There Are No Children Here by Alex Kotlowitz Read Free Book Online Page A

their minds a lot these days.
    By season’s end, the police would record that one person every three days had been beaten, shot at, or stabbed at Horner. In just one week, they confiscated twenty-two guns and 330 grams of cocaine. Most of the violence here that summer was related to drugs.

Four
        ON A WARM DAY in mid-July, a caravan of three cars pulled up to the sidewalk at the two high-rises just across the street from the Riverses’. Two young bodyguards stepped out of the first and last sedans. Then from the middle emerged Jimmie Lee, a barrel-chested, square-jawed man who was no more than five-feet-seven. A bulletproof vest sometimes made him look even bulkier. He held his cellular telephone at his side as a band of worshiping teenagers mobbed him.
    A commotion caught Lee’s attention. In the entranceway ofone of the buildings, a drunken man berated his young daughter. “You bitch. What did I tell you?” the father screamed at the cowering girl. Lee walked toward the building and, with a suddenness that left the father defenseless, slugged him in the jaw, knocking him to the ground. Lee stared at the crumpled drunk.
    “You don’t give no kid disrespect,” he told the man.
    “But that’s my daughter,” the fallen man explained.
    “I don’t care if she is your daughter. She’s thirteen years old and you’re calling her a bitch. Don’t do it again.” Lee walked into the building, where he had a meeting with some of his workers.
    Lafeyette, Pharoah, and the other children knew to keep their distance from Jimmie Lee. But they also knew that he and no one else—not the mayor, the police, or the housing authority—ruled Henry Horner. The boys never had reason to speak to Lee or to meet him, but his very presence and activities ruled their lives.
    When he pulled up in his caravan, they knew enough to go inside. When nighttime fell and Lee’s business swung into action, they knew enough to stay away. And when something happened to Lee or one of his workers, they knew enough not to talk about it. Jimmie Lee, it was said, was everywhere. He knew who was talking about him, who was finking, who was flipping to the other side. And when he knew, someone would pay.
    Jimmie Lee headed a drug gang called the Conservative Vice Lords. Its name had nothing to do with its political affiliation. The members controlled Henry Horner. No one could sell drugs without their approval. Their arsenal included pistols, Uzis, and even grenades. Some of its members were well schooled in torture techniques, and once allegedly threatened to shove a hot nail up an opposing gang member’s penis. Lee even had an “enforcer,” according to the police, a young man whose job it was to maim and kill and who kept a two-shot derringer for such a purpose.
    Residents so feared and respected the gang’s control that they refused to call 911. In Chicago, the caller’s address automatically flashes at police headquarters, and police will sometimes then appear at the caller’s home, seeking more information. Snitchingcould get you killed. The police installed a hot-line number and promised confidentiality, but in all of 1986, public housing residents called the number twenty-one times. One woman so feared the long tentacles of the gang that after she drew a rough diagram of a recent gun battle for a friend, she ripped it into small shreds for fear that the Vice Lords would find it.
    By 1987, Lee’s notoriety had grown to such an extent that his photo, taken with five other high-ranking Vice Lords, hung on the walls of every police station on the city’s west side. Next to the others, all of whom glared menacingly at the camera, Lee looked calm, even pensive. He sported a full beard and aviator glasses. His red sweatshirt had BULLS emblazoned on the front; he also wore blue jogging pants and high-tops and a thick gold necklace. Lee worked out with weights, and that showed even in his baggy jogging suit. His upper torso and neck were thick