Jack Lawrence

Have any of you been approached by somebody in the gang that says, hey, join us?

Why do kids join gangs at this school?

13-year-old Danny Lopez is a schoolmate of Juan Arteaga and a prime target for gang recruitment.

Are you lonely?

It's hard.

What do they say to you when you say, I don't want to join?

Was there drugs involved with the gangs?

Were they selling drugs or dealing drugs?

So there was no sort of older people that were using you guys to sell it so that they didn't get in trouble?

So Junior tells me that over time the violence began to get more and more severe.

Kids would graduate from getting in fights and throwing rocks at cars to beginning to arm themselves with weapons like knives and guns.

So when was the first time that you saw a gun?

Was it someone in your group or was it someone in another gang?

When was the first time you saw someone carrying a gun for, shall we say, protection?

You know, all these things that you're saying about how you get chased and jumped.

When I was a kid, there was a gang and for somehow, some reason, some rumour got around that I'd said something about them anyway.

It was ridiculous, stupid kid stuff.

But I remember one night when I was at home, my parents were away and I had some friends over and they turned up at my house and tapped on my window with a knife and they were trying to break into the house.

And I have never been more scared in my entire life than that particular night.

And that was just one night.