Gang tattoos lead to jail confrontations
“Before I went to state jail, I knew that two of these tattoos were affiliated with gangs. The dog paw print is for the Bloods. The star is for Tango Blast. But I was never gang affiliated. That’s never been my M.O.
“They told me, ‘You know what this means, right? If you get these, and if you ever get put down, they’re going to take them from you.’
“The paw print is for a dog I had named Diablo. Someone shot and killed him. I had another dog named Ava. Someone ran over her. My people are real dog lovers. That’s why I got the tattoo. And the star, I just liked it. It looked cool.
“So I knew going in that I’d have to fight for the right to keep them. When I got there, I decided to find out who the boss of each gang was, and talk to them. I told them, ‘Look, I’m not gang affiliated. But you’re not taking my tattoo. Whatever we’ve got to do, we can rock and roll.’
“What they did was put me in a restroom with three other guys, and we had to fight for 30 seconds. Then a second group of guys came in for another 30 seconds. I had to take a beating for carrying that tattoo without being gang affiliated.
“I fought back. Because if you just sit there and get your ass beat, they’ll know you’re weak. That’s called a heart check. I had to do that for one gang, and then the same thing for the other gang.
“The way they put it to me was, you knew what you had to do to get that mark off you. Now they let every group in the pod know, hey, he already got his 60 seconds. So anybody else who sees me with that tattoo, and they try to shake my hand but I don’t shake properly, they’re not going to look at me no crazy way. They’re going to be like, OK, he’s the guy from that pod who already got his 60 seconds.
“To be honest, it went a lot better than I thought it would. Some people were like, ‘You just got in here. Why are you already fighting?’ Well, because I got these tattoos, and I’d rather get it all out of the way early on.
“Although I was just a young guy, I was able to handle my business. People came up to me after that with a lot more respect. It made my time go by a lot easier.”
— Sergio Yepez
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