Why Do We Bang? A Look Into The Street Gangs of Lo

[DoubleOGJohnson]

 

Today Los Santos, San Andreas is a city of various turfs and streetgangs. But how and why did it happen and where did the gangs emerge from? A former member of the Grove Street Family gang named Brian "G-Locc" Stone delves into Los Santos' hidden past.....

 

Brian "G-Locc" Stone: My name is Brian Stone, people call me G-Locc and I was born 1973 in Los Santos at Saints General Hospital. I grew up in the notorious neighborhood of Ganton. My gang affliliation was Grove Street Family. To me gangs were the thing to do in this city, but I rarely if ever really wondered how it all started. It was there before I got there and I just fell into that lifestyle without rhyme or reason. As a 34 year old man however I began to ask questions and sought the origins to the gang problem in Los Santos. Where did it start? How did it start? How could it end? My journey into history begins on the street I was born and raised....Grove Street.

 

(Triple OG Sweet Leader Of GSF Speaks)

 

G-Locc: Tell the kids how it started mayne.

 

OG Sweet: Grove Street Family was founded in 1969 as Orange Grove Family. We originally got our name from Grove Street in Ganton. Back in the 60’s it was named Orange Grove Street. That’s why you see OGF tags up around the city, that’s from the original gang. The founders of OGF were Fred “Big Devil” Harris and Glen “Lil Devil” Harris. The Devil Brothers founded Orange Grove Family and by the 70’s they were all over the town. In the 80’s, Orange Grove Street was changed to Grove Street by the city, so that’s when the Devil Brothers dropped the “O” from “GF” and we’ve been Grove Street every since. The Devil Brothers both died in the early 80’s and that’s when I became the leader.

 

G-Locc: When did you become Grove Street and how did yall get your colors?

 

OG Sweet: I joined in 1975. As far as our color goes, older members told me that at the meeting at the Devil Brother’s house when they were creating OGF that there was a huge debate over the color of the gang. Some wanted it orange, others wanted it green. The original OGF members decided on green because they liked to hang out at this local bar on Grove Street called the Green Bottle. It’s probably the most famous place to Ganton locals. At night time the Green Bottle has green lights, and those lights illuminated the surrounding area and made the streets and the clothes you wore look green if you were near the lights. So Lil Devil noticed this and decided to keep the theme since the most popular place on Grove Street at the time had a green theme.

 

G-Locc: People see GSF throwing up up the three fingers and the “b”. What’s the origin of that?

 

OG Sweet: The three fingers represent O-G-F, the original three initials of the gang. We throw the “B” up because we always had a family theme since the beginning. So when you threw the “B” up you was basically saying that you are one of the brothers of the Family. We’re all brothers and sisiters.

 

G-Locc: A lot of people don’t know about gang history before the late 60’s? What was going on before then?

 

OG Sweet: From what I was told, blacks came to Los Santos in bulk from the 20’s to the 40’s. We moved into neighborhoods on the East Side like Jefferson, Idlewood, Glen Park, Willowfield, East Beach, and Ganton. The blacks founded gangs to protect themselves in these neighborhoods from the whites. And the gang before OGF out here was called Ganton Family. There were Families before the Grove. Once the whites were leaving in the 50’s, Ganton Family fought the Bouncers from Idlewood and the Street Boys from Willowfield. As OGF replaced Ganton Family and OGF grew and expanded, OGF swallowed up some of the Bouncers and Street Boys and some of them became Orange Grove Family around 1970. The rest of the Street Boys and Bouncers refused to come under OGF and they got together and founded the Ballas in 1971.

 

[next part G-Locc visits Balla OG Charles “Sharky” Clark]

 

[Vanilla Shake]

Um, Big Devil and Lil' Devil were killed during the time that CJ was in Liberty City, between 1987 and 1992, not in the early 80's.

[DoubleOGJohnson]

G-Locc: So who really founded the Ballas? And were you part of the formation?

 

OG Sharky: It was basically a bunch of members from the Street Boys and Bouncer gangs that didn’t want to turn OGF. The actually leaders of those two gangs defected and took up positions in OGF. One man didn’t create the Ballas, it was a joint venture in every sense of the word. And yes I was apart of the creation, I grew up in Willowfield making me a Street Boy. I like many others believed that Orange Grove Family were kind of bullying the smaller gangs like us around to joining them. You gotta remember that OGF outnumbered us Bouncers and Street Boys by 1970. To some of us, we didn’t see a difference between Ganton Family and Orange Grove Family. And if Ganton Family were our sworn enemies so would their descendants be.

 

G-Locc: Explain further how the Ballas broke off from the Bouncers and Street Boys.

 

OG Sharky: Both of our gangs were sent an ambassador from OGF, and the ambassador was a guy named OG Tony. It was supposedly Lil Devil’s idea to bring the Street Boys and Bouncers under OGF. So there was a meeting between all three gangs and right then and there the Street Boys and Bouncers became OGF. When news came out to everybody else we were like, “hell no!” So the members who opposed the merge had our own meeting out in Idlewood. From that meeting the Ballas emerged, and three sets were born. They were the Front Yard Ballas, Kilo Tray Ballas, and Rollin Heights Ballas. I was apart of the Rollin Heights Ballas.

 

G-Locc: Where does the Balla culture originate from? I mean things like the colors, speech, gang signs, etc.

 

OG Sharky: Well at that time two of the neutral colors in our part of Los Santos were red and blue. So to show that we were not connected with OGF but at the same time that we were not neutral since we took the stance to oppose them, we put red and blue together. Put red and blue together, you get purple forever. Then we came up with the concept that we were gonna be a organization of connected sets. So it became customary for Ballas to greet each other by making the letter “C” with their hands. It was to show that even though we were from different sets, we were all consolidated. That’s what the C stood for, plus OGF were already throwing the “B” up so that was not an option. All us Ballas threw the same gang sign up because we were all connected.

 

G-Locc: A lot has been said about Ballas on the East Side, but give me info on the Ballas from the West Side.

 

OG Sharky: There’s Rollin Heights Ballas, Front Yard Ballas, and Temple Drive Ballas on the Southwest Side, then there’s Temple Drives in Temple. The Temple Drives are purely a West Side set, the others came over from the East Side. A lot of people look at the East Side as the main hoods, but the West Side keeps the Ballas strong after how much GSF has done to us on the East Side. It’s nowhere where it used to be.

 

G-Locc: So what is your unique place in Balla lore?

 

OG Sharky: I gained my respect because I actually founded the Rollin Heights Ballas in Jefferson. The Rollin Heights sub hood I was from was overran by OGF so that's when I moved to Jefferson. The street I lived on was San Pesso Street. There was a gang in Jefferson called the Jefferson Dukes. The Dukes soon found themselves at odds with OGF so I got together with the Duke leaders and after awhile I convinced them to become apart of the Ballas. The Dukes dropped their name and became Rollin Heights Ballas. Soon we were on every block in Jefferson and Jefferson became a stronghold. Jefferson was one of the few neighborhoods to be under 100% control of the Ballas.

 

G-Locc: What put the Ballas on top of Grove Street in the late 80’s and early 90’s?

 

OG Sharky: The drugs did...absolutely!

 

[next G-Locc speaks to Truth who sheds light on the Crack Epedemic Conspiracy in Los Santos]

[mark-2007]

Cool, I like it! It's different from everything else 'cos it's like a fictional history lesson with interviews and stuff. However, I think you should try make the people speak like they might do with slang and also in the next chapter The Truth should speak like he's high.

[DoubleOGJohnson]

CIA+CRACK COCAINE = LOS SANTOS?

 

G-Locc: So tell people who you really are?

 

Turth: I won't give my name so just call me Truth. I have studied San Andreas and the goverment for most of my life. I've studied the government through all of its conspiracies and controversies, one of them was the drug trade man.

 

G-Locc: How did the Crack Epedimic change LS?

 

Truth: It armed the gangs and the Crack Epedimic put the Ballas and Vagos at the top of the food chain. When the Ballas were making money, Grove Street was not dealing so their power decreased while the Ballas increased. That’s when you saw a multitude of Ballas taking Grove Street hoods until Ganton was the only GSF hood left by 1989.

 

G-Locc: What man is responsible for a lot of the epedimic?

 

Truth: There was a guy named Eddy “Boulevard” Davis who was the biggest drug dealer in LS during the 1980’s. “Boulevard” Eddy Davis was a Front Yard Balla member from Willowfield, and lived near South Boulevard where he got his nickname from. “Boulevard” Eddy Davis began as a small time peddler in Willowfield then after hooking up with the Nicaraguans, he expanded operations.

 

G-Locc: What did this expansion consist of?

 

Truth: “Boulevard” Eddy Davis was able to push his drugs outside of the corners of Willowfield with his Nicaraguan connections. Plus he received the drugs in large amounts, more than he had before. “Boulevard” Eddy Davis transportated drugs in and out of Los Santos through South Boulevard, thus the name “Boulevard” Eddy Davis. He also was alledged to have spread remnants of his drug empire into San Fierro, Fort Carson, El Quebrados, Bayside, and Las Barrancas. Crack cocaine was a big part of the Ballas spreading all over San Andreas because “Boulevard” Eddy Davis sent Ballas to sale drugs for him in these cities.

 

G-Locc: Was there a link between Eddy Davis and the CIA?

 

Truth: It’s alledged that “Boulevard” Eddy Davis funneled money to Nicaraguans revoluationaries called the Contras and that the CIA approved of it. In fact, a lot of the speculation is aided by the fact that “Boulevard” Eddy Davis was not arrested until after his Nicaraguan connection to the Contras expired and he would have been useless to the CIA. Before then, he was unchecked and untouched.

 

G-Locc: So why didn’t the CIA stop Eddy Davis?

 

Truth: A lot consider this could be contributed to a racist conspiracy to flood the black community with drugs. The CIA was not powerless, and they know who brings the drugs in America and San Andreas. That is why many believe the CIA is behind it all since they know all that is going on.

 

G-Locc: How did Eddy Davis impact the 1990’s in Los Santos?

 

Truth: From the ashes of “Bouelvard” Eddy Davis came the Loco Syndicate. The Loco Syndicate was responsible for distributing cocaine on the streets of San Fierro and Los Santos. The Loco Syndicate included the San Fierro Rifa, Vagos, and Ballas collective together. The Loco Syndicate was led by Ray “Jizzy B” Wallace and Thomas “T-Bone” Mendez. The Loco Syndicate was infiltrated by the CIA and folded after all the leaders were killed. After the Loco Syndicate faded, Big Smoke became the main man in San Andreas’ drug trade. He worked for the corrupt C.R.A.S.H. unit of the LSPD and once again we see apart of the system acting shady. That's why many black men do not trust the system in Los Santos and that led to the riots in 1992 that tore the city apart for a time.

 

G-Locc: Is there a solution to the drug problem?

 

Truth: We need straight forward policy enforcement by the government. No more secrets, no more bullsh*t.

[Coral_City]

Very interesting - very unique from all the rest. I like it. Although, I don't think The Truth would be down for any of that government stuff.