Street Gang — marioforte

OUR STRATEGY

Our Strategy

Gang Intervention
Gang Prevention
Gang Education

Gang Intervention

Tackling crime and reducing gang violence requires engaging with some of the most aggressive individuals associated with gangs in high-crime areas. Working alongside local law enforcement, Mario leverages his expertise in modern gang dynamics and personal experience to build rapport with gang members and criminals. He focuses on those at risk of becoming repeat offenders or recently involved in violent crimes, many of whom are gang members seeking revenge against rival gangs. Mario has pioneered a groundbreaking program that has facilitated numerous former gang members in leaving behind lives of crime. Through his extensive years in ministry, Mario has cultivated connections with accomplished Christian professionals who are eager to assist him in mentoring these individuals. Following a rigorous vetting process and months of personal engagement, Mario selectively pairs gang members with these seasoned Christian mentors, guiding them toward becoming impactful members of society.

Additional services offered include but not limited to:

Support in securing employment.
Enrollment assistance in technical schools for skill acquisition
Tutoring to aid high school graduation.

Financial education encompassing:

Building credit
Facilitating home ownership
Guiding investment decisions

Lastly, the team will attempt to persuade rival gangs to sign peace treaties and conduct street Bible Studies. This program has seen considerable success, as many gang members have embraced Christianity and launched their own street gang Bible studies and discipleship classes, involving numerous former associates. Furthermore, through the previously mentioned strategies and initiatives, many up-and-coming young leaders have converted to Christianity, leading to a decrease in gang violence. Engaging these young gang leaders in the program and its strategies enables us to effectively reduce gang violence through actions like negotiating peace treaties among gangs and conducting street-level discipleship with multiple members.

Gang Prevention

Over the last thirty years, Pastor Mario and his crime-fighting team have penetrated the public school system; speaking and performing to tens of thousands of teens using all the tools mentioned above. In our opinion, it is possible to penetrate what many consider to be the devil’s territory. This has resulted in hundreds of teens receiving Christ as their personal savior while at school!

Jump Jams –

The team has designed weekend events called Jump Jams”. These weekend events provide:
Training on gang awareness to the local Police Departments
Graffiti paint outs (painting over gang graffiti on the local businesses buildings) or in some instances, depending on the relationships established we will ask the local gangs to join us in order to instill pride in their own community.
Food drives
“Life-Line Conferences.”
- These conferences are geared towards parents, teachers, police officers, and correctional officers. The seminars taught within the conferences will teach you how to identify the early signs of gang involvements and how to prevent children from joining gangs.

Street parties for the local communities (in partnership with local nonprofit agencies, churches and adults that can be a positive influence).

By partnering with the local Churches, Police Depts., schools and the community, we can create an atmosphere of community.

Gang Education

To curtail gang-related crimes, our team understands the importance of partnering with informed adults. It has been our privilege to visit churches, police departments, schools, and to conduct conferences on a variety of gang related topics for many years.

Some of our teachings include the following:

How to Decipher Gang Graffiti –

Gangs have their own alphabet. Our understanding of their written language has assisted in solving and preventing many crimes. In the same manner, by recognizing gang graffiti, it is easier to determine where drug spots are in a city, who is being targeted by rival gangs, and whose gang territory the city is located in.

Gangsta Discipleship-

Thru his many years of ministerial experience he has learned that it is always beneficial to find common ground with those we are ministering to. As part of our efforts, we have produced a manual to use when reaching gang members.

Integrating Hip-Hop’s Four Elements-

Hip Hop is composed of four key elements:

Rapping
Deejaying
Break Dancing
Graffiti.

We believe that Hip Hop is a unique and powerful way to connect with teens. Our ministry is at the forefront of this cultural movement, and by using Hip Hop, we specifically engage gang-affiliated teens, making it easier to build friendships and trust. To share our approach, we’ve recorded a podcast that’s about two hours long. This podcast covers all the elements mentioned above and offers insights into Hip Hop that you might not have known before.

Our vision is to establish a hip-hop school that will incorporate not only the 4 elements of hip-hop but also basic life lessons that, unfortunately, have not been taught to most of these gang affiliated teens.

First music Hip Hop album Jesus Disciples ONUG

The only gang church in the nation with Latin Kings

In El Salvador with Mara 18 Salvatrucha Gang