Young soccer fans and gang members change their game

Soccer often meant the outbreak of violence among youth gangs in Lima’s district of El Augustino, in Peru. Being radical soccer fans, ‘wearing the team shirt’ as they call it, whether of the Alianza Lima or the Universitario Deportes often resulted in bloody confrontations among youths, as well as crimes and drug abuse.

It was precisely soccer however, that served to bring peace to these same youths, 12 years ago. It all began when one of the gang leaders that rooted for Allianza Lima befriended ‘padre Chiqui’ as Father José Ignacio Mantecón is known. Mantecón is a Jesuit priest at the head of the parish of El Augustino, and it was his experience as team chaplain that helped him to establish the necessary trust with his unlikely peacemakers.

The person to first bring it up was also the boss of one of the most fearsome gangs, Sully proposed to ‘padre Chiqui’ that they work out a solution for his group and for other youths. In a newfound role as referee of this new game, ‘padre Chiqui’ began the program that today offers the El Augustino community of 180 thousand people special services that range from psychological counseling, education, job training and sports, to legal aid, thanks to a successful juvenile restorative justice program.

The program has become an alternative to gang life. “For many youths, gangs were a home, they had issues with their families, they had been abandoned and badly treated, or they were boys forced to work from very young age, who ended up in the streets. In the streets, they found the gangs,” explains ‘padre Chiqui’.

Things have since changed in El Augustino. In 1996 there were 36 gangs causing or becoming victims of violence in the district, while today, according to the priest, there are none. The last Lima Police report on gangs issued a month ago, says Father Mantecón, no has an entry for El Augustino.

The struggle for peace

The project began when an initiative born of the youths –supported by padre Chiqui and other members of the community – held a number of debates to determine what were the top concerns among youths, and how to respond to them. Thus was born the Martin Luther King Association of Youth Groups of El Augustino (MLK), inspired in the peaceful struggle of the Nobel Peace prize laureate. And with the association the definition of four strategies to solve the problem of violence in the area: education, sports, employment and the reparation of community property.

“Schools are not adequately prepared to receive these kids. Attempts by schools to impose discipline result in youths being expelled. They end up in the streets and doing drugs,” said the priest. “We need to offer them alternatives, places where they can play music, games, and study.”

MLK offers the entire community, not only local youths, opportunities to carry on with their studies. From an original group of less than 10 students and two teachers, there are today 12 teachers and 169 students, among them members of rival gangs, teens coming out of restorative justice programs and women from religious movements. Some MLK members are currently the recipients of undergraduate scholarships given by Pacha Mama, the Spanish institution.

The other great force behind this renaissance was sports. At the heart of the initiative the Club Deportivo MLK was born (MLK Sports Club) a second division team with 300 players. The sport that sparked so much of the violence in the past has become a force for peace and a way to teach youths how to live together.

Justice and fairness

The most productive aspect of the entire project has arguably been its juvenile restorative justice program. Its goal is to offer young offenders an opportunity to change their ways and make reparations for damage incurred to the community, in place of simply dispensing punishment.

According to the local coordinator of the juvenile restorative justice project, Patrícia Magallanes Herrera, the idea is to look for more fairness in justice, a system that offers reparations goes further than merely protectionist or punitive trends. “We must keep in mind that in Peru these teens have had their rights violated long before they arrive at a police station: they have no access to school, health care or work, and the majority has already been expelled or rejected, and this is what drives them to the streets,” said Herrera.

In her view this change in perspective has yielded excellent results in El Augustin thanks to work carried out in coordination with civil and police authorities. “Whenever a youth is detained at a police station, regardless of what he is accused of, we notify the attorney and he asks us to send out a lawyer or social worker to provide the child’s defense on the spot.” Instead of being sent off to a detention center as used to be the rule, the youth is placed in a special child detention area inside the police station.

Once legal assistance is provided, and the adolescent meets with the team, the case is forwarded to an educational monitoring group that will evaluate the potential of each teenager. This will help them select an activity that the teen can carry out in form of reparations. “We find out whether the teen works, studies, if we could have him work with gardening, or other educational or cultural activities that appeal to him. We also invite the child’s family to take part in the process,” said Herrera.

In the last stage of the process, victim and offender may actually meet face to face, the meeting is usually friendly and taken as an opportunity for the offender to ask for forgiveness. “For that to happen, we rely on a mediator, someone neutral and careful, who is able to bring both parties together to a meeting. The offender usually narrates what he was going through when he committed his crime and asks for forgiveness. In the majority of cases, the victim accepts the apology,“ said Herrera.

The program keeps track of young offenders along the entire process, and follow up meetings are held for each case every 45 days. Program members also meet with families to offer support and, in the case of drug abuse, have youths enrolled in weekly sessions or rehabilitation programs.

According to ‘padre Chiqui’, the local community’s experience with the program is living proof that restorative justice is not only more efficient in reducing the rates of recidivism but also less costly than incarceration.” Kids who are sent to youth detention centers show very high rates of recidivism. Here, on the other hand, police stations have a special area tailored to their needs, along with police officers dedicated exclusively to them,” added padre Chiqui.

Lessons learned

In the book “Asociación Martin Luther King, una experiencia con las pandillas de El Agustino" (The Martin Luther King Association, an experience among the gangs of El Augustino) published by the Cidade Viva organization, padre Chiqui, or Father Mantecón narrates his experience and evaluates lessons learned.

“Keep in mind that, if you are going to approach a gang, it is important not to raise false expectations or make promises that will be broken.” He also points out the inconvenience of creating structures that are foreign to the reality of the teens involved. One has to take advantage, for example, of the youth groups’ own organizational structure, to rely on their leaders, recognize the most pressing needs of their members and to address their frustrations,” said the priest.

He also stresses that it is important to work with long term projects since many of the experiments that failed did so because public or private institutions begin relationships with gangs only to abandon them. “This is the source of tremendous frustration on their part, it is very difficult to reestablish trust, “ said ‘padre Chiquin’ Father Mantecón.

 Translated by Lis Horta Moriconi