Down the Road: The Fall of Austin Read Online Free PDF Page A

a caveman’s club.
They play or cheer for organized sports and other games in their
community that substitute for the wholesale slaughter of people;
games that prove the dominance of one city’s people over another.
In Texas, nothing comes close to the jingoistic fanaticism of high
school football. Despite its roots in tribal conquests, sport is a
healthy way of releasing aggression.
    But Hector ‘Sleepy’ Arana did not have the
opportunity to participate in civilized sports. Going to the gym to
work out was an opportunity he had only in jail. And any sort of
conditioning exercise came from running from authorities or gunfire
from rivals on the steamy roads of El Salvador. This was his life
as early as the age of nine, when most American children were still
trying to coax their parents to buy them Hannah Montana dolls or
Transformer toys. There would be no playing in Hector Arana’s life.
Running day and night, getting into fights, and robbing and
thieving to survive made Hector a very tired boy. That’s why the
Mara Salvatrucha gang he eventually joined called him “Sleepy.”
Whenever he had a chance, whenever he felt safe, he would
sleep.
    His crimes in El Salvador made him run to Los
Angeles. Entering as an illegal alien, his potential for a
profitable job was minimal. After killing two gang members in
defense of the L.A.-based Mara, it took little time for him to join
the ranks of some of the city’s top drug runners.
    But with murders executed by his command and
by his own hands stacking up, even his ruthlessness needed to be
curtailed. Captured twice by LAPD, but released both times by lack
of evidence (and a good lawyer in the pocket of the Mara,) he was
ordered to journey to Texas, where the Mara was close to setting up
shop. Within days, he traveled to the Lone Star State, with a new
outlook and a new attitude. Having experienced the consequences of
his actions firsthand, he learned that the ruthless road had a high
price. If it wasn’t for the lawyer, he would most certainly be in
San Quentin. But he was given two chances at freedom, and he wasn’t
going to spoil it.
    That was, of course, until the double cross
in the dark alley of Sixth Street. Just a learning curve, balancing
ruthless efficiency with measured risks.
    So when he arrived at jail, he anticipated
the attacks from the mob of strangers restlessly imprisoned within
its walls. Survival teaches you to find weapons, to make them. And
before he was released into the general population, he was
armed.
    It was two men he had never seen before and
would never see again. It was only a matter of seconds before both
were sent to the morgue by his hands and a crude but effective
shiv. To his surprise, he was not punished. Nick Lopez, Travis
County Jail security guard, had watched the attack, and was there
to help break it up—that is, restrain Sleepy after the men had
their throats ripped open and faces pounded to meat pie.
    Nick vouched for him, having enough influence
within the ranks of the proper leadership as well as the inmates.
He informed the officials that Sleepy acted in self-defense.
    The influence and respect of Sleepy was
quickly building within the facility. And the alliance between Nick
and Sleepy was forming swiftly as well, all in the course of a
day.
    The iron bars to the prison cells clicked,
then rattled open. The inmates of Cell Block 4 stepped out, forming
a line in front of their cells. Racial tensions were high, and
though the deputies did not admit it, the meal times for inmates
had been split along racial lines. The line for dinner Sleepy was
now in was predominantly Hispanic.
    The security guards led the line of Hispanics
to the mess hall where they were served food under the watchful
eyes of mirrored sunglasses worn by stout men holding riot
shotguns.
    Dressed from top to bottom in an orange jump
suit, Sleepy pulled up a chair to dine on the jail’s fine
cuisine.
    His long hair was tied and held up by a
hairnet, exposing his