Fighting back against gangs

GRANDVIEW — Pablo Casillas doesn’t need to hear much from his father. That’s good, because Sergio Casillas doesn’t say much.

The 17-year-old boy calls his father, a dairy employee with a knack for construction, a “thinker.”

The lessons from his father sink in during the quiet times — listening to music late at night and installing windows side by side: “Always be your own self, don’t follow the crowd.” “You got to be able to take care of yourself before you take care of somebody else.”

Pablo, a former gang affiliate who is now leading efforts to curb Lower Valley gang activity, credits the soft-spoken wisdom of his parents for his turnaround. Their type of steady guidance is missing for too many kids, he believes.

His voice is one of many in Grandview, where gang shootings this year have teenagers begging for more parental supervision.

“A lot has to do with parents working all the time and not having time for their kids,” Pablo says.

Kids are saying this. Not pastors, not school counselors, not Focus on the Family.

Listen to these Grandview High School students:

“It’s a lack of good parenting skills,” says T.J. Hecker, a senior.

“I think the parents need to be more involved with their kids,” says Rocio Jacobo, a senior.

“My dad has always told me I can do anything I set my mind to,” says junior Maria Orduno.

The experts — adults — agree.

Confident, loving parents are the most important ingredient in steering kids away from gangs, says Detective Ricardo Abarca, the gang specialist at the Grandview Police Department.

“We focus so much on the kids, but it really comes down to the parents,” Abarca says.

But parents face an uphill battle, in Grandview and across the Yakima Valley.

Many work long days in the farm fields and can’t get home early to attend, say, a teacher’s conference or workshop about recognizing gang behavior. If they don’t speak English, they may not understand school discipline policies and the juvenile justice system. Some are afraid to discipline their kids for fear of having them taken away by the state.

Kids often know the system better than their parents and take advantage of it, threatening to turn in their parents for abuse if they don’t get their way, says Alex Santillanes, president of Barrios Unidos Yakima Valley, a gang-intervention nonprofit funded mostly by the Catholic Diocese. Pablo Casillas is the founder of a Grandview student chapter of the organization.

Parents sometimes fall for it.

Others are simply afraid of their own kids. In extreme cases, gang members have drawn guns on parents or stepparents “just to show them who’s ‘bad,’” says Santillanes.

Barrios Unidos, police departments and school districts up and down the Valley hold seminars to teach parents to recognize gang symbols, such as clothing and logos. They invite managers from the state’s Child Protective Services or juvenile justice officers.

The Grandview School District is integrating gang-intervention techniques into the conversation at parent meetings and in school activities. They hold most of them in the winter when agricultural workers have more time off.

“We try to do as much outreach as we can,” says Matt Mallery, executive director for state and federal programs for the Grandview School District.

Some cities have tried to add parent culpability rules to city code. A year ago, Grandview added a clause that made it a crime for parents to allow their children to skip school. Police issued 19 citations and put one mother in jail.

However, in April, a Yakima County District Court judge struck down Grandview’s ordinance as unconstitutional because terms were too broadly defined and state laws already cover truancy. City officials are reworking it.

When police see a kid running around with gangs or fighting, Abarca talks to the parents right away. Sometimes it helps, sometimes it doesn’t.

“Does it get frustrating sometimes?” he asks. “Yes.”

Gangs offer a promise of street reputation, parties, drugs and a life free of rules. Those things appeal to kids, even kids with strong families.

Some parents do everything right and still lose their kids to gangs, says Ed Radder, Sunnyside police chief.

“There are other parents,” he says, “that just don’t care, or actively support their kids’ role” in gangs.

After-school activities, law enforcement, and having a local economy that provides good-paying jobs for parents and kids are part of the solution to keeping children out of trouble, Radder says.

Pablo Casillas’ parents, Sergio and Maria, don’t sugar-coat it. They flat out blame the gang problems of the Valley on bad parenting — “a lack of love, support and communication,” Maria says.

Pablo became involved in gangs as a middle school student. He thought it was cool and got a rush from fighting. Other kids did it, so he wanted to try it, too.

“Trying different masks,” he calls it in hindsight.

His parents noticed his bruises. They noticed how he and his friends all wore the same bandanas and color of clothing. They noticed when rivals followed him home from school to call him out for a fight.

One day, a rival gang member showed off his gun, scaring Pablo into a closer relationship with his folks.

Nothing changed overnight, but Maria and Sergio Casillas were relentless in the attention they gave their son.

“Always ask, ‘What are you doing?’ What did you do?’ ‘What are your plans for later?’ ” Maria says through an interpreter.

She insisted the family sit at the dinner table together each night. On her rare days off, she would take Pablo and his two younger brothers to a park. If they misbehaved, she and Sergio took away video games or grounded the boys for a weekend.

Pablo didn’t always like it, but he wanted to please his parents, gradually believing he could trust them more than his fellow gang members.
The Casillases do not buy work as an excuse.

They both work for Lower Valley dairies. Maria works many graveyard shifts; Sergio averages 12 hours a day some weeks. They have to put in a lot of hours to afford the rent for their modest, small home on Forsell Road west of Grandview.

But when Pablo broke up with a longtime girlfriend recently, Maria took time off. Not everybody can do that, she admits, but everyone should make good use of the time they have.

Even if they have only a minute break, they should use it to call their child to say, “I love you,” Maria says.

“Let it be the best, show them that they really do care,” she says.

• Ross Courtney can be reached at 930-8798 or rcourtney@yakimaherald.com.

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