One-man gang

Terry Webster

Thursday, Oct. 21, 1999 | 11:37 a.m.

Trouble is standing on the doorstep of Clark High School just days after two students were injured in a gang-related shooting outside the school.

Clark Principal Wayne Tanaka doesn't like what he sees.

Still vivid in his mind is the trail of blood the two shooting victims left through the parking lot and the school last week as they fled their assailants. Swirling through his memory are headlines from 1994 when a student died after a gang member shot him through the heart at a nearby convenience store.

He doesn't want to return to the place where safety ends and disorder begins.

"Prevention stops at the time of chaos," said Tanaka, who has been working for the past seven years to help clean up the rough neighborhood encasing his school. "Then you begin mopping up and putting up the yellow crime tape. People are put in the hospital. People are arrested."

By many accounts, Tanaka's efforts to help stop crime have been a success. He is respected; he is controversial and outspoken. A 28-year school district veteran, the 51-year-old Tanaka has been at Clark for seven years.

And he knows the threat of gangs and crime is a concern facing other schools here and throughout the nation.

Today, Tanaka continues his own fight.

"Off with the do-rags," he tells three youths wearing black stocking caps as they walk toward the school entrance. Muttering under their breath, they pull off their caps and saunter through the school's entrance, claiming they are picking up a transcript.

Tanaka follows them in, moving quickly. He throws them out moments later after the trio makes several disrespectful comments.

"Who's number 32 at that college?" Tanaka asks the one wearing a red jersey. "Oh, your friend is wearing the same number. Isn't that interesting. What does it mean?" They look around, nervous.

"You're wearing it. You must be proud of it," Tanaka said. "Why don't you tell me what it means?"

"Is this a show or something?" red jersey asks. Police later learn he has a criminal record for possession of a weapon, burglary and other charges.

Tanaka, a Japanese American, has identified the jersey No. "32" as a symbol associated with a white supremacist gang.

"Get out," he tells them.

The three continue bucking authority and the scene concludes with seven police officers rigidly posed around the youths' car in the parking lot.

"They don't want you on their school property, that's the problem," an officer shouts into the driver's side window, his voice rising with each word.

As the youths drive away the tension also leaves -- for now.

But the incident kept Tanaka from a group of students who needed his attention. He gets to them later, in barely enough time.

"One of the teachers here told me this is so unfair," Tanaka said of the Oct. 11 afternoon shooting that injured two of his students. "I told them, 'I know how you feel, but life isn't fair.' "

In connection with the shooting, Maynor Villanueva, 18, was charged with two counts of attempted murder, two counts of battery, and one count of robbery, all with a deadly weapon. Additionally, he was arrested on possession of a controlled substance, possession of a stolen vehicle and leaving the scene of an accident charges. A 14-year-old male, whose name was withheld, was charged with aiding and abetting in an attempted homicide and possession of a stolen vehicle.

Police said the attackers followed the victims onto school property after they left a nearby convenience store.

Although arrests have been made, the terror doesn't end after a gang commits a crime, Tanaka said. Those who survive attacks become moving targets. So do their families.

"The real terror of it is that in the end, the gang controls your life," Tanaka said.

Because it isn't safe for them or their peers, the two shooting victims can't return to Clark High School. They will receive their education through another means.

One family was advised to return to their California hometown. They can't. There, an older sibling had a run-in with a gang.

Even on the condition of anonymity, students who want to get out of gangs are too frightened to speak out.

"They said no way. They don't want to give any indication they are talking to anyone," Tanaka said.

Safety issues are taking another toll at schools: Time.

Administrators are honing detective-like investigative skills. Teachers are trained in identifying gang behavior. "We're always busy with safety and security," Tanaka said. "There are so many other things we should be concerned with: School improvement, test scores, attendance. If this had not happened, we still would have been busy. But we are really busy now."

He takes it all in stride.

"In this town, you can hold them, fold them or play them," said Tanaka. "I play them."

One of the hands dealt to Tanaka came in 1992 when a zoning change led to the construction of Durango High School, which led to an increase in the at-risk population at Clark, he said.

"Still, we're exceeding all expectations in terms of student performance," Tanaka said. "I could have said, 'Well, what do you expect?' But we're going to keep pushing and not accept second best. We're trying to change all that by offering students an education. It's one of the most empowering things."

Presently, parents from all over the city send their children to Clark, a magnet school with special academies for math, science, teaching and finance.

Community programs are designed to address problems before they start. A program called One Neighborhood For Everyone is credited with contributing to a 30 percent drop in crime during 1994. Many other preventative programs have followed, most with an emphasis on outreach to at-risk families.

Metro Police Capt. Mike Ault calls Tanaka one of the pioneers in cooperating with police and bringing community outreach programs into schools. Today, similar programs are in place throughout the Clark County School District.

"He looks at the community in the holistic sense," Ault said. "It's not a school in the middle of a neighborhood. It's the hub of the neighborhood."

Other criticize Tanaka for being too accessible.

"He has received some flack from his colleagues because he is so open," said Allin Chandler, executive director of the Clark County Association of School Administrators. "I'd say he has the courage to step out front in terms of bringing people into his school."

Chandler said schools are continuing to pick up more and more responsibility for social ills.

"We feed the kids," he said. "We're responsible for providing a safe environment not only during but before and after school. The safety aspect of it is an issue affecting all schools." Hours spent studying gangs has given Tanaka the ability to identify the way they walk, talk and dress.

"Sometimes it's just the way they move their head," he said. "It's the way they talk or stand. They won't look you in the eye."

A training book at Clark tells staffers how to spot gangs, which are defined as groups of individuals between ages 7 and 28 who gather regularly and commit crimes.

Gangs have their own names, structure, culture and claim a certain territory or neighborhood as their own. Members are usually male. In recent years, however, females have started forming their own gangs, according to the training book.

Following a fall training session on school safety, Clark High School history teacher Les McNamara never imagined he would be using the information so soon.

He was one of the many people who assisted the shooting victims.

"They literally ran into me in the parking lot," McNamara said. "I remember running with them into the school, but I never even realized it. I was running so fast and I wasn't even out of breath. One of them told me he had been shot. I didn't believe it. Then he lifted his arm and I saw all the blood."

McNamara doesn't want a repeat performance.

"I don't ever want to have to do that again," he said.

The push-off point for gang activity is often prejudice or hatred of another group, Tanaka said. Racial controversy has even touched the Clark Chargers mascot, a mustang.

"People have asked whether the horse is black or white," Tanaka said, referring to the large mural on an outdoor school wall.

He sees it differently.

A picture in Tanaka's office shows a circle of mustangs surrounding the Clark Chargers logo. The horses are of every color: White, black, gold, red, brown.

After the three alleged gang members have finally driven off his campus, Tanaka heads for a group of students in a classroom down the hall from his office.

He smiles before opening the door, knowing what's inside.

"Sorry I'm late," he tells a group of about 20 students wearing full business attire who are gathered for a Future Business Leaders of America meeting. It was almost over.

He congratulates the students, saying he is certain they will go on to become chief executive officers, stockbrokers and other business professionals.

"Look at them," he whispers, motioning to a line of students standing before a table.

Like the Chargers picture of the horses, Tanaka said, they are of every color.

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