Overview

This thought-provoking book examines gang history in the region encompassing West Texas, Southern New Mexico, and Northern Chihuahua, Mexico. Known as the El Paso-Juarez borderland region, the area contains more than three million people spanning 130 miles from east to west. From the badlands--the historically notorious eastern Valle de Juarez--to the Puerto Palomas port of entry at Columbus, New Mexico, this area has become more militarized and politicized than ever before. Mike Tapia examines this region by exploring a century of historical developments through a criminological lens and by studying the diverse subcultures on both sides of the law. Tapia looks extensively at the role of history and geography on criminal subculture formation in the binational urban Setting of El Paso-Juarez, demonstrating the region's unique context for criminogenic processes. He provides a poignant case study of Homeland Security and the apparent lack of drug war spillover in communities on the US-Mexico border.

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9780826361097

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Reviews

Very rarely do criminologists get to read an authoritative book by an authoritative scholar on a topic with great interest but little scholarly attention. Tapia's book is a landmark achievement on the gangs of the El Paso-Juarez region in a one-hundred-year time period. You will not be able to put this book down. --Alex R. Piquero, coeditor of Rational Choice and Criminal Behavior: Recent Research and Future Challenges Tapia provides a sorely needed supplement to our knowledge of gangs in the Southwest, giving us a detailed history of gang development, cartel and street-gang relations, and the evolution of street-prison gang hybrids in the El Paso, Las Cruces, and Juarez regions. --Christian Bolden, contributor to The Encyclopedia of Theoretical Criminology Explores one hundred years of a defiant, intriguing, and sometimes deadly urban social phenomenon. --El Paso Times

Tapia provides a sorely needed supplement to our knowledge of gangs in the Southwest, giving us a detailed history of gang development, cartel and street-gang relations, and the evolution of street-prison gang hybrids in the El Paso, Las Cruces, and Juarez regions. --Christian Bolden, contributor to The Encyclopedia of Theoretical Criminology Very rarely do criminologists get to read an authoritative book by an authoritative scholar on a topic with great interest but little scholarly attention. Tapia's book is a landmark achievement on the gangs of the El Paso-Juarez region in a one-hundred-year time period. You will not be able to put this book down. --Alex R. Piquero, coeditor of Rational Choice and Criminal Behavior: Recent Research and Future Challenges

Very rarely do criminologists get to read an authoritative book by an authoritative scholar on a topic with great interest but little scholarly attention. Tapia s book is a landmark achievement on the gangs of the El Paso Ju rez region in a one-hundred-year time period. You will not be able to put this book down. Alex R. Piquero, coeditor of Rational Choice and Criminal Behavior: Resent Research and Future Challenges Tapia provides a sorely needed supplement to our knowledge of gangs in the Southwest, giving us a detailed history of gang development, cartel and street-gang relations, and the evolution of street prison gang hybrids in the El Paso, Las Cruces, and Ju rez regions. Christian Bolden, contributor to The Encyclopedia of Theoretical Criminology

Author Information

Mike Tapia is an associate professor of criminology at New Mexico State University. He is the author of The Barrio Gangs of San Antonio, 1915-2015.

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