ABSTRACT

The recent mass shooting of 22 innocent people in El Paso by a lone White gunman looking to "Kill Mexicans" is not new. It is part of a long, bloody history of anti-Latina/o violence in the United States. Gringo Injustice brings this history to life, shedding critical light on the complex relationship between Latinas/os and the United States’ legal and judicial system.

Contributors with first-hand knowledge and experience, including former law enforcement officers, ex-gang members, attorneys, and community activists, share insider perspectives on the issues facing Latinas/os and initiate a critical dialogue on this neglected topic. Essays examine the unauthorized use of deadly force by police and patterned incidents of lynching, hate crimes, gang violence, and racial profiling. The book also highlights the hyper-criminalization of barrio youth and considers wide-ranging implications from the disproportionate imprisonment of Latinas/os. Gringo Injustice provides a comprehensive and powerful look into the Latina/o community’s fraught history with law enforcement and the American judicial system. It is an essential reference for students and scholars interested in intersections between crime and communities of Color, and for use in Sociology, Latino Studies, Ethnic Studies, Chicano Studies, Criminology, and Criminal Justice.

chapter |22 pages

Introduction

part I|2 pages

State-Sanctioned Violence

chapter 1|19 pages

A History of Anti-Latino State-Sanctioned Violence

Executions, Lynchings, and Hate Crimes

chapter 2|19 pages

Officer-Involved Shootings of Latinos

Moving Beyond the Black/White Binary

chapter 3|17 pages

Interest-Convergence Theory and Police Use of Deadly Force on Latinos

A Case Study of Three Shootings

chapter 4|23 pages

Killing Ismael Mena

“The SWAT Teams Feared for Their Lives…”

part II|2 pages

The Youth Control Complex

chapter 5|22 pages

The Street Terrorism and Enforcement Act

A New Chapter on the War on Gangs

chapter 7|17 pages

“Captives while Free”

Surveillance of Chicana/o Youth in a San Diego Barrio

chapter 8|20 pages

Hyper-Criminalization

Gang-Affiliated Chicana Teen Mothers Navigating Third Spaces

part III|2 pages

Race, Citizenship, and the Law

chapter 9|23 pages

“A Class Apart”

The Exclusion of Latinas/os from Grand and Petit Juries