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Gangster's Paradise Lost

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LA CityBeat Nov. 6, 2003 By Dennis Romero Cover photo by Steve Appleford Losing the mural, it seems, was a sign of the times. In 2002, when the city renovated the recreation center at Stoner Park in West L.A., the last remnants of the Westside's Latino gang culture were told that the building's big Chicano-era mural would be temporarily removed to accommodate construction, but then returned. The big tableaux from the side of the building was an homage to the Mexican flavor of the neighborhood, and a point of homeboy pride. But when Mayor James K. Hahn presided over ribbon-cutting ceremonies celebrating the completed makeover last summer, the mural was absent, and the homies still haven't seen it. (A council district field deputy who keeps his eye on parks in the area said he has no idea what happened to the artwork.) Today, a few survivors of the Sotel 13 gang, which has claimed the park since the early 1950s, still congregate at the rec center each weekday at 3 p.m. ...
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Dennis Romero's bio

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Dennis Romero is a third-generation journalist who covers national news for NBC News Digital . He has reported on the housing crisis, wealth disparity, police and crime, popular culture, youth culture, raves, electronic dance music, ecstasy abuse, cannabis legalization, surfing and skateboarding. He's been a features staff writer at the Los Angeles Times, the Philadelphia Inquirer and local and national magazines. He's covered the Los Angeles Police Department from its headquarters newsroom. And he was recently a contributor to the op-ed pages of the Los Angeles Times. His work as also appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, Rolling Stone, and the Guardian. His byline has appeared on MSNBC multiple times. He's appeared on CNN, Investigation Discovery, E! News, and Reelz.  His late father  Fernando Romero  worked at the San Diego Tribune and Los Angeles Times. Fernando's eponymous father was a television reporter, anchor and sports announcer in Tijuan...
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Boomtown

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LA CityBeat Nov. 18, 2004 By Dennis Romero At Glendale Boulevard and Second Street, you can see the crossroads of L.A., old and new. Immigrants from the Mexican state of Michoacan play the pre-Columbian handball game of tarasca in a dirt lot destined to soon sprout a 276-unit, five-story apartment building, mostly for the middle and upper-middle classes. On the hill above, the $45 million Visconti apartment complex is already going up rapidly, faster than the graffiti that lines the historic Toluca Yard, a long-abandoned Pacific Electric rail stop that's become home to the nation's only known tarasca court. Five blocks to the east, the towing skyscrapers of Bunker Hill reflect the setting sun, washing gleaming rays upon this gritty but shifting neighborhood just west of downtown. The area is patrolled by the Los Angeles Police Department's Rampart Division, once the city's leader in homicide reports, and once described as the Fort Apache of the LAPD. Now, Land Rover...
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