A Girl Gangster's Journey Out of the Life

At 10 years old, most girls bring home a toy as a gift from a new friend, but Nina Handley came home with a black eye, a gift from her new family, the Eastside Crips gang.

Years later, Handley earned another stripe, a slash across her face, and with it the nickname Scarface.

“I endured a lot,” said Handley, now 24. “I’ve been stabbed five times. I’ve been tortured. I’ve had my fingers almost cut off by rival gang members.”

Handley is one of the lucky ones in Tucson, Ariz., where the police and social service agencies are seeing a rise in the number of girls involved in gang-related activity. The increase is outpacing the prevention services available to at-risk teens who may be vulnerable to gang recruitment.

Nina Handley, 24, a former gang member from Tucson, stands beside a life-size cutout of Al Pacino from the movie “Scarface.” Scarface was her gang nickname. (Jennifer Perez/NYT Institute)

Statistics on girls in gangs are hard to come by because they typically focus on young men. But law enforcement officials and local outreach workers say that girls are also being affected.

“All-girl gangs are rare,” said Sgt. Judy Allen, supervisor of the Gang Investigation Unit at the Tucson Police Department. “They won’t claim gang membership, but they’ll hang around, dress the part, graffiti.”

The lure of gang life — a sense of belonging and empowerment — seems simple. But the reality is much more complicated. Reformed gang members say getting out is harder than getting in.

For Handley, gang affiliation was a seductive alternative to an unhappy home life. “I started banging in elementary school,” said Handley, who was wearing a white tank top that showed off her former gang tattoos. “I had a broken home; my parents fought or were never around. I just wanted to be like the big kids, too.”

She tried leaving the gang many times, she said: “You either go to jail or you die.” Seven years ago, she managed to escape, but she says it’s an “everyday struggle.”

“Even now,” she said, “I still have to face the fact that someone could come at me or beat me up.”

David Bradley has heard similar stories. As chief executive officer of La Paloma Family Services Inc. in Tucson, he knows the complex terrain that draws girls into gangs and makes it hard to get out. His agency provides group homes, foster care, in-home services and a parenting program for boys and girls up to 18 years old.

By the time they reach La Paloma, many children have already been in the juvenile justice system, mental health system or Child Protective Services, or sometimes all three.

“There are three things I always talk about: poverty, violence and substance abuse,” said Bradley, 55. “If a kid gets caught in that triangle, they often don’t come out alive.” The healing process for these girls, who are often abused, is challenging.

“You are running away from an abuser and run right into the arms of someone who might be just as bad and hurtful to you,” he said.

Most Tucson gangs are “barrio gangs,” Allen said. “A large number of kids we see are in gangs because the father or cousin or neighborhood they were born in or live in has a strong gang presence.”

Handley in the living room. (Jennifer Pérez/NYT Institute)

Handley grew up in a rough neighborhood of Tucson and discovered the Eastside Crips in the fourth grade. An older female gang member slowly recruited her by acting like a mother figure.

“They kind of baby you and take you under their wing,” Handley recalled. It worked. “I just wanted a family. I didn’t want the broken-home lifestyle anymore."

Eventually, the babying stopped. The gang forced Handley to make a decision: Join or stop hanging around. She chose initiation. Then came two more difficult options.

“If you were one of the groupie girls that hung around, you could sleep with all the dudes in the crew, or you could get beat down,” she said. “I got beat down for like 15 minutes by all the girls in the group.”

Handley said she sold drugs and recruited more members, recycling the same promises that had been made to her.

“I used to carry a big wad of money all the time,” she said. “They saw every day I could buy new shoes, new clothes, and I had so much jewelry.”

Recruiting was perhaps one of the few things she did at school — when she went. Fighting was the other, she said.

As a member of the Crips, Handley wore blue. “If you saw somebody wearing red, or they were showing off their hood, or throwing up their signs, then you pretty much start a fight with them,” she said. “Anywhere.”

Handley still wears blue; it’s a hallmark of her gang life. “My attitude sometimes is still very gangster,” she said, “like I’m real big on disrespect.”

Girls join gangs and remain in them for money, power and respect. “Most people saw the money and everything is about money,” she said. “I had so much respect and I had so much power, people that I didn’t even know gave me respect.” When her mentor was sent to jail, he chose Handley to lead the gang. She was 15.

Handley gave orders to a crew of 25 to 30 members who ranged in age from 10 to 40. But responsibility came at a heavy price. She has a criminal record and an 11th-grade education. And worst of all, she lost a close friend to gang violence.

One night, Handley went to help the friend move to a new home but Handley had to leave early. Later that night she learned that two gang members had fatally shot her friend as part of an initiation. Handley believes that she herself was the intended victim.

The killing marked a turning point. “I walked away because a lady that I considered like family was murdered, and it was supposed to be me,” she said.

Walking away was not easy or clean. After she left she sold drugs and worked at a convenience store, she said. She’s now an assistant manager at a novelty shop in Tucson. The temptations from her old life still linger, she said.

Handley earns $10.60 an hour, compared with the $1,200 she used to make in a day, she said. Her bedroom also pays homage to her past life. Posters, pictures and a calendar from the movie “Scarface” cover her walls. Snapshots of her posing with her gang members adorn another corner of her room. A lone photograph of her slain friend rests on top of her TV. And Handley has still had her share of troubles.

Last year she was released from jail after serving time for domestic violence against a live-in girlfriend, she said. There, she learned that the stigma of gang association is harder to erase than the tattoos that cover her arms.

“When I went to jail, I’m still listed as an active gang member, and that will never go away,” she said. “And I’m like, I’m not that anymore.”

The wounds remain, but she has managed to rebuild some relationships while having to let go of others. Handley said she is closer to her parents, and she doesn’t frequent the old places or associate with friends from the gang. She lives with her father and stepmother, and she has hopes for a new life: to get her G.E.D., go to college and open her own business, as her father did.

She is also considering working with gang-prevention groups. “If I could’ve had somebody to go and talk to and help change,” she said, “I probably would have done it a lot sooner.”

Michelle Rios, community programs coordinator for the Pima County Juvenile Court, said girls associated with gangs who end up in the system have little recourse.

“The detention as a whole wasn’t developed for girls,” said Rios, who is developing gender-specific programs for girls. “So even if girls are arrested on a minor offense, because of a lack of resources and placement, we can end up keeping them in detention longer than boys held on a similar charge.”

Handley said she’s willing to work with any program designed to help girls in gangs find a better life.

“I don’t care what people have to say about me now. I’d rather have people knowing about what goes on,” she said. “If I could help out somebody or make a difference where they don’t have to go the route I did, then that’s what I want to do.”