metropolitan

Gang violence increasing

Three popular performance artists have been killed in the last three months in the poor neighborhoods of Panama City and Colón.

Most people who live in those neighborhoods say they were victims of gang violence. The police have made no arrests.

La Prensa

Fallen:Performance artist Alonso Blackwood, better known as Danger Man, was shot in the head, abdomen, and neck in a gang-related incident. 1052473

Investigators have been unable to prove who killed three popular Panamanian performance artists in recent months, but almost everyone on the street will tell you they know exactly what happened to Alonso Blackwood (Danger Man), Carlos Jiménez (El Velax) and Manuel Caballero (Manolo). They were victims of a reckoning of accounts between local gangs.

According to a 2007 police report, there are as many as 100 different gangs in Panama. Gang members---believed to number around 600---are armed, and most of them are minors.

More recently, Reggae musician Miguel Tasis (Mr. Fox), received death threats. Mr. Fox did not respond to inquiries from this newspaper, but a relative said he had been threatened by a gang member from Colón.

Danger Man was killed at 11.45 p.m.on Feb. 21 in the Don Bosco neighborhood. He was shot to death in front of a cousin's house. The prosecutor in charge of the case is trying to find out whether Danger Man was going to be called as a witness in a drug trafficking case under investigation by U.S. authorities, which could help explain why he was murdered.

People on the street, however, say he was murdered by mistake. A friend of the victim who did not want to give his name said Danger Man had been targeted by a drug trafficker who thought he was responsible for the arrest of a cousin of his in the U.S.

El Velax was assasinated during a “pasa pasa,” a dance popular in the poor neighborhoods where gangs flourish, on June 7 in La Feria in Colón. Authorities say they know who killed him, but they haven't made an arrest yet. El Velax's parents say he was assasinated out of “jealousy.” Investigators say it appears the crime was a response to the murder of another La Feria resident, José Rodríguez (Runku), over an old quarrel.

The day after Runku was murdered on March 29, Danger Man's manager Manolo was killed in San Miguelito. A priest from the neighborhood who spoke on condition of anonymity said the crime was gang related. Manolo had been trying to collect some money he won from another gang member in a cockfight. They had an argument, and he reached for his gun. But the other gang member shot him first. Police have a suspect, but they haven't arrested him yet.

The murders have stirred feelings of helplessness, fear, and revenge among the victims' friends and families. “I´m here today, but tomorrow, who knows?” a friend of Danger Man and Manolo said.

“I only pray to God that my son's murderer and whoever sent him repent,” said El Velax's mother.

A gang member from La Feria, where El Velax lived, gave a simple explanation for his death that seems to obey a certain “ghetto” logic of violence: Someone had to pay for murdering Runku.