This Is for the Mara Salvatrucha (21 page)

B
renda’s “new future” would begin with orientation meetings, lectures, rules, and explanations. Not a very bright start. In fact, she hadn’t known that she’d have to spend the next couple of weeks learning the structure of her new life, bogged down in the minutiae and paperwork as she separated the new Brenda from her old name and past.

Brenda wasn’t the only one unhappy. After waiting out the two days between her McDonald’s near miss and her delivery to the federal marshals, Alexander had discovered that Brenda had called gang members from her hotel and cell phone. Alexander had given back her safe house cell phone, and in only two days, she certainly had made use of it. Some of the same numbers on the phone before she took off with the gang were back on the registry. She had called her friends from the hotel.

Alexander liked Brenda and was 100 percent dedicated to her protection, but he was a straight shooter, and he was realistic. She was a constant frustration. He knew from her previous behaviors that it was likely that she would do something immature again, like run off. Her calls to her gang buddies only confirmed his worries. He’d spent many a long night looking for her in just about every corner of northern Virginia. She had been missing for weeks before Greg had rescued her from the McDonald’s. For all he knew at the time, she could have been dead.

Plus, he fumed inwardly, she had trashed the FBI safe house. Alexander had to take responsibility for acquiring new furniture and getting the carpet cleaned. Truthfully, the safe house was just an annoyance. He acknowledged that she was young and simply needed protection, not only from the gang but from her own youthful desires. He was truly worried about her safety. She just wasn’t getting the message that she had to
stay away from the gang or she would be killed.

Alexander continued to deal with Brenda’s tendency to do whatever she wanted despite the potential harm to herself. He didn’t empathize with Brenda’s problems with loneliness. From his perspective, her conduct at the hotel was simply a breech of security. He decided to use the drive to her dropoff point as an opportunity for a lecture.

“If you start playing these games with the U.S. Marshals, they’re not going to be as forgiving,” Alexander began. “They’re going to take note of it, and they’re going to kick you out. And any chance of you starting a new life away from the gang is going to be lost forever.” Brenda sat in silence, hoping he would drop the subject, but he was just warming up.

“Look, you know every time you reach out to them, you know it doesn’t take much for them to do the callback and have the hotel number and find out what hotel you’re staying in. I’m saying your caller ID is out there and readily available,” he explained, sounding frustrated.

Not only was she putting her life in danger, but she was endangering his and his partner’s lives. As they made their way down the road, Alexander kept lecturing. Brenda was quiet. She had heard it all before, but from Greg. Alexander had never used such strong admonition. She was about to enter witness protection. There was no room for half listening and then doing whatever she wanted. This time it was for real. She was in a car with an FBI agent who had every intention of turning her over to the marshals. For any teenager this was serious business.

As Alexander talked, Brenda’s focus turned inward, to her own thoughts. This is it. There is no return. You break the rules and you’re out, on your own. There was no turning back to her life in Texas, or the life she had had with her family in California. Brenda Paz as the world knew her would have to disappear. She was not happy about going into witness protection, but she was resolved. She knew it was the right thing to do. If she ever wanted to see her family again, her only option was to push forward through witness protection and hopefully come out years later with enough distance from her past to risk doing
so, but the thought of so much time away from her family put her stomach in knots.

When the car stopped, Brenda roused herself from her deep thoughts and realized that they finally had arrived at the dropoff point. Alexander checked her to make sure Brenda was not carrying anything that could harm the marshals. The last thing he wanted to do was to hand over a potentially dangerous individual. This treatment, though, reminded Brenda that although these men protected her, they were not family, nor were they her friends. For them, especially the marshals, she was a job.

Satisfied that Brenda was clean, Alexander told her to grow up. It was a strange mix of demand, annoyance, and caring. Brenda looked at him gravely, sensing the seriousness of the moment, then gave him and his partner a hug. She got into the car that would escort her to her new reality without a backward glance. It was last time Alexander ever saw her.

O
ver the following days and weeks, Brenda’s life completely changed. She was in a new world, one sequestered from normal life on many levels. Secrecy was paramount. Along with a number of other federal witnesses, Brenda moved into a hotel in Philadelphia where she went through weeks of background checking. Her past was combed for details that had to be scrubbed out of existence. New papers were fabricated. At first, she thought it was actually kind of cool when they handed her the new driver’s license and a new name.

The end of March came and it was her birthday again. Brenda was in a hotel room in Philadelphia, alone. It was the second birthday she had spent by herself. The loneliness was an ache in her heart, but she knew it was a very sensitive stage of the Witness Protection Program and she was forbidden to call anyone. Brenda turned on the TV and reflected on being seventeen. She sighed and flipped through the stations. The television was her only company for the night.

Brenda was, in fact, fascinated with the process of creating a new past. She had done a good job of creating stories herself while in the MS. Now, thanks to the marshals, she was from Ohio. Texas and California were completely erased. Her past life in Virginia disappeared, and the pieces that couldn’t be removed were buried under secrecy and protection. It sure is easier changing your story on the streets, she often thought, as the weeks went by. All documents relating to her past
life were altered or erased, and a new identity was created. It was one thing to make up a story that people believed; it was altogether another to make that story true on government papers. Like many of the other witnesses, Brenda also enjoyed the first opportunity in a long time to sleep the deep sleep of someone who is truly safe. She was surrounded by protection twenty-four hours a day, fed and housed, and given any amenity she required, within reason and the law. Once Brenda was settled into the routine of the marshals’ orientation program, she did what was most natural to her and reached out to someone who would talk to her.

She befriended a Latino boy who was not a member of MS-13 but was under similar circumstances. He was in her cohort of witness protection entries. He had entered the program at roughly the same time she did and was staying in the same hotel as Brenda during the orientation process. Over the weeks they spent together, it was easy to grow close. Around him, in this new world, she could be anyone. They were young, in a completely novel environment, and safe. Where some teens would be at camp or headed off to college, these two were holed up in a hotel, running from a strange and scary past, with no one else to turn to. They spent every moment together, and he quickly became her new best friend and lover.

G
reg heard from Brenda just as spring broke in northern Virginia, weeks after he had dinner with Alexander and her in Quantico. She called from Philadelphia to say she had lost her purse and needed him to wire her some money.

He didn’t believe she’d lost her purse, but he knew that whatever the real story was, if she was asking for money, she probably needed it. She asked for $200, but he wired $300. This was when he learned her new identity.

Brenda Paz was now Ellysia Gonzalez.

What Greg didn’t know was that the marshals had placed Ellysia Gonzalez in Kansas City, not Philadelphia. Brenda’s new apartment was on a nondescript street. Her days consisted of reading and studying for her GED and sometimes going out to look for temporary work with the help of the marshals. Anyone who knew Brenda would have foreseen that she’d grow bored. All she could think about was seeing her new boyfriend from Philadelphia. He was the only person she knew in her new life.

Fed up and bored, Brenda had taken all of the money that the marshals had given her and bought a one-way ticket from Kansas City to Philadelphia. After a couple of days in Philadelphia, reality dawned. She realized in a tense moment that she needed to get back to Kansas City before the marshals found out she was missing. There
was one man that she knew she could count on. Greg was the person she called.

With her new Ellysia license, Brenda picked up the $300 from a convenience store a block away from Philadelphia’s Ninth Street Italian market. She booked a flight back to Kansas City and again disappeared into the secret world of witness protection.

She surfaced weeks later when she called Rick Rodriguez’s cell phone. “Whatcha doing, Rodriguez, you barbecuing?” she asked in a bubbly, nonchalant manner.

Brenda was still in Kansas City, and Rodriguez’s cell phone was one of the numbers she had memorized. Out of boredom she just called him. When he answered, she had made a lucky guess about what he was doing. It was during the afternoon on the weekend. Chances were he was barbecuing.

Rodriguez was spooked. The detective assigned to discovering who had put the
luz verde
on Rodriguez had not yet closed the case, and Rodriguez thought maybe Brenda was spying on him. But it didn’t make sense. He knew she was in witness protection. He chatted with her for a bit, then got off the phone and tried to forget she had even called. How weird, he thought.

When Brenda called again less than a week later, describing exactly what Rodriguez was wearing when he had exited the Arlington County police building, he got mad. Brenda had obviously been in town—that’s how she knew what he’d been wearing. His worries intensified when he realized she had been watching him, even possibly spying on him. Perhaps she was setting him up for some type of ambush. He focused considerable effort on figuring out what was going on, where Brenda was staying, and, most importantly, if she was back in Virginia to help pull off the
luz verde
on his head. But that wasn’t the case. Brenda had flown from Kansas City to Baltimore and taken a bus into Arlington not to spy on Rodriguez, but to see Denis.

Kansas City was boring. She didn’t like the program and needed her friends. Of all the people Brenda thought she could reach out to, Denis was her first pick. She still loved him. And she felt very comfortable around his family.

While in Arlington, Brenda stayed with Denis’s parents. When she went to see Denis, she saw Rodriguez as he was leaving the Arlington County prison where Denis was awaiting trial for the murder of Joaquin Diaz.

Rodriguez was on fire. It was spring, and through the entire summer, fall, and winter of the previous year he’d lived with the threat on his life. The pressure was getting to him. Denis still hadn’t given him any information, and the detectives working his case hadn’t found any solid leads. As far as he knew, Brenda was in witness protection, but suddenly she was back in town and knew what he was wearing. This was the last thing he needed. He put out an all-points bulletin on Brenda and then called Greg.

Greg was alarmed by the news. Dammit, he thought, I should’ve known it. He started making phone calls and eventually learned Brenda was staying with Denis’s parents. Not good. He looked up the address and immediately went to the Riveras’ house, where he found Brenda and took her to a restaurant. He wanted to shake some sense into the girl, but he knew the way to win her over was to appeal to her intelligence and convince her to go back to witness protection. She obviously had no clue what she was doing.

Brenda was sullen at the restaurant, picking at her food with her fork as she explained her frustration with the marshals. She told him she was in Kansas City and lived in a bad neighborhood. It was full of methamphetamine addicts, whom she called “tweakers.” Greg pointed out that though the situation wasn’t ideal, it was a hell of a lot better than being here, where there were many people who wanted to harm her. She needed to stay in witness protection. Brenda countered that Denis was protecting her from the MS. He would make sure no one knew she was talking to the cops, and she could handle Denis. She trusted him.

Greg didn’t trust Denis. Brenda looked at Denis through rose-colored glasses, but Greg saw something entirely different. Any kid who could do what Denis did to Joaquin Diaz could not be trusted, ever. Why didn’t Brenda see that? Greg knew Denis couldn’t protect her forever, if protecting her was even his intention. His house was the last place she should be hiding out. She was playing a dangerous game. Bottom line, she needed to get back to Kansas City, and fast. Greg’s arguments were clear. He appealed to her logical side. He used every bit of his persuasive nature and southern charm to win Brenda over. He pointed out that Kansas City wasn’t that bad. She had met a few people, and, as Greg reminded her, she even liked the federal marshal assigned to her case. He worked on her slowly, winning her over to good sense.

By dessert Brenda had agreed to return. After all, Greg wasn’t a lawyer for nothing. If anyone could change her mind, he knew he had
the power, and he’d done his best to wield it for her sake. However, she wanted to spend one more night before going back to the program. Greg knew it was risky because when Brenda was thinking on her own, she tended to follow her impulses, not her head. Right now he had her thinking objectively, just as he wanted. However, it was her life and he had to respect her need to make her own choices. He went home and eased his concerns by booking her a flight back to Kansas City for the following day. The next morning, just after breakfast, he drove over to Denis’s parents’ house to get her. Thank God she’s still here, he thought when he arrived.

Greg made a day of it for Brenda before the flight, taking her to see some movies at the Lockheed Martin IMAX National Air & Space Museum. When it was time to drive her to the airport, he parked and escorted her inside, determined not to let her out of his sight. He couldn’t get her back to Kansas City fast enough for his peace of mind. After spending many hours killing time before her flight, Greg finally saw Brenda off with a sigh of relief.

Brenda’s trip to Virginia was actually the fourth time Brenda had voluntarily left protective custody. First, she had run away from the Less Secure Facility in Fairfax. Then she had abandoned the FBI safe house to live on the street. Recently she’d snuck away from the marshals in Kansas City to fly to Philadelphia. Now she had slipped away again to visit Denis in Arlington. All four times Greg was there to bail her out of trouble, possibly saving her life on every occasion. He couldn’t, and wouldn’t, always be there for her. Brenda had to make her own decision to stay put, to stay safe.

Witness protection, formally known as the Witness Security Program, was not designed for teenagers. It was created to provide a safe living space for middle-aged federal witnesses who were willing to testify against organized-crime bosses in New York and Chicago. It was a program mostly for men who needed to disappear with their families. Essential informants in ongoing federal investigations into organized crime, these men had a reason to stay out of sight and mind. They sought to protect their families. By placing Brenda under witness protection, the government acknowledged the importance of her cooperation and the value of her knowledge of the inner workings of the Mara Salvatrucha on a national level. Such a young, naïve girl, with so very much power. Her placement in witness protection also reflected the government’s acknowledgment that the Mara Salvatrucha was an or
ganized criminal group, one able to reach out and get to Brenda from many places within the United States. The marshals took Brenda’s security very seriously, as with any top-level informant. The long stretches of solitude required for security, though, were undoubtedly Brenda’s Achilles’ heel.

Before Brenda had boarded the plane, Greg snapped her picture, proof she had boarded her flight. He took the photo at a memorable moment in both their lives. It was May 10, 2003. Walking out of the terminal, Greg couldn’t help but wonder if he would ever see her again.