a coupleof weeks to get a job, so
I won't even I got this jobat the distribution center, so I started
getting some money so then that's whenI tell my sister. You know,
my sister lived in Hollywood her howher place was crowded too, you know,
because she she lived with her husbandand three kids and her husband's brother
who was stayed in here and theretoo. But I told my sister and

(20:38):
I lived, let me stay overthere, and I helped you out.
You know, I'll give you somemoney and I'll take care of kids while
you go to work because my jobbeing started till the afternoon, you know.
So she said, yeah, butI wanted to leave because it was
more quiet on that on that side. I mean, there's still gangs there,

(20:59):
you know, there were still andthere, but on that street that
she lived on, those are prettycalm street. There's a very pretty quiet
street, you know. So Icould I could go over there, I
could park my car, I couldwalk to the to the apartment without no
problems, right because there's nobody onthe street looking to see who pops up
or what. You know, likethere's really there was really nobody there.

(21:22):
A couple of streets away, yeahthere was guys, but on that street
was it was a lot more saferthan where I was at with my dad's
because that's a whole like right basicallyright right right where my deadly and right
in front, right behind they're there. There's guys there, you know.
So I would have to constantly facethat they have their math on on online

(21:47):
that show like call the like it'slike a Mapootballs Angels, but then it
I's like highlighted all over like it'ssupposed to show the game. Like you
said that those did they change allthe time and stuff too, probably right
for the most part, you know, like there's been areas, like certain
areas have been established for a prettylong time. But then there's there's wars,
you know, and at the timeof this crime, it was a

(22:11):
very very serious ward you know,like people were dropping then like a lot
of guys that I know got killed, you know. So it's I mean
that's why I say, like thatstreet alone and and Wimmen that wasn't even
like the main location, right,the actual the main location was actually on

(22:34):
Union on six Communion, which islike a couple of blocks away. But
you know, Wimmer was a veryactive street because it was an easy target
for the for the other gangs toto basically become Sixth Street just go down
the block. If you're trying togo to to Union, it was a

(22:56):
lot more difficult for them because you'rewas up the hill, right, So
it's a lot more dangerous for themto come into that to the street.
Like they have to go up thehill. There's always guys. So you're
trying to come up in here andtrying to kill somebody, you're gonna risk

(23:17):
getting shot yourself in a whitmer.It was a little bit easier to just
go straight through, you know.So I think that's why it was a
lot more shootings on that street.Those guys were constantly coming. They were
constantly coming, man, constantly constantly. You know. Uh, right before

(23:37):
this this happened, a couple ofguys got killed. Right after this happened,
a couple of guys got killed.You know. It's just a lot
of a lot of guys that Iknow got murdered. That's that's been called
like the most active area of LosAngeles, the highest the highest number of
crime rate, the highest number oforders. You'll have sixty seconds, maning,

(24:06):
you're not an easy three Yeah,yeah, Look, tell a man
no trouble. I don't want beastman, I just want vibe, big
man. Like me, No needfor the telephone hide, I got too
much getting online. Who want rulein denimals like wrong moves, but they're
gonna ride. No