Tattoo-Removal Program Erases Ties to Gang Past

Forging a new life after seven years in prison for murder is hard enough, and Nino Paz decided the 1 1/4-inch tattoo on his right wrist created more difficulties.

“There are a lot of wrongs you can’t right. Some things can never be changed, and will always stick with you, but this is one of the things I could correct for myself,” said the 23-year-old from the Los Angeles area who is on parole in San Diego.

Paz is one of hundreds of parolees and probationers who found himself branded with symbols of gang affiliation that became painful reminders of the past and who have now taken advantage of a San Diego County-administered tattoo-removal program.

The program began in 1983 when Kenneth Gross, a San Diego dermatological surgeon, volunteered his services shortly after going into private practice.

“I thought about what I wanted to do in practice, and I said I wanted to do something that is a community service,” said Gross, who normally would charge anywhere from $250 to $2,000 to remove a tattoo.

Gross, who first plied his trade in the Navy, removes as many as two tattoos a week from young people as part of the program, none of which is tax-deductible, he said.

In the last eight years, Gross has lifted tattoos of swastikas, gang signs and drug-related images. And, though state laws forbid tattoo parlors from having minors as customers, that hasn’t stopped minors from getting homemade tattoos and winding up in Gross’ office.

“When it comes to intelligence, some of these kids are very smart and innovative, and they’ll get the job done,” Gross said. “Kids are very inventive.”

For instance, some melt vinyl records or candy wrappers to use as ink, Gross said.

At age 12, the day after he joined his gang, Paz used a sewing needle and India ink to tattoo his left arm with “LL,” referring to the La Loma neighborhood in Carson, where he grew up.

“One day I got jumped-in (initiated into the gang), and the next day I was putting on the tattoo, you know, telling people that I belong to the neighborhood,” Paz said. “At first I was proud of it and was flashing it around. I thought at that age that the tattoo was showing everybody my toughness, and that I belong to the neighborhood.”

It was the first of a dozen “tacs” for Paz, including one on his wrist depicting a gangster he made while in prison with ink formed from a combination of toothpaste, shampoo, water and smoke from a burnt razor blade. Paz also made a tattoo machine using a spring from a ballpoint pen and a cassette player.

Now, all that is left of that tattoo is a scar, similar to a burn mark.

“It reminds me of where I came from, and where I don’t want to go back to, and it keeps me in check a lot,” Paz said.

He decided to have the tattoo removed after working temporarily as a clerk in a bank.

“I was trying to show my best, and one of the things I thought was holding me back was my tattoo. People always look at you in a different way when they see something like that,” said Paz, whose other tattoos are on less visible parts of his body.

“I liked working at the bank, and it’s a whole different atmosphere for me. For the first time, I started feeling like I’m with the winners, these people are really going somewhere, and I want to go somewhere,” Paz said.

He didn’t get a permanent job at the bank, but Paz thinks removing the tattoo will help in landing the next job.

“I’d rather have the scar than the tattoo,” he said.

Peter, a 17-year-old from East San Diego, also wants to make a new start by getting some of his tattoos removed. The Times agreed not to use Peter’s last name.

His older brother used a guitar string, a cassette recorder and India ink to apply Peter’s first tattoo as a birthday present when he turned 11: his name spelled out in 1/2-inch-high letters on the back of his right hand.

“My mom looked at my hand and then started yelling at us in Spanish. She said, ‘Why did you put that on your brother, he’s no piece of paper,’ ” Peter said.

“After each tattoo I got, I promised my mom that I wouldn’t get another,” said Peter, who is in Juvenile Hall for manslaughter in the death last April of his best friend’s brother.

Peter now has more than a dozen tattoos, including “EAST SAN DIEGO” in 4 3/4-inch high letters across his back.

“As long as other people can’t see them, then I feel right about it,” he said. “I feel it when I walk down the street, ladies looking at my hands.”

He only plans on removing the tattoos on his hands, for now. “If I take them all off, I won’t have anywhere to lie (down),” he said.

The shooting five months ago has changed the way he feels toward gangs, and getting the tattoos from his hands removed is one step in separating himself from the gang, Peter said.

“It just made me change my whole life. It makes me feel like I have to live for two people now, and I know that . . . (the person he killed) wouldn’t have wanted me to be in a gang,” Peter said.

He also has responsibilities now, with a 9-month-old daughter to take care of when he gets out of the detention system, Peter said.

“I’m doing this for myself. If I put them on, I can take them off,” he said.

Arlene Smith, spokeswoman for the county probation office, said her office often refers probationers who are going to be sent to the California Youth Authority to Gross.

“It is for their best interest and safety to remove the tattoo” so they won’t be identified with a certain gang by members of rival gangs while in the institution, Smith said.

Volunteers in Parole, an organization run by the state Bar Assn., also refers young adults to the tattoo-removal program.

“Probably one out of three end up not getting them removed. Either they change their mind or they flake out,” said Jim Pauley, director of the organization that makes about three referrals a month to Gross.

“The ones that do it through my program are really trying to clean up their bodies, literally, and their lives more symbolically,” said Pauley, who coordinates volunteers who help people just released from the youth authority to turn their lives around.