Program Can Help Erase Gang Past

By Carla M. Collado
my.style Contributor

Getting out of a gang can be a dangerous and near-impossible feat. Gang members can get beaten or even killed for trying to desert their group. Some try to move away, others change how they dress and others try to get real jobs and start new lives.

But one of the major challenges they face is escaping social stigma.

Edward Acevedo, who has been involved in helping former gang members turn their lives around for several years, says many employers discriminate against them. As soon as they see tattoos on former gang members, they label them as troublemakers, he explains.

Now, Acevedo and his organization Open Hands of Long Beach — a group that since 2004 has raised money for elderly and child literacy programs, as well as homeless services — are launching The Long Beach Anti-Gang Academic Youth Initiative.

“While there’s a downward trend in crime in Long Beach,” Acevedo says, “there’s an upward trend in gang activity. We wanted to do something positive for young students and individuals who really want to change and turn their lives around É distance themselves from past mistakes. Everyone deserves a second chance.”

The Anti-Gang Academic Youth Initiative is a program that will give five Long Beach high school seniors and/or college students the chance to have their gang tattoos removed for free. To sign up, students must be at least 18 years old and submit and application and essay explaining the goals and visions for their future.

Each of the five students chosen will have the opportunity to get tattoos on their face, neck and hands removed (since these are the areas most visible to people).

For the program, Open Hands is teaming up with The Skin Laser Center in Venice, Calif., where the students will receive treatment. Dr. Steven Popkow’s center has been helping former gang members get rid of their tattoos for the past eight years through the Agape Light Tattoo Removal Program. Popkow says that for most of the more than 1,000 patients he’s treated in that time, having their tattoos removed is life altering.

“For the ones who want to get out of the gang lifestyle it’s critical,” Popkow says, “to get that time behind them É psychologically, it changes them dramatically.”

The average tattoo removal takes five to six treatments, spread throughout a year or so, he explains. The Nd:YAG laser Popkow uses works like this: as the tattoo ink absorbs the laser, it starts breaking down, is eventually absorbed by the blood and then released by the body’s natural filtering process. Thanks to major advancements in laser technologies, the procedure leaves no scars or markings, Popkow says.

Laser tattoo removal costs on average $1,000 per person, he adds. However, the students chosen through the Anti-Gang Initiative will receive the treatments for free. The only catch is that to continue getting treated, the students must maintain good grades and attendance in school.

“This Long Beach program focuses on young (people),” Popkow says. “It tries to get them before they’ve gone to jail or gotten injured or hurt.”

Several of his patients — most of whom are in their 20s through 40s — have gotten stabbed and shot by other gang members for having their tattoos. Others simply come to Popkow because if they had gang tattoos while in prison, they would be killed.

Although due to limited funding only five students will be picked for the Anti-Gang program, Acevedo encourages Long Beach organizations to sponsor students for gang tattoo removals.

“Once they see their tattoos really disappearing,” Acevedo says, “they become more willing to embrace their new lives.”

Students interested in applying for the program can e-mail openhandsoflongbeach@yahoo.com for an application. Applications must be mailed and postmarked by Nov. 11, and sent to: Edward Acevedo, Open Hands of Long Beach, LB Anti-Gang Academic Youth Initiative, PO Box 3551, Long Beach, CA, 90803.

Winners will be notified by e-mail during the first week of December.

For more information on the Anti-Gang Academic Youth Initiative, call (310) 869-8290. To learn more about The Skin Laser Center, visit www.skinlasercenter.com.

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