Leaving the Battlefield
The Intercept, November 2018. There are an estimated 60,000 gang members in El Salvador. Benjamin knew many who wanted to leave the gangs. He wanted to show them it was … Continue reading
Historic shift in U.S. policy divides federal agencies and Trump administration over how to address gang violence
The Intercept, October 2018. With Cora Currier. En español, Revista Factum. Oswaldo joined the Salvadoran gang Barrio 18 when he was 14 years old. By the time he was in … Continue reading
Justice, from Colombia to Central America
The Los Angeles Review of Books, August 2018. A brick wall, the first layer of the barrier, encircles most of a city block on an unassuming street in Guatemala City. … Continue reading
Deported into a Nightmare
The Atlantic, June 2018. Edwin Vásquez, a 16-year-old, is learning how to live with fear. One afternoon last fall, as he played soccer on a field near his house in … Continue reading
The Rise of the Net Center: Anti-corruption efforts in Guatemala vs. an army of trolls
The Intercept, April 2018. With Cora Currier. En Español aquí. At 6:02 A.M. on August 27, 2017, the president of Guatemala, Jimmy Morales, uploaded a video statement to Twitter declaring the former Colombian … Continue reading
El Salvador’s “iron fist” crackdown on gangs: A lethal policy with US origins
World Politics Review, Feb 2018. Late one morning in the fall of 2016, police officers handcuffed a group of middle school-aged boys on a street in a neighborhood on the … Continue reading
The corruption beneath the 2017 Honduran election chaos
The Intercept, December 2017. On the night of December 2, 2017, a Honduran woman in the rural province of Olancho was protesting what she saw as a stolen election. The woman, … Continue reading
