Danger and Trust: San Quentin, the Mexican Mafia and the Chicano Movement

Free Preview: Danger and Trust: San Quentin, the Mexican Mafia and the Chicano Movement, is a Memoir I completed in 2009. When I began my anthropological research among Chicano prisoners at San Quentin Prison in 1966, never in my wildest dreams did I imagine what frequently unforseen things would occur over the next 31 years—inside San Quentin for 20 months and “on the streets” (outside of prison) in California until 1997. Some of those unpredictable, almost incredible things included: —Reaching the ultimate depths of the prisoners’ own illegal and rule-breaking culture via the secretive—potentially deadly if crossed—Mexican Mafia. —Being pulled into activities of the Chicano movement on the streets in California—thus expanding the scope of my research. —Being angry and outraged that some of the staff members and administrators who are hired to manage the ideal prison system routinely ignore those ideals, mistreat the prisoners and hide their abusive acts from the public, including legislators. —Being menacingly threatened by San Quentin administrators with prosecution by the Marin County District Attorney for revealing hidden staff secrets to the media; the Warden hoped my prosecution would lead to my being sent to prison with a number behind my name. Then, after strip searching me, angrily kicking me out of San Quentin. —Being repeatedly set up by prison administrators or their representatives, to commit felonies—which I discovered and avoided. —Giving shocking, revealing testimony to the California State Criminal Procedure Committee in Sacramento about facts that were hidden from the committee and other outsiders by prison administrators and California Department of Corrections (CDC). —Discovering the true identity of under-cover agent-provocateurs who failed to provoke me to do things I would never have imagined doing, yet not revealing my discovery while I warily continued dealing with them; they never admitted their true identity to me. —Being saddened and outraged—even though I understood the need for the FBI in our free society—that the FBI would attempt to set me up to commit felonies, destroy my livelihood, and ruin my family. —Having officers of the Brown Berets and Black Panthers in my home in Berkeley. —Being fired from Cabrillo College for daring to criticize California Department of Corrections and protesting the U.S. bombing of Cambodia. —Writing a still-unique and still largely relevant, popular ethnography, Chicano Prisoners: The Key to San Quentin, that would remain in print for twenty-eight years. —Living under a death threat against me, my wife and our two children for six weeks. —Refusing to be pulled into becoming an advisor for Edward James Olmos’ 1992 movie, American Me, which depicted some of the brutal reality faced by Chicano prisoners in prison—unfortunately one scene depicting the rape of a Mexican Mafia member was blatantly unrealistic; three advisors for the film were later murdered by the infuriated Mexican Mafia. —Refusing to testify in a 1997 case against 12 Mexican Mafia members who were convicted by the U.S. government of racketeering, conspiracy, murder and extortion charges carried out in a bid to extend their influence beyond California prisons—thus I avoided my untimely death by the Mexican Mafia. In this memoir, I will elaborate on the above-noted events and some of the many other things that occurred during the 31 years that I was involved with Chicano prisoners inside San Quentin Prison and with the Chicano movement on the streets in California. The late 1960’s and the following years were an exciting time in California, especially in Berkeley, and the San Francisco and Los Angeles areas: The Chicano movement. The Brown Berets. The so-called “race riots” at San Quentin. The Black Panthers. The Free Speech Movement at U.C. Berkeley. The Berkeley Barb underground newspaper. The Peace and Freedom Party. The war in Vietnam. Numerous manifestations of social protest in California during those years. Chicano Prisoners: The Key to San Quentin is an ethnography which was published in 1974 and remained in print until 2004. Originally I wrote this book as R. Theodore Davidson, but since then I have used my less formal name, Ted Davidson, for works that I write. Chicano Prisoners became a classic in ethnography, describing the salient features and hidden depths of the prisoners’ own culture—very much as the prisoners themselves understand their largely illegal and/or rule-breaking culture. The book is truly unique in anthropology and penology; almost the entire book has been included in two larger works—on Urban Anthropology and on Penology. It helps the reader understand why prisoners think and act as they do in their culture and particularly gives insight into the behavior of Chicano prisoners, and much more. Parts of my ethnography are dated, but surprisingly much is the same—still being of value to those who now are interested in California prisons, Chicano prisoners, the birth and early development of the Mexican Mafia, types of prisoners, differences in behavior between Black and Chicano prisoners, failed efforts to apply anthropological knowledge to bring about legitimate change in our society, and much more. When reading Danger and Trust: San Quentin, the Mexican Mafia and the Chicano Movement, readers who can find a used copy of my now out of print ethnography, Chicano Prisoners: The Key to San Quentin, will find it quite useful to read parts or all of the ethnography to enhance their knowledge about how I did my fieldwork for this longitudinal study of Chicanos—in prison and on the streets. Personally, I understand the insidious, relentless spread of the increasingly violent Mexican Mafia from California prisons to many other parts of the United States. Unfortunately, the spread of the Mexican Mafia is a very real crisis in the making, recognized by authorities who are unable to stop it. Often authorities unwittingly enhance the spread of the Mexican Mafia by convicting its members of Federal crimes and then sending them to Federal prisons in other states—across our nation. From their own perspective, members of the Mexican Mafia see themselves as successful in the way they have adapted to and are able to use the larger U.S. culture to their advantage. Ted Davidson