Nuestra Familia/Nortenos, part 1: Video Series

From The History Channel's "Gangland" series, all portions uploaded to YouTube by Xcalifas 4. You can buy this series for home viewing under more comfortable seating arrangements.

This series concentrates mainly on the "Black Widow Investigation" and the work of one informant.
This means they've really only had one informant of this value. That said, think how many man-hours went into this huge investigation. Most of it unsung, unheralded, and requiring immense focus and research.

Video 1, Introduction. "Blood in, blood out." Nuestra Familia formed in 1968, after "The War of the Shoes."

Video 2:  See the 'wila' or kite, the way letters are passed in prison. Military structure of NF. Prison as a desirable or admirable rite of passage. Environmental coercion in prison and on the street.

Video 3:
"Gang Taxes" on every illegal operation on their turf. Unsaid is that extortion also works against the legitimate businesses too.

Video 4:
High publicity grab of Northern gangs into the Nortenos via music. "G.U.N."  Operation Black Widow.
For awhile you can/could listen to this music on MySpace, the Generations of United Nortenos page.  Give it a try for "114% Buster". (A Scrappa? No, I can't trust her. I'm just a 114% Bustah.)

Video 5: The end of Operation Black Widow. The change in the power structure at Pelican Bay is lightly mentioned, but the real (short-term?) consequence for the Department of Corrections at P-Bay will have been an increase in violence, as other gangs try to rush into the power vacuum.