I'm not a terrorist

by Angel Garcia/PNN

I remember back in the day, when me and a couple of my homeboys would sit in Dolores Park. We would just relax, talk and soak up the shining afternoon sun.

It was during one of these peaceful afternoons that my friends and I would experience police profiling and brutality in one of the worst ways.

After my homies and I had gathered as usual in the park, the rest of the crew showed up and we began to organize a soccer game like always. One of the homeboys looked at me and said, "Hey what's going on little homie.do you want to play with us?"

I happily joined the game and took the position of goalie. It was then that the police rolled up to the park and one of the officers looked up, cracked a smile and said, "Hey look at the cripple playing soccer."

My newly acquired happiness disappeared quickly and the sunny afternoon abruptly turned dark.

A minute later the officers ordered my friends and I to get down on the ground. I was only 14 years old and could not speak English, so I didn't understand what he was demanding. Watching everyone else, I quickly got on the ground, when suddenly an officer came up behind me and kicked me on the back of my neck.

This was just one of the many incidents of police brutality that I faced living as a poor immigrant in California.

This particular incident happened long before the words gang injunction had ever been mentioned; yet the cops were already harassing us- just for being a group of Latino kids hanging out in the park. I can't even imagine the affects that a statewide gang injunction would have on people like me and my friends.

The proposed gang injunction won't even let young people stand on a street corner together and even worse will categorize almost any youth of color as a "gang member" or even "terrorist."

Yet again the government that we live under has found another way to discriminate against poor people and youth of color.

The government and police say they exist to protect youth, families and community members, yet this law gives them free reign to treat us like criminals.

Being poor and Latino, I am already suffering from constant police harassment and abuse and this gang injunction will only make me more of a target. It is just a way for our government to legally persecute people simply for being young, poor and of color.

Our youth need to be educated, not harassed and thrown in jail. Gang injunctions are simply not the answer.

Angel Garcia is a writer for PoorNewsNetwork and the author of Gangs, Drugs and Denial, a memoir exploring his life as a former gang member and drug addict on the streets of San Francisco.