http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Avenues_(gang)
The Avenues were not always violent when they started and rarely engaged in illegal activities. They were started by the Flores brothers in the 1940s, but little is known about the brothers. The greatest of their crimes during the 1940s was simple assaults. As time progressed and their numbers increased, they became more violent and started to act like a criminal street gang and not a social club. In the late 1960s, when heroin started to flood the streets, they turned for the worse and would be forever more labeled a criminal street gang. They increasingly took part in the illegal drug trade and these actions have continued to the present day.
The Avenues Gang are well known for their hatred of and hate crimes committed against black residents of their neighborhoods. Reflecting their hate-filled attitudes, they tried to keep even non-gang affiliated blacks from moving into the Highland Park area.
Avenues Gang Members Meet the End of the Road | News | Los Angeles | Los Angeles News and Events | LA Weekly
During the four-week trial in federal court in downtown Los Angeles, prosecutors painted a grim picture of Aves 43 gang members who, during a six-year campaign between 1995 and 2001, threatened, intimidated and beat African-Americans who dared to make Highland Park their home, and ultimately killed three black residents. Kenneth Kurry Wilson, 38, was shot to death by a van full of Avenues gang members in the early hours of Sunday morning on April 18, 1999, as he was attempting to park a Cadillac on Avenue 52, a tree-lined street just a short jog from Figueroa Street. The following year, Christopher Bowser, 28, was shot three times in the head while he was waiting at a bus stop. Bowser, who had lived in Highland Park with his mother since 1989, had been regularly chased down the street, threatened and, just eight days before his death, was beaten by the Aves 43 set. A third victim, 21-year-old Anthony Prudhomme, an aspiring music producer, was attacked in his bed and shot twice in the head.
when they come out , except they come out with serious physical or mental problem, most not all. Another sad reality that no on wants to admit is that again, most but not all , were not that educated to begin with so now they come "back" to the real world with nothing but whatever skills they learned in the services, which a lot of times don't translate into the real world. The others that don't come back with PTSD etc have to get right back into college or something training , acquire more debt etc to be able to make money to survive.
) but yea i remember the marines , army , navy etc, showing up to my H.S setting up tables and just recruiting mad people on the premise that you could 1. get free money for school 2. get a career while traveling the world, it always sounded like false promises to me even back then, my next though was 
what happens if we have a war
