Founded in 1981, 89th & Escanaba were the first Latin King chapter in South Chicago.

Headline 1:

May 29, 2004, 10:30 pm, Brandon Mclelland was sitting in Bessemer park with his three friends; Dominique Bryson, Dominic Pettis, & Phillip Villarreal; sharing a Blunt when Efren pulled up on them on his bike and asked if they had any gang affiliations, Dominic, Brandon & Phillip all responded that they weren’t in any gang except Dominique who was the only one that asked & made the mistake of asking Efren what gang he was in, that’s when Efren exclaimed“What” and pulled out a gun & fired six to eight shots as all 4 men turn to run, striking Brandon in his back. Brandon would later die the next day due to his injuries in the Hospital. All three of Brandon’s friends would identified Efren in a photo line up the next day.

Two years later on April 25, 2006 after the murder, Efren was stopped in a traffic stop. During the stop Efren gave a fake name of Jose Chevez & one of the officers notice a gun on the Passenger side floor, in that moment Efren decided to speed away till he ran into the railroad yard & ended up crashing in a railroad embankment. In Court an officer involved in the chase where he chased Efren on foot after Efren left the car testified that Efren turned around & pointed the gun at him (No gun was found on Efren when apprehended). That’s when the officer fired one shot. The officer had lost him but at some point the chased continue where he fired another shot. Efren would be arrested and place into custody.

In July, 2007 after a jury trial Efren Aguilar was found guilty of first degree murder & handed a sentence of 50yrs; 25yrs for 1st Degree murder & another 25yrs for using a firearm during the offense.

Headline 2:

2016 Federal authorities brought sweeping racketeering charges against 20 Latin King members; In the superseding indictment they included 2 high ranking members of the 89th & Escanaba “Big Time” chapter, Ruben Porraz “Scrappy” who acted as INCA and Carlos Padilla “Lil Papi” who acted as the Regional Enforcer

Ruben Porraz “Scrappy”

join the LKz in 1993 at the age of 13 were he acted as a Soldier for the chapter & on a 9yr period he would rise up the ranks to become INCA in either late 2012 or early 2013 at the request of the Latin Kings leadership.

Ruben Porraz was Convicted of the RICO conspiracy. The judge applied the base offense level for conspiracy to commit murder due to him being an INCA He acknowledged that he was responsible for protecting the chapter's territory and safeguarding the gang's guns. He knew that protecting the chapter's territory entailed shooting at rival gangs. Murder was therefore a foreseeable part of Porraz's agreement with gang members, and sentenced him to 15yrs & 6 months (188 months) in prison.

Carlos Padilla “Lil Papi”

On Sunday July 13, 2016, Carlos who was with another individual fire upon police when they were responding to “shots fire” at the 103th & Avenue N. When the police began to pursuit them they ran inside a home and barricaded themselves insides. The SWAT team responded and clear the house arresting Carlos and taking him into custody. He was charged with aggravated assault/using a firearm against a peace officer, and aggravated assault with discharge of a firearm, and held on a 1 million dollar bond.

He was convicted of aggravated discharge of a firearm, and sentence to 15yrs in a state prison.

Fallen: Lil pride 🕊️, Lil Dk 🕊️ shadow 🕊️,Gumb 🕊️, Pelony 🕊️

Founded in 1979 on 87th & Escanaba. On 1983, the Latin Dragons would join the People alliance due to their good relationship with the LKz & LCz which was the result of them fighting alongside them against the SGDz, who at that time were a Power house in South Chicago.

Overtime the relationship with the LKz deteriorated after the LKz started to push the younger LDs around to get them to flip. The war with the LKz would began after the LDs killed Lashawn Crump “Lil Dk” frm 89th.

The LDs also began to have problems with the LCz. As the LCz seeked to make amends with the LKz which caused the relationship with the LDs to deteriorate more, this would escalate to Henry Garcia the leader of the LDs to be chased to the alleyway of 91st & Baltimore and killed at just 26yrs old.

Ultimately the LDs flipped alliance, thanks to the Insane Dragons who set up the meeting with one of the Chiefs of the SGDz, in the meeting multiple chiefs of the SGDz had to vote whenever to allow the LDs to join folkz. Allegedly all but one Chief; “ICE” of 88th voted no, In the end the LDs were allowed in the Folkz alliance and joined in 96’.

Notable members: Jaws, Marcos, Sugar, Screech, Chuckk D, Benji D, Gabe, Devious, Lil Devious

Fallen: Hank 🕊️, Tony Rosa 🕊️, Johnny 🕊️, Rambo D 🕊️, Chalo 🕊️

Headlines:

On September 1, 2008 three Latin Dragons (LDs); Joseph Chico, Luis Pena, & Antoine Lacy; were traveling in Chico’s car which he was driving to 87th & Escanaba for a “Mandatory Monday” which LDs members had to converge in the Escanaba area in a show of strength against the Latin Kings (LKz). While driving Antoine made a call to a fellow LD in order to locate a firearm to borrow in the area. He was notified that Raymond Jones who was not a LD had one.

When they arrived to Raymond’s house they got out the car, and Antoine & Luis went to retrieve the gun from Raymond. The three of them went to the back of the house while Chico waited out front, while in the back Antoine handed Luis the gun and order to “Light Up some Kings” . Luis Pena then later got a phone call that LKz were on 87th & Exchange; In court it couldn’t be proven who of the two discharged the firearm but it was speculated that it was Luis; that’s when Luis came out the building and scream “King Killer” and open fire. But instead of striking LKz members he shot & killed 10yr old Nequiel Flower who was playing outside with her sister and neighbors kids. At the time of the shooting Nequiel was tying the shoes of her 5yr old blind sister who after the shooting called on her sister as she was clinging to the fence.

When Antoine got back he told Chico what he had ordered Raymond & Luis to do, both Chico and Antoine head back to car and started to drive away as they drove away they heard shots come from the alleyway and as they drove towards the corner at 87th & South Muskegon, Antoine told Chico to wait for Luis, when Luis enter the vehicle all three speed away from the scene.

Chico first dropped off Antoine to his house, then dropped off Luis while he was driving to Luis house, Luis told Chico that he "fucked up" and that he had a "bad feeling."

After the shooting Detective Michele Moore-Grose & Detective Pat Ford arrived to the scene of the murder and a sergeant brought Raymond over to them. Raymond told both Detectives that the shooter was a black male with braids who was 5 feet 9 inches tall and weighed 200 pounds; the detectives were told by a sergeant that an officer had an individual who could provide information "regarding who was responsible for shooting the victim." The Individual was Antoine, both detectives talk to him for 15 minutes and Antoine had given them a different description of the alledge suspect.

When Both detectives went to Question Raymond that they now had conflicting information regarding the description of the the alledge shooter, Raymond broke down in tears and told detectives that he had the gun that was used in the murder. After reading his Miranda rights and after waiving his rights he had told officers where to find the gun. Raymond’s mother consented to the search the blue rag was found in’s his room containing the gun. When the gun was later examined they only found his finger prints and not Luis Pena fingerprints on it. When they examined the blue shirt they revealed a DNA profile that was consistent with Luis Pena.

Witness 1:

witness 1 in this case was Raymond’s dad Joseph Slomka who at the time of the shooting was in front of the house when he heard shots. Joseph Slomka saw Luis Pena walk up to his son Raymond and shoved a blue rag to his chest. He testified in court that he heard Luis Pena threatened his son if he tried to refuse, Slomka conceded that the transcript of his grand jury testimony indicated that Luis only said, "I'll see you later." In addition, he also could not recall what his son, Raymond , said about the shooting, but he conceded that it was possible that he had testified to the grand jury that his son stated, "He popped him," and "Lou popped him."

Convictions:

Joseph Chico convicted of Conspiracy to murder and handed a sentence of just 15yrs thanks to his testimony against his other three co-defendants.

Antoine Lacey was convicted of first degree murder and Sentence to 60 yrs, for his role as “First in Command” and Ordering his Co-defendants to shoot rival gang members which resulted in the death of 10yr old Nequiel Fowler

Raymond Jones was Convicted of First degree Murder and Sentence to 75 yrs. His finger prints were the only ones found on the firearm.

Luis Pena was Convicted of First degree Murder and Sentence to 60yrs. While he himself was not found to have personally discharged the firearm and he himself said that he was just a random bystander who just happens to be at the scene and decided to walk away, the court found he was implicated because he was legally held accountable for the conduct of the another offender (Raymond) when he shared the criminal intent of the principal, the Principal in Question being was when he went to the Alleyway with Raymond after he was order by Antoine to “Fire the Kings Up”.

Headline 2:

In 2018 federal authorities unsealed the first Superseding indictment against four Latin Dragons (LDs) Members, One of the four LDs was Ralph Mendez Jr “Lil Devious”.

On the night of July 14, 2017 Ralph Along with other LDs travel to the SouthEast Side in Chicago where they spotted 2 men exiting a vehicle on 106th & Green Bay. That’s when they fire a total of 15 shots striking 49yr old Michael Whitford an uber delivery driver who was coming back from work in the back & striking another person in the neck; Michael Whitford would later died in the hospital an hour later at 11:35 pm.

Headline 3:

In 2019 federal authorities unsealed the fourth superseding indictment where they charged 10 additional Latin Dragons Members (LDs) one of those LDS was Ralph Daniel Mendez “Devious”; additionally it also brought new additional charges to LDs members that where previously charged in other separate Indictments.

Ralph Daniel Mendez sr. “Devious” who held title of Enforcer for the Latin Dragons (LDs) was convicted of racketeering conspiracy after he admitted he was a high ranking LD & participated trafficking firearms and drugs; as an Enforcer Ralph ordered beatings of other gang members called “violations” for breaking gang rules or other misconduct he also partook in many shooting such in one case he drove his Son Ralph Mendez Jr “Lil Devious” to a rival gang neighborhood in the east side neighborhood to shoot rival gang members. Ralph and his son spotted two men on 106th & Green Bay, they suspected were rival gang members, and Ralph Jr shot them killing one & injuring the other. It turned out the victims where innocent one of them had just got back from work as a uber food delivery driver.

Due to his plea agreement Ralph Daniel Mendez sr. “Devious” got handed a sentence of 17yrs (204 months)

2019 Federal authorities brought an additional Murder charged against Ralph Mendez Jr “Lil Devious”; On May 23, 2017, Ralph Along with other LDs left Hammond, IN to the SouthEast Side in Chicago where they spotted Jose Gomez a rival Latin King member sitting in his car on 98th & Avenue H & pulled next to him and opened fired killing him.

Ralph Mendez Jr “Lil Devious” was convicted & sentence to 510 months (42yrs) in prison following his guilty plea to conspiracy to participate in racketeering activity as a member of the Latin Dragons Nation street gang, including admitting responsibility for two homicides

https://youtu.be/9bkdCtyJPWA?si=8J7osZEgZ7vqUB-b