Prison gang
A prison gang is an unofficial term used to denote any type of gang activity in prisons and correctional facilities. The official term for this is Security Threat Group, or STG.
The concept for the "Security Threat Group" name is to take away the recognition and publicity that the term "gang" connotates when referring to people who have an interest in undermining the system.
Most prison gangs do more than offer simple protection for their members. Most often, prison gangs are responsible for any drug, tobacco, or alcohol handling inside correctional facilities. Furthermore, many prison gangs involve themselves in prostitution, assaults, kidnappings, and murders. Prison gangs often seek to intimidate the other inmates, pressuring them to relinquish their food and other resources.
Prison gangs can also be responsible for laundering money from outside gangs, usually the "free world" branches of the same gangs "on the inside".
Most correctional facilities have policies prohibiting the formation of prison gangs; however, many prison gangs continue to operate with impunity. Many members are serving life imprisonment (a few are on Death Row) for various crimes, thus they have no incentive to leave a gang or to integrate with the general prison population.
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Common prison gangs
- Aryan Brotherhood - A white supremacist prison gang, the inside equivalent of the Aryan Nation.
- La Eme - The Mexican Mafia. "Eme" is the letter "M" in Spanish. The mexican mafia are composed mostly of hispanics, although some black and caucasian members exist. The Mexican Mafia and the Aryan Brotherhood are allies and work together to control prostitution, drug running, weapons, and "hits" or murders.
- La Nuestra Familia - "Our Family," another mostly hispanic prison gang that is constantly at war with La Eme.
- The Texas Syndicate - A mostly Texas-based prison gang that includes mostly hispanic members, but does allow caucasian and black members.
- Most African-American prison gangs retain their street gang names and associations. These commonly include Rollin' sets (named after streets, i.e. Rollin 30's, Rollin' 40's, etc.) that can identify with either Blood or Crip affiliations.
Blood in, Blood out
Most prison gangs follow the policy of "blood in - blood out."
- Blood In - This generally means that to get into a prison gang, one has to spill someone else's blood. Most often this requires a murder, although occasionally it can be only an aggravated assault. The idea is that law enforcement officials will refuse to carry out murder or aggravated assaults, therefore allowing the prison gangs to remain uninfiltrated.
- Blood Out - Most prison gangs are for life. Blood Out refers to trying to get out of a prison gang. Most often, this means the member will be killed, although occasionally it can be a severe beating. In reality, for many prison gang members, once they are released from prison, if they choose not to continue in any prison or outside gang activity, they can usually walk away and not associate with any other member.
Identification
Many small prison gangs require members to recognize every other member of the organization. However, in larger prison gangs such as La Eme, the use of gang tattoos are used for identification. The tattoo must be earned and anyone found with a prison gang tattoo that they didn't earn will usually have it removed, commonly by cutting it out or by using an iron. Because tattooing is used for prison gang identification, many prisons have prohibited tattooing while inside the facility and issue severe penalties for any tattoo equipment or signs of recent tattooing.
Latent function
Christian Parenti argues in his book "Lockdown America" that prison gangs serve a convenient function for the prison establishment and guards: they help regulate rogue and rebellious elements within the prison population without intervention from prison authorities. Parenti sees the repression dished out by gangs on non-affiliated prisoners as a latent function of prison gangs. Thus, gangs are often more-or-less tolerated by prison administrators due to the side-benefits they create. Prison rape is also consciously ignored by guards and authorities for this same functionality.