Rotten Mango - #226: She Was Murdered For Wearing The Wrong Colored Shirt (Case of 14-Year-Old Brandy DuVall)

Episode Date: January 4, 2023

It was her favorite outfit. A red Michael Jordan jersey, black shorts, and sneakers. She was hesitant about wearing it because, well, the color red meant something in the area, but her mom encouraged her to wear what she wanted. Besides, all she was doing was quietly waiting for the bus to take her back home to Grandma’s. As she stood there waiting, in red, a car drove past. For a brief second, the guys laid eyes on her. A girl wearing red. She was the one. That split second would lead to the horrific gang rape, torture, mutilation, and murder of a 14-year-old girl who just wanted to wear her favorite color. Full Source Notes: rottenmangopodcast.com To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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in all states or situations, prices vary based on how you buy. But a being better boob. Welcome to this week's main episode of Rod and Mango. I'm your host Stephanie Sue. She had on her favorite outfit. It was a good outfit for a good day. I mean, she had spent most of the day hanging out with her best friend, and now she was waiting for the bus to go back home to her grandparents.

But first, let's talk about that outfit. It was her favorite color. Red. A red Chicago Bulls jersey. Black shorts, red, black and white running shoes. I mean, she really liked this outfit. It meant a lot to her. She had always been a fan of Michael Jordan, and that Jersey was a gift from her father. So she's wrapping Michael Jordan, Chicago Bulls,

and her dad. So to wear the Jersey, I mean, it made her really happy, but she was a little bit scared. She knew what the Jersey could imply when she's walking around this neighborhood. She asked her mom once, do you think it's okay to wear red? Because you know, all of them? And her mom told her, you can wear whatever you want, whatever color you like. I mean, that sounds like any logical mother that would say that, to encourage their child to express their style, to feel confident in themselves, right? To brand you, it was her favorite color and her favorite basketball player, but to them, it wasn't about the Chicago Bulls.

It wasn't about Michael Jordan. It was about the color red. She was wearing red and red was their color, the color of their gang. And in their eyes, she was theirs now. What? That brief moment that these guys laid eyes on her, standing at the bus stop in red, bright red,

it would lead to the horrific gang rape, torture, and murder of a 14 year old little girl. What? I mean, it's terrifying. Like, we do so much to try and not get into trouble. Brandy Duval did the same thing. She did everything that she could. She got good grades.

She was an honor role student. She was nice to her parents, to her grandparents. And she did everything a 14-year-old thought that she should be doing to stay out of trouble to be a good, moral, ethical person, and then she was murdered senselessly. All for what? Because she was wearing the color red. As always, full show notes are available at rottingapodcast.com, but there is a very, very detailed book on this case called No Angels, the short life and brutal death of Brandy Lee and Rose DuVal by Steve Jackson. He worked closely with the families involved to get the story. He actually had a stop

writing true crime for a few years after this case because it was it was just so dark. Like I don't even know how to begin to describe this case. The book itself is very detailed, very dark, very emotional, but I think it's a story that needs to be heard because I can't imagine how many more situations like this are taking place all around the world right now as we speak and how many more victims there needs to be before people start. I don't know, I guess, waking up. Like, you're going to feel so frustrated, you're gonna have this pent up anger and sadness.

That's mainly what I felt researching this case. So with that being said, let's get into it. The story starts with Maria. Her real name can be found online, but we're gonna refer to her as Maria. Now, Maria grew up with her grandparents and her mom in a house that they referred to. Everybody referred to this house as 27-27 California. Give me a explain. The house was near the corner of 27th Street and California Street, but the house itself is located in Denver, Colorado. So all of it takes place in Colorado, not California.

Maria said, you know, growing up, she felt a little bit left out. She had six siblings. I mean, it's a full house. She lives with her mom, her grandparents, all of her siblings, but her grandparents spoke Spanish. Her parents spoke Spanish. And then none of the grandkids spoke any Spanish. So all the adults are having these conversations in Spanish and Maria is like, wait, why

don't I know what you guys are talking about half the time? And so she asked her mom and her mom sat her down and tried to explain to her, if you know Spanish, everyone is going to call you and I quote, a dumb immigrant. Because that's the racist stereotype that they have of people who speak Spanish in this area. But Maria, she took it to heart, yes. But she also felt like the adults didn't want to teach the younger generation Spanish because they all wanted their own little secret language that none of the grandkids could understand. That's how she felt. I don't know if it's true, but she felt that way.

But other than that, not knowing the secret language of the house, she had a relatively nice childhood. She remembered being free in the neighborhood. Everybody had these cute little gardens in the front of their houses filled with flowers and vegetables. I mean, it was a really wholesome place, but it wasn't picture perfect, at least not from the outside. This area was set to have been struck by poverty. Because sometimes that's kind of how poverty feels, like little lightning strikes, striking

random pockets on earth and filling the residence lives with hardships that other people don't have to experience. Maria didn't know it at the time, that she and everyone else around her were poor, because she was a kid. What did she even need the money for? She would go climb trees, hang out at playgrounds, and this neighborhood was unique. So this neighborhood, it was a less affluent neighborhood, but there was also a really, really low crime rate.

So it's a lot of working class families. Just everything feels so safe. There's no weird men in the alleyways. There's no whispers of crimes. There's no looking over your shoulder to make sure you so safe. There's no weird men in the alleyways, there's no whispers of crimes, there's no looking over your shoulder to make sure you're safe. The area felt very homey. It was so safe in fact that the kids

pretended to be in gangs to feel cool. That's how they spent their time. The guys would fight over, no, this street is my turf. You're on my turf, this is my street. The girls were set to have fought over the guys and pull each other's hair, but it was all kind of done in good fun, you know? I don't know, that's good fun, but that was the consensus.

Nobody really was in a gang, they just said things and pretended like they were. Faked her forks with little pupu, maybe their finger guns, you know, that type of thing. And by the time that Maria's 12, her whole life changes. Because she lied. She lied to a guy named Danny Martinez. He was 16 and she lied. She said she was 15 when she was actually 12. And Danny was in her. He promised he would take care of her, shower her with luxuries and life that she would never experience otherwise. He didn't have a plan. He didn't have a job. The guy is 16, right? But he knew that saying that was all the right things to do. So they start dating, and three years later she gets pregnant at 15. Now there were a lot of girls in the area getting pregnant while

they were still minors, so it wasn't anything shocking to the community. Like Maria was not going to be outcasted this black sheep of the family. Oh my God. She actually had a really good support system. She gives birth to a little girl, then gets married to Danny, gets pregnant again. This time with a son, they would name Danny Jr. So bear with me. Now we're going to transition Danny Martinez, the dad into Big Dan. That's what everybody called him once his son was born. And then now Danny Martinez, the son and soon after another son, Antonio Martinez, these are all very important people. So there's Big Dan the dad and then Danny the kid

and Tonya the kid and she has another daughter, yeah. Oh, okay, okay. But mainly Antonio and Danny, the kids are gonna be the important, the brothers. So they're the Martinez brothers. Okay. And Maria is still living with her family in 2027 California. So this is like a full, full

house, but the neighborhood starts changing. It's no longer what it used to be when Maria was a kid. It was from this peaceful, idyllic place, vegetable gardens, to suddenly creepy men in the alleyways waiting to jump on you to see if you had their next fix of crack cocaine. It was a lot. And her husband, the children's father, Big Dan, he was kind of over it. He felt tied down by his kids. He was like, wait, I'm still so young, you know what I mean? And I guess he didn't care to think that

Maria was even younger than him, but he wanted to live out his youth. So he stopped coming home sometimes for weeks at a time. Maria said for weeks, he would completely forget that he had a wife in kids at home. Big Dan started getting involved in drugs, with really, really, really bad people, and Maria couldn't take it anymore. So she's working as a single mom at a bar. She's a bar tender. She runs into a guy. Bill Rollins. Bill was the opposite of Dan. He was a sergeant in the Air Force, and on his off days, he wore suits. Yeah, what? The guy was as clean cut as you can get. Everyone said he just had this sophisticated authoritative air about him, but he was actually

a really, really good person. He loved Maria, he loved her children, and they started this emotional affair, and then he asked her to move to California to live on base with him and she agreed. She packed her bags, divorced Big Dan and left and for a while, like this was Maria's. I don't want to say come up but like this was her chance. She had a safe comfortable suburban living. She had this husband that was well established in his career.

He was taking care of her kids, he would do like dad activities with them, he would take them camping, hiking even without Maria. He loved those kids. Maria got a job, she felt like her life was just coming together, I mean, this was amazing. People thought she had hit the jackpot with Bill. Even though the kids were a bit of a handful, he loved them, especially Danny. Danny's the oldest son, but he's the middle child.

He was insane, okay? This guy could not sit still for more than two seconds. Where Danny's the middle child? Yeah, they had a daughter and then Danny and then Antonio, yeah. Oh, okay, very, very. Yeah, so Danny, he just was, he couldn't sit inside for more than two seconds. It drove him completely mad. He wanted to go outside, he wanted't sit inside for more than two seconds, it drove him completely mad.

He wanted to go outside, he wanted to bounce off the walls, bounce off the trees, he wanted to be leading a group of people into the woods on a hike, he wanted to be around people, he wanted to do things, active things, see things, be around people. Can you imagine how exhausting that is for a parent? Like, I can't even imagine. But at least the kids all got along, right? Maybe too well. Sometimes when something in the house was broken, Maria would never figure out who did it. She didn't know who to discipline,

because the kids refused, absolutely refused to snitch on each other. Sometimes Maria would discipline Antonio. She would spank him for something that Danny did, and Antonio would just take it. He wouldn't feel resentment. He wouldn't tell his mother it wasn't him He wouldn't go hey Danny. You're the reason I got spanked it. He just went with it They had a strict no snitching sibling code

Which couldn't be me my sister and I snitched on each other like every chance we got we weren't even asked I'd be like okay mom fine. I'll tell you I'm not kidding, but I am kidding, but not really. So for a while, things are good in this house until it wasn't, because Maria discovered that she had an affinity for injecting herself with meth. She quite liked it, and Bill was not OK with it. She couldn't stop for Bill.

It's like she saw herself crashing and burning. That's how she describes it. She knew that she should stop. She knew that Bill was she describes it. She knew that she should stop. She knew that Bill was a great catch. She knew that she should stay and do everything to keep this relationship, but she couldn't. She literally couldn't give up the drugs for him, for her kids, not even for herself. So after leaving Bill, she takes her kids back to 27, 27, California to live with her family in Denver, Colorado.

And even though they're getting help from Maria's family, the kids' life does not get better. It was actually pretty bad. Maria was unable to overcome her drug addiction. She had these intense mood swings. The kids had to watch the ambulance be called on her multiple times for her overdosing. And on top of that, when the paramedics came in, they knew what they had to do. They would hide all the extra needles

and show them one syringe to say, oh, this is what she injected herself with, so that she wouldn't get into even more trouble. Like, they were definitely growing up way too fast. They were being parents to Maria at one point. And they really, really, really missed Bill. Like, Bill was stable, he was comfort. Bill made the kids feel safe,

because yes, he was a bit stricter than Maria for sure, but he was someone you could run to. You look, oh my God, I have a problem, right? And now he was gone. And sure, they moved back into the neighborhood where their biological father Big Dan was, but he was a horrible influence. In fact, he would later buy drugs from his own kids.

So, Big Dan during this time that he had the kids, he was arrested at least 31 times with assault charges, DUI charges, burglary, drug charges, auto theft, weapons charges, and Maria said he had a nickname in the gang called Big Dog. He was as much a part of a gang life as the kids would be. Like, he never tried to stop his kids from doing what he did He just went along with them as if they were his friends like fellow gang members or something So around this time the Martinez brothers start hanging out with a few close friends Francisco Martinez who is not related to them and everyone called him Pancho. That's his nickname Which I don't know how accurate Google translate is, but it translates to hotdog, unless I'm missing something? Maybe there's a slang for it.

But Francisco grew up in a huge house filled with sisters, so when he started hanging out with Danny and Antonio, he felt like he had finally met his brothers. And from then, the three of them, inseparable. Maria said Francisco just showed up one day and he never left. She didn't mind though, you know, Francisco was very polite, he was quiet, pretty clean, he liked to help the brothers clean their rooms. Oddly, he really liked iron clothes, like he just wanted to iron their clothes all the time.

Like he refused to wear clothes that weren't ironed. It's kind of weird. I like it though. Well, you're not gonna like him much longer, but I like that little tidbit. So Maria was like, okay, why not? Just stay over. And then from there, the three of them adopted a younger kid into their group named Frank Vigil, Jr.

He went by little bang. Little bang? So they all have nicknames. Danny Martinez is bang. And Antonio Martinez is boom. Francisco Martinez is poncho and Frank goes by little bang because he was just so young. So the brothers just kind of took them into their gang as they would call it to protect

him. That's kind of how they said it. And then sometimes they would be joined by their actual cousin Samuel Quintana and he went by zigzag. Samuel's dad actually was a deputy for the Denver Sheriff's Department. So their uncle was a deputy for the Sheriff's Department. And his parents hated Samuel hanging out with the Martinez brothers. They're like, we don't care that you guys are blood-related.

We don't care that you guys are cousins. They are a bad influence. Samuel came from like, I guess what you would call a stereotypical middle class family. He was on the soccer team. His parents paid money for music classes. all these extra curriculars. He was on track to graduate, join a local college, and then join the police force. Like he was living a regular law-abiding life. There was nothing crazy about him. His dad straight up sat Danny, his nephew down. It was like, if you see me in my jail because he's a

deputy. You brag like you don't know me, because that's where your headed son. Wow. Yeah. So even though Samuel's parents did not support him hanging out with his cousins, Samuel loved them. He chose to hang out with them. Like, he is the same age as them. He's not like Frank who's much younger.

He just loved how cool their lives seemed. They didn't have to listen to anyone. They didn't have to listen to anyone. They didn't have to do their homework. They always had girls over, they always had drugs laying around, they always had cash from dealing drugs. Samuel thought that their life without rules was like the coolest thing ever. So mainly we have Danny Martinez, his little brother Antonio Martinez and Francisco Martinez, their best friend, and then Frank, his little brother Antonio Martinez, and Francisco Martinez, their best friend, and then Frank, their little underdog, the one that just joined the group. They had others join their little gang, but they would initiate them by beating them up.

If you weren't blood-related, you would get beaten into a bloody pulp to be able to join their little gang. So they're just hanging out nonstop. When Maria decided to change her life, I turned it around. She felt like it was divine intervention. She had gone to inject heroin one day. She went to open a syringe. There should be a needle in there, right?

She popped up the cap off. No needle in the syringe. This fine, it happens. She grabs another syringe. Pop's off the cap. No needle in the syringe. She frantically goes through the entire bag of syringes, no needle in any of the syringes, and she felt like this

is God telling her the Lord is telling her you need to quit injecting heroin. So she did quit. She dumped all the heroin into the toilet that day. Antonio would later confess it wasn't God, it was him that took all the needles out. And Tonya is... Her son, youngest son. Youngest, wow. But it only works for a little while because Maria was like, I think God is telling me to not use needles. So she started smoking crack cocaine.

She was addicted and it was bad. Everyone in the neighborhood had gotten addicted and the whole neighborhood was going downhill. This is kind of, if you guys ever heard of the War on Crack cocaine, this is what we're talking about. Crack cocaine and this, this is like so nuanced so I don't want to get too deep into it, but it completely tore up underprivileged low-income neighborhoods and it primarily tore up a certain demographic of people. Literally ripped their communities apart, and I don't think they've still recovered yet.

Even though they might have been no longer taking crack cocaine or smoking it, but the devastation that it caused, it meant one of the craziest things to happen in the US, truly. So the gangs, they start taking over, shoving crack cocaine literally down on everyone's throats because that's how they make their money.

They're coming in, making money, getting more low income residents addicted, ripping families apart, getting parents addicted to drugs, getting children recruited into their gangs so that they can help them sell those drugs. It's literally heartbreaking. So while Maria is getting targeted as a consumer, a buyer of these drugs, her children are being recruited into the gang as potential sellers literally from right under her nose.

Maria said she missed the first warning signs, but she knew something was up when she got home one day. And our two kids, Danny and Antonio, they're waiting for her and they ask her, mom, if we give you a down payment on a car, can you keep up the payments? What, where did you even get that kind of money? Don't worry about it. What, no, I don't want the money

if I can't understand where you got it from, where would a little kid like you get money like that? And then from there, she said, all she heard around the house was, and I quote, blood this, blood that. She tried to tell them that they were being brainwashed indoctrinated by the games, but even she admits that meant nothing coming from the customer, the person that gave the games their power, the person that bought their drugs. There was an incident where she tried to tell her youngest Antonio to get his life together. And he told her, you ain't been living your life, right?

So don't tell me how to live mine. If Maria ever tried to even scold her kids in front of her own parents, so the grandparents live in the house, right? Her parents would yell at Maria, ah, you were just as wild when you were young. Leave them alone, they'll grow out of it. So anytime the boys were in trouble, they would bring up the fact that Maria was hooked on drugs

that she didn't do anything better with her life. So why should they? And this was you know her divine intervention for real this time I think Maria felt the hypocrisy dripping from her own words and from there she quit cold turkey She quit drinking smoking pot crack everything. She started going to church every week She started learning about gangs. She started going to church every week. She started learning about gangs. She started reading about gangs. She hated it. It was just getting worse every day. It went from blood this to blood that to all this gang rhetoric. That's what she called it. The corrupt cops are shaking us down. The brotherhood. It's us, the gang, against

the world. Women were all called bitches and hos. Cops were called the popo and the bad guys. And only gang members could be trusted. Gang members were family. Which side note, what's ironic is that the gang members would actually rob each other frequently. So I don't know how you call that family or some sort of brotherhood. I don't know if that's in all gangs,

but in this particular gang, that's what happened. They robbed each other all the time. None of them said they took it personally though because it wasn't their money to begin with. It's dirty money that they've been selling drugs for or stealing. And I think for them, the mentality was money is so easy to make because they're dealing drugs. Obviously, they didn't have any financial background to be financially literate, so they didn't take offense to having money stolen.

They're like, I'll just make it back. Now, if you're part of a rival gang and you stole their money though, that would be bad. Maria was shocked when she heard someone calling her sons by their nickname. Bang and boom. She said she was scared because that's the sound that guns make. These kids had guns. Yeah, and they would point loaded weapons at people who they perceived as enemies or rivals. And they would say things like, and I quote Antonio, he said this,

if you're not willing to shoot, then get out of my face because I'll kill you and I don't care. How old are they at this point? Like high school, yeah, like 15 at this point. BANG and BOOM were proud of their nicknames. They felt like it was proof. Proof to the gang to the rivals

that they were willing to be violent and they were willing to get dirty if they had to. The brother's reputation was so big and honestly, so horrendous, that whenever there was a random shoot-out or a drive-by shooting, people were like, oh, it was probably bangin' boom. Yeah. Wow. So what have her sons gotten into?

Maria starts attending these neighborhood meetings sponsored by a church that was to educate the community on drugs and gangs and, you know, the things that are happening recently because it just feels like all of a Set in this neighborhood was infiltrated by drugs and gangs the police would attend these meetings as well and the police were really harsh because I think most people attending these meetings were Not affiliated with drugs and gangs. They're like oh no my community is breaking down my house values going down So the police had no idea Maria was there. So they just straight up said, we'll solve the problem this way. Round them up, put them in the stadium and shoot them all down. And Maria's eyes went wide. And she said, excuse me. I'm the mother of two gang members. These people, the gangs, the bloods and the crypts or whatever. The gangs moved into Denver and started recruiting

our children and your solution is to shoot our children. A lot of people in Colorado ultimately blamed California. So California had a raging gang problem. Some of the most notorious gangs were originated and formed in California and California started making these deals. Hey, gang member, we don't want to house you in the prisons because in the prisons the gangs are going crazy too. So we're going to do this.

We're going to defer your sins. But if you ever come back into the state, you're going in a prison. So they'd be like, okay, bye, California. What are the nearby states? Let's go to fucking Colorado. Is that really what happened? Yeah.

Wow. So a bunch of gangs started dispersing throughout the United States. A lot of them ended up in nearby Denver, and Maria was learning a lot. She tried to fix her children, but they didn't want to be fixed. Sometimes you want things for someone more than they wanted for themselves. So nothing she did helped. She tried flushing their drugs, getting rid of any gun she found in the house, even kicked

Danny out of the house at one point. Nothing. There was nothing Maria could do to save them. The guys were in too deep. They even had their own gang. So they were considered a subset of the bloods. They called themselves Duce Sevin, Crenshaw Mafia Bloods. So Duce Sevin stood for 27, 27 California. And apparently the house that they lived in wasn't the heart of crypt territory, which if this sounds super foreign, I'm gonna get into it in a second. So for them to start a bloods gang in rival territory, it was Balzi, it was dangerous, it's potentially fatal, but they wanted everyone to know that they weren't scared.

But the mom lives there. Yeah, they don't care. Yeah, so that's like me starting a little country inside of North Korea and calling it South Korea, and then naming the address in North Korea that I live in. You're just, it's so blatant. You're asking for trouble. You're asking for something that happened at that house.

A family of Danny and Antonio said, it was weird. Danny was very respectful, very polite. You would never know that he's in a gang. But the money changed him. All the money from selling drugs. He always had wads of cash that he would throw around. Money is power. Danny and his brother Antonio had a lot of power

on the streets. It's weird, they wanted respect, but the only way they got respect was through fear and guns. That's why they always had guns on them. Now, all that fear, all that anger toward the whole family apart. Side note about money. At the height of the brother's gang life or career, I'm not sure what you call it, lifestyle,

at the height, right? They're making so much money and blowing it all the next day, like all of it. They would rent out penthouse sweets in the fanciest hotels in Denver, and they thought they kind of got a kick out of making hotel staff do things. Like these are people that would normally look down on them. That would never let them loiter on the premises, that would call the cops on them,

but this just goes to show money talks. As long as they can pay the money for the penthouse, what are they going to do? They would buy their girlfriends designer goods. They would blow all their cash on shopping trips at the mall. I mean, it was a lot. Their neighbors started to call the cops on them. Antonio said they didn't like all these young guys who didn't seem to have jobs, but drove around nice cars and sat around talking on their phones. We weren't doing nothing wrong. I mean, we weren't shooting anybody on the front yard or the back yard.

What I think they really didn't like was all these gang members coming over to visit. I just want to clarify. I come from like, obviously, I think most of us listening to come from a privileged place where we are not associated with gangs. So it's very different to say, oh, well, I would never join a gang.

It's like saying I would never join a cult. Unless you're in a very specific set of circumstances and your environment is a very specific way. It's hard to say, but I will say we have a loved one who has been affected tremendously by the gang lifestyle, by gangs and gang affiliations. And it's, it is so terrifying. Like it's heartbreaking and terrifying. And it's like a cult.

You can't even talk to them. You can't even have a conversation of like, I think you're ruining your life. And I want to help you because I love you. Like you just can't. Whether you're doing a dance to your favorite artist in the office parking lot, or being guided into Warrior I in the break room before your shift, whether you're running on your Peloton tread at your mom's house while she watches the baby,

or counting your breaths on the subway. Peloton is for all of us, wherever we are whenever we need it. Download the free Peloton is for all of us, wherever we are, whenever we need it. Download the free Peloton app today. Peloton app available through free tier or paid subscription starting at 12.99 per month. Why would you break into these apartments? For money, for drugs, whatever was in there?

Why aren't you afraid of getting caught at doing this? No. Who's going to catch us? What a police. getting caught at doing this? No, who's gonna catch us? What a police. It was the height of the crack era, and instead of locking up drug dealers, some New York City cops had become them. I would suit up in my uniform and we're gonna want some drug dealers,

and I know how to do it really well. This is the inside story of the biggest police corruption scandal in NYPD history and the investigation that uncovered it all. Did you consider yourself a rat? 100% I saved my soul just like everybody else does. Listen to and follow the set, an Odyssey Originals documentary podcast series available now in the Odyssey app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your shows. I'm not a big guy, man, but I love being that dirty mother f***er.

So the bloods and the crypts are a tale as old as time, it seems. If you're lucky, you've probably only heard about them in songs or references and movies, or maybe you learn the gang science, the bloods. You know, you spell it with your hands. I remember in my little small town high school, people would throw up that sign in their popped-colored polo shirts. It's ridiculous now that I think about it. Thinking they were cool. And that's if you're lucky. If you're unlucky, you know about the bloods and the crypts because someone you know or someone you love is either in one or has been affected by one or is affiliated by one, but to put it really

simply because I can, you know, do some internet research, but it's a lot, right? The bloods in the crypts, they were the biggest gangs in California. Now they have subsets across the United States, and they both remain one of the largest and most violent associations of street gangs in the United States. They're still active. Both gangs are really similar in that they dabble in gambling, illegal gambling, drug dealing, sex work, forced sex work, larceny, robbery, racketeering, vandalism, property crime, auto theft, and also for the black market sale of firearms and weapons.

They mainly had their rise to funds and power when they started selling crack cocaine to practically everyone. There are a lot of gang members who would sell to their own parents, sell to their own family members, their own grand parents. It was really bad. And they're really dangerous. They will indoctrinate young high school kids at one point most of the members of one of the gangs was 17 years old. That was the average age of the gang member in this massive gang that has like 50,000 members.

They will indoctrinate the young high school kids to sell to their friends or to get them hooked on the drug sooner and quicker or to sell to their parents or anybody they knew and they tell the kids, it's okay because you're a minor. So if you get caught, you're going to be let off with a slap on the wrist. It was really bad. Yeah, the gangs were wreaking havoc in their own community, and they were doing stuff that you really can't put on like a W2. Like that's what they were doing. So these California gangs, they start breaking off, creating their own sets of gangs, which

sidenotes, sometimes subsets of crypts would have rivalry with other subsets of crypts and the same thing with bloods, so it's not just black and white, or I guess in this case red and blue, because the color for the bloods is red, the color for the crypts is blue. So they have their own hand signs, and they all start venturing into Colorado to sell more crack cocaine. It's almost like a race to get more turf to get more area in all these distant neighboring states and cities. But before we talk about the murder, we have to talk about a different shooting. Antonio Martinez, Danny's little brother, shot someone a few days before his 15th birthday. This is kind of important. It was allegedly a crypt group that was walking past their house. And for some reason, Antonio was really triggered by

that. He felt like they were looking for trouble. They were bigger than him They were older than him and they were flashing game signs. They were doing the Crip handsome symbol He felt like if he didn't do anything Word would get around that you could go to the Martinez house and mess with him and they won't do anything So he pulled out his gun and he screamed yeah motherfucker. What's up? You think this is a game? The Crip started running and Antonio claimed he did a name. He just fired a shot to scare them. And he laughed later as he reminisced about this moment,

but one of the rival gang members got shot in the butt. And he went to jail. 15-year-old Antonio went to jail, and that would oddly save his life. So at first, Antonio said he didn't care that he was arrested. He was actually excited to be on the news. He wanted everyone to know what he did and he thought it was cool. It would get him more street cred. Even though he was potentially going to be charged as an adult for attempted murder, he really did not care. He was proud. He didn't show any weakness.

And then a few wake-up calls happened. After that, the house at 2727 California was involved in a drive-by shooting. Maria's little brother, Jimmy, so this is his uncle and Tonyo's uncle, his young kids, talking like three years old. We're sleeping over, they were sleeping on the living room couch, and bullets start raining down into the house through the windows, shattering glass everywhere. The bangs were ear-de deafening. Jimmy was the first to scream and everyone ran downstairs to check on his young kids and when they turned on the light, Jimmy had been shot five times and as he was screen panicking, they said they could see the blood spurting out of him because the blood is flowing and pumping and with the screams it.

The three-year-old? No, her little brother. Oh, the uncle? Yeah, the uncle. The kids were thankfully fine. But it was a revenge shooting. They were aiming for Danny, because Antonio was in jail, so they were trying to kill his brother. And it was really complicated for Maria,

because there must have been pain that, because of her own children, her brother almost died. But also, no, he's survived. But it would be a long journey. But maybe also relief as a mom, that it wasn't Danny. I don't know, it's very complicated, you know? And maybe there's fear about like, is that it? Yeah, how can you imagine?

And then another shootout. You know how they have an older sister? Danny and Antonio. Yeah, she was home with her newborn daughter when bullets started cascading into the house Thankfully this time nobody was shot, but there it was really bad and how does Danny and Antonio feel about this? They wanted revenge. They were like talking about how they were gonna get this and that and this and that and Maria finally confronted them and said there will be no revenge. You guys are the one that joined the gang. What do you expect? This is the consequence for what you do. You put us all in danger. Jimmy, Raquel, your sister, you know, your sister's daughter. So they didn't get revenge. Maria said that it was heartbreaking because

she would visit her son in juvenile prison. But that's not the part that was heartbreaking. The saddest thing is when he was in prison, he finally looked like a little kid. He wasn't looking over his shoulder, he wasn't holding a gun trying to be tough. He was playing soccer in the yard with other juvenile kids, with other kids like being a kid. He finally felt safe. He didn't have to look around see if there were crips coming or older bloods who didn't like him There was no posturing. There was no trying to fit into this hierarchy of gang life And I think Antonio realized yeah, this is not right and Tonya had dreams that did not involve maximum security Penitentiary he wanted to go to college

He wanted to be an artist one day. He has big dream which he thought you know was kind of stupid He was embarrassed about it, but he wanted to draw for Disney one day. He's very artistic, really good at drawing. He knew that if he kept going to prison, all those dreams would be down the drain. So he got his life together. When he got out. So this actually helped. Yeah. He stopped selling drugs. He still hung out with his friends, but he stopped engaging in gang activity. He stopped going to gang parties, flashing weapons, throwing up gang signs. He stopped wearing red. And he would say, you know, I didn't stop wearing red because I'm betraying the gang. He said he was already so well established in the area. Everybody knew which side he was on. He didn't have to wear red. Regardless, he worked hard, got into the Colorado Institute

of Art, and he would later go, and I quote, go legit, as the gang said. He has a tattoo shop with a friend in California, and he charges over $100 an hour for his tattoo work. He's a tattoo artist, yeah. Wow. Yeah. The same cannot be said for the rest of his family and his friends.

They were even deeper into the gang life. Danny did briefly try to go back to school, but then his girlfriend at the time got pregnant. So he was like, okay, well, I got to drop out of school and go to work. AKA drug dealing. Their house was a drug house. 27-27 California had all the proof of being a drug house. It was completely riddled with bullets in the front.

Sometimes they would wake up in the morning, go outside, and there was a new bullet hole, and they would just laugh. They'd be like, oh, I didn't even hear that. That's how used to they were at getting shot at. So as Antonio is finding a new path that doesn't involve gangs, he's kind of drifting from his brother, and it's weird because, you know, there's still brothers, Antonio said,

we'll always be boomin' bang. But there was kind of a distance now. Have you guys been to Clear Creek Canyon in Colorado? It's a known destination. People like it. It's not a desolate place. It's, I mean, from Google Maps, it looks kind of pretty, especially when the sky is blue, no clouds in the sky, just beautiful.

A group of college guys were driving down the canyon, windows down, music blasting. They're concerns that day. They're trying to figure out where to get cheap beer and who to hang out with. That's the kind of energy. Spontaneous, right? It's a fun, it's a fun day. They want to do things that feel good. So one of them's like, hey, why don't we pull over and hang out by the creek? The driver pulls over and warns his friends, you know, it'll be cold though, the creek. Yeah, well, this is a nice day. They park the car and they start heading down the grassy hill to the stream below. It's about 30 feet below. It's not just like a rolling grass hill. There's rocks. It's pretty steep. It's a long way down. So one of the friends was walking ahead

and I don't know how you were so calm, but he just turned around and pointed. There's rocks, it's pretty steep, it's a long way down. So one of the friends was walking ahead, and I don't know how you were so calm, but he just turned around and pointed. There's a body down there. His friends are like rolling their eyes, but then he looks down, thinking it's gonna be something else, right? But sure enough, there's a pair of blue jeans, pants, and connected to that is a completely nude body from the waist up. So they try to rush down as quickly as they can can and as they get closer and closer to the body, they see more and more red patches in the grass. Blood. And soon they were a few feet away from the body and there was a pool of congealed blood around the body

and they're like, oh my god, they stumbled back as fast as possible, they stumbled up the embankment, scraping their knees, their hands, I mean, they're out of breath. This is back when having a cell phone was not the norm. So they didn't have one. So they ran back up the road, they start jumping up and down on the road, waving their hands around, and let's be real. A bunch of college dudes trying to get you to stop in the middle of a canyon, no matter

how pretty the day or clear the sky, most of us would be skeptical. So a ton of cars pass them, it takes them like a minute or five to finally have someone pull over, and he's like Oh, I have a cell phone. I have a cell phone. He tries calling 911. His reception doesn't work. And since one car stopped, another car stops like what's the commotion? What's going on guys? Do you need a jumper cable or something? And soon there's a whole crowd of people have running half crawling, sliding down the hill to see the body. Finally, they collectively decide, yes, they're indeed is a body, the boys are not lying, they were not mistaken, they run back up the hill and agree that they will all drive to the nearest phone and call the police. A few minutes

later, Jefferson County Sheriff's Department was bombarded, was bombarded with calls. Please help, there's a body at Clear Creek Canyon, oh my god, lots of blood, please hurry. A female police officer, Diane, was the first one at the scene. She got close enough to see a little girl lying on her back, facing the sky with her eyes closed. She was really close to the stream. Her head was almost in the water, and her feet were kind of pointed up the hill.

It's almost like she was trying to run up the hill and fell backward, like propelled back. Her hands were handcuffed behind her. She was covered in blood and there was so much blood. There was blood all over her around her body, up the hill, a trail of blood smearing rocks, grass, plants leading down to her. The police were able to gather that she tried countless times to get up, to get up the hill, falling falling back due to her injuries and due to her arms being handcuffed behind her. Then she would get back up and try again until she finally fell on that time.

Diane had been a police officer for 13 years and she said she had never seen anything like this. There were giant rocks soaked in blood. Even if you picked up the rock, the soil underneath was completely soaked in blood. It was a day of horror and pain for people in this line of work. Diane was shocked. She handed the body over to the medical examiner who had done about 9,000 autopsy in his career.

And at this point, he said, very, very few, whereas disturbing as this one. It was a child, a A tiny tiny little girl, barely five feet tall, maybe a hundred pounds. A tiny little body tortured and mutilated and murdered. There were bruises everywhere all over her body. A bite mark on her left breast. Her rectum was mutilated. And it looked like somebody had cut her rectum entrance with a knife. She had 28 stab wounds all over her body, chest, neck, and back. She had blood to death. And the next day, that little girl's mom was standing on the other side of the wall. With a glass window separating her from her daughter on the cold table, this is how you ID the bodies. And they all watched as she screamed and tapped on the glass window saying, wake up baby, wake up. Please wake up. Brandi Duval would not wake up.

She had died two months before her 15th birthday. 14-year-old Brandi Duval was someone who really liked to follow the rules, but also she liked to break them. And you're like, what? That doesn't even make sense. So Brandi got good grades. She made honor roles. She was, she obsessed over each test. I mean, she stressed herself out. She just wanted to make her mom proud and her step-dad proud. She was like any teenager. She was innocent at heart, even if it didn't seem that way. So for example, and people try to bring this up during the trial later, but Brandi wasn't a virgin at 14. But it's not because she was this promiscuous girl, she was still so naive and innocent about sex. She would still get a little bit uncomfortable when there was a slightly promiscuous scene on TV.

She was confused about some of the sex scenes. She liked to wear certain clothes, she hated wearing swimsuits at the pool. She would wear jeans to the pool and her mom was scared that she would drown in the pool. She wouldn't even wear mascara. She was just trying to find herself. But overall, she was an honor role student who studied a lot. And when she was done like any other kid, she wanted to try having fun. So that night, she had gone to her best friend's house. And they drank a few beers. They smoked a bit of marijuana. She left at around

11.30 pm. It's the weekend. She walked to a local bus stop on South Federal Boulevard and from there she was going to take the bus and it stops about maybe a few blocks from her grandparents house. That was the plan. And earlier that day she had seen her mom giving her this big hug and said, I love you. I'm going to be back home later. I mean the two of them had this really close relationship. People that knew Brandy and her mom, Angela, they said that they were more like friends than mother and daughter. Brandi had this independence about her.

She was street smart. She was, you know those kids that you don't have to constantly tell them, do your homework, do your homework, because they're so responsible, they do their homework. Brandi was like that. After a night with her best friend, she's ready to go home

She's the type of kid that likes to sleep in her own bed and she was bubbling with excitement They were living with her grandparents at the time But they finally were getting their own apartment with her her mom and her stepped out and they were moving in tomorrow So she's like yes, and she's standing at the bus stop and remember she's wearing her favorite outfit She loves basketball and her idol, like a lot of basketball players, you know, it was Michael Jordan. Michael Jordan's jersey happened to be bright red because he played for the Chicago Bulls. So she was wearing red with black shorts and red black and white sneakers.

And then she would be taken into a gang member's house. What happens inside that house, it's not 2727 California, but it's on West Hawthorne Place. It was rented by a man that everyone refers to as Uncle Jose Martinez. What happens in that house is a collection of events given by Jose, the uncle, and another gang member,

remember the cousin Samuel? Yeah. So they're gonna tell us what happened, and it's not good. Five of the gang members, none of the main ones, but five random gang members, pull up in a car and they talk to Brandy. They didn't kidnap her off the street, but they lured her into the car with some sort of fake promise of something.

I'm not sure what, so I don't want to speculate, but the prosecution has speculated. Maybe they told her they were going to drive her home. Maybe they promised her more beer. It didn't really matter in the end why she got in the car because who cares if she got in the car if she wanted to leave at any point, she should be able to leave at any point.

So that's not even an argument. Inside the car, five gang members. They drive straight to Uncle Jose's house. Now they call him Uncle Jose because he's Danny and Antonio's uncle, but he's not Samuel's dad. Yeah, okay, so this is a different uncle, yeah. Uncle Jose.

So Uncle Jose is sleeping, and his young kids are in the house too, and he's actually sleeping in the room with his young kids because he had a bunch of clean laundry piled up on his bed, and he didn't have time to put it away. So he's asleep, and inside of his house in the living room are Danny, Francisco, Frank, and Sammy. So Antonio is gone. He's like studying and doing shit. This is like the

core group. And for the next five hours, it was just pure evil, a free-for-all rape torture, murder nightmare. Samuel said the other gang members brought bandy into the house and excitedly told him that this girl was down to screw everybody. Samuel said nobody cared to get to know her name, and if she didn't want to quote, screw everybody, it didn't matter because they were going to take control of this situation. He saw Bandy being escorted into the house and she had her head down. She appeared to be high or drunk and nobody introduced her to anyone. Nobody offered her a beer or water.

She was taken to the bathroom, stripped down naked by the gang members, and then carried into Jose, Uncle Jose's bedroom, the empty bedroom. And side note, there were other girls there at the time. Girls that were dating some of the gang members. But nobody cared. So we get bits and pieces of that night. Jose said that he walked into his room because he heard some noises and he saw Danny standing over

someone who was lying on the ground. It wasn't Brandy though, it was a dude. Wait, who walked in the room? Uncle Jose, Uncle Jose. So he woke up. Yeah, he was like, what's going on? Yeah. And then he sees Danny standing over our body

and it's a dude. He's like, what the fuck is going on? The dude's name was Smiley. He was getting initiated into the gang. So then Uncle Jose is like, what the fuck is going on? The dude's name was Smiley. He was getting initiated into the gang. So then Uncle Jose is like, oh my god, goes back to sleep. He's like, who's to this, right? He said, I don't want any part of it, whatever.

Goes back to sleep. Later, he hears more noises and then the door opens to the room that he's sleeping in and it's Francisco. This is Pancho, right? Francisco. And he says, hey, Uncle Jose, do you want some head? Yeah, that's

what he said. They were already gang being brandy at this point, forcing her to perform Felatio on the gang members while they took turns raping her. Side note, remember how that guy smiley had just been initiated into the gang that night? The way that they even confessed to the police is that they quote, allowed him to be Brandy, because he was now a member of the gang, and he was quote entitled to her now. Another side note, the star witness Samuel, the cousin, yeah, Sammy, he was the first to be Brandy. He said, at that point, I took the initiative

and I had sex with her. So Jose is like, no, Francis go, I don't want no head. But then later, he kept hearing noises and he was getting annoyed. So he went into his room and he found Danny waping brandy. But he claimed he didn't really know that it was right at that point. He wouldn't have second, but at that point he claimed he didn't know. He said the room was filled with blood. Yeah, I'm like, how did you not think it was right?

And he said that he was annoyed because he thought, wow, they're really having sex with this girl, and she's on her menstrual period. Like, it's her menstrual cycle, which I don't know is kind of hard to believe, okay? So then Uncle Jose claims he starts yelling at the gang members who are all watching Danny Brandy, and they're like laughing and cheering him on. And he yells at them, get out of my fucking house,

you're fucking up the house, get this bitch out of my house, she's fucking up everything. He said nobody was listening to him. He said it was like nobody understood English, all of a sudden. They just carried on. Jose heard Francis go say, my turn, and forced the girl to perform Felatio on him.

Danny got off Brandy, physically got off her, and Jose said it was alarming. So everybody is standing there laughing at Danny because once he was done raping Brandy, physically got off her, and Jose said it was alarming. So, everybody is standing there laughing at Danny because once he was done raping Brandy, he was covered in blood. His pants were down to his ankles, his underwear was all bloody, so he was wearing white boxers and they were now red. He had red blood all over his legs. And he was just hopping away, content with himself, away from the bed, and into the shower

in the bathroom. Jose claimed at this point he starts yelling again like, content with himself, away from the bed, and into the shower in the bathroom. Jose claimed at this point he starts yelling again, like, why is there fucking blood all over my house? And they all ignored him, and instead they escorted Brandi into the bathroom to clean her up. Jose saw Danny and Francisco go into the cramped bathroom with her, and out of nowhere, Francisco just bodies slams her onto the ground. Through her onto the ground of the cold bathroom. Jose said that Francisco did this as hard as he could. Mind you, Brandy is barely a hundred pounds, and Francisco, I don't know, but looking at his mug shot, I would guesstimate 250 to 300 pounds.

I mean, just that kind of force? It was alarming, and they're all just laughing. I just want to know what's so freaking funny. Like, is the joke funnier in prison, Francisco? Because what's so funny to some people about violence against woman? I don't get it. So Jose said that he kept continuing to yell at everybody, but nobody listened, and he gave up and left.

And then he came back and he saw Brandy on the bed again, forced onto her hands and knees, and somebody was raping her, and he said that he heard someone laugh and say oh man somebody fucked her up and so as I was like what? so he looks and he saw that her rectum was bleeding profusely and her rectum entrance was the size of a grapefruit and he said that's when it hit him that this was rape he said and I quote this was no freebie this was rape she continued to get raped and Jose said he didn't quote, this was no freebie, this was rape. She continued to get raped, and Jose said he didn't know if she was being sotomized or raped. Because if she was sotomized, I imagine that would be incredibly painful.

Not that it's not already. So it's suspected that Brandy had such intense wounds on her rectum because Francisco wanted to sotomize her, and it wasn't working so potentially he had taken a knife to rip her rectum open. Jose said Francisco was having the whole time and later he would go into the kitchen grab a broom and ordered Annie to stop what he's doing and violently shove the broom into Brandy's rectum that had already been mutilated. Jose said

at this point she she was crying, please don't do that. It hurts, please let me go. Please take me to the hospital, but Francisco kept laughing. And then Danny announces, I got shit on my shoes. So I mean, when you have that much mutilation

and wounds to your rectum, you're not really gonna be able to hold in your feces or any of that. Like, it's Francisco gets pissed and gets all up in Brandy's face to tell her. And I quote, you got shit on his shoes. That's my friend bitch. And he backs up, gets all the strength that he has and kicks her in the chest. Uncle Jose said that Francisco did this really hard as hard as he could like he would kick a football.

They dragged her into the bathroom and Uncle Jose said that he was trying to get in because he was worried and all he could do was peep through the door and he saw Danny forcing her to perform filetio. Meanwhile, Francisco had a toilet plunger and he's not sure what he did with the toilet plunger. Jose claimed he kept screaming at them to leave her alone and they kept walking him out of the bathroom. Then the next thing Jose knows is they're grabbing handcuffs and handcuffing Brandi, and they're still not done assaulting her. For a few more hours, non-stop Jose heard other guy screaming, my turn, my turn. He just remembers that she kept asking to be taken to the hospital. Francesco and Danny were throwing her around, assaulting her, and at one point, Francis go jumps

up and kicks her in the back of the head with his foot. And then he asked her, do you know where we are? Brandi gave the right answer, and it was the wrong answer. I'm not sure it would have made a difference anyway. She said 60th and federal, and immediately the guys start talking about how they have to quote dust her, since she knows where they are. She could hear them all discussing how to kill her. They're like, oh, why don't we grab this wire and choke her out, and pretending to choke each other while she's sitting right there, screaming

and crying in pain. Imagine a 14-year-old girl tortured for hours a child, bleeding profusely naked, bloody, battered, hands cuffed behind her back terrified, listening to the tortures her captors, discussing how to end her life. She gave the right answer, but it was the wrong answer. So they pull a pair of jeans over her,

left her nude on the top and threw her into the car. If she didn't move as fast as they wanted or if really anything, they would just kick and throw her. Later Samuel said that night, everybody agreed that she had to be taken out. Later prosecutor would ask, take her out, meaning you're gonna kill her? He nodded and said,

not out to dinner if that's what you're thinking. Jose kept saying everyone had the devil in them that night. Now, side note about Uncle Jose. He claims that he tried everything that he could to stop what was happening to that little girl, but nobody would listen to him. They wouldn't stop. They were like possessed animals.

And he was way too scared to do anything because of the gang. Jose said that Brandi was still alive when they dragged her out of the house. And by all accounts, I believe that to be true. And he hoped that they were taking her to the hospital, which like used your brain cells, Uncle Jose. They're not.

I don't know why you would have such stupid hope in these people. Also, if you wanted her to be taken to the hospital, why don't you call the police? Why don't you make sure that she gets medical help? But instead, Jose just starts cleaning up his house. He finds Brandy's clothes, throws them in a corner, he finds her high school ID card, and a B-shaped diamond pendant

that he throws into the corner. He said he didn't know her name until he heard the news a couple days later and heard her name. The next day, the guys came over to pick up Brandy's stuff and get rid of the bloody mattress. Jose had no problem handing everything over. Again, he claims it's because he's terrified for his life and he was so scared of the gang that they were going to kill him. He did everything that they asked, which nobody believes him. So the truth is, I don't think Jose actively participated in the murders. And I do think there were times where he said, Hey, don't do this.

But it wasn't don't do this. You're hurting someone. It was don't do this in my house. Don't get blood on my floors. But he does try to be this heroic person later during the trials. So just remember, we don't like this man. He said that he handed over all of Brandy's belongings except he kept something that fell out of her pocket

and it was a prayer card, which is basically a holy card that has a saint or a religious scene on one side. The other side has a prayer. And under that prayer was an inscription and it read, see, I will not forget you. I have carved you in the palm of my hand. It's supposed to be in doing. Jose would later tell his families, his kids,

that night was the worst night of his life. He said that they were like demons. Nobody would listen. It was later said, nobody thinks much when these guys and gangs kill each other. They even think they're like soldiers fighting for each other in their quote hood, but now they're killing civilians. There is no honor in that. It's sick, just killing children. Jose's kid said, these are family members, these are cousins, we wanted

to blame it on drugs. How else can you explain what they did to that little girl? They just tore her up, but they don't do drugs. They get drunk, they smoke some pot, but they don't do crack, they don't do cocaine, they sell it. So this guy would not under cruise drugs. They were just drunk. Not that that would do anything, but no, yeah, they weren't even on drugs. So at this point, only Frank was under age.

He was 17 and the rest were in their 20s. Yeah, like 25. So the gang members, they dragged her into the car. Jose said that he would have violently fought, you know know had his grandkids not been in the house. He was so scared for their lives Anyway, they went out and apparently Danny told Jose before leaving Uncle Joe, I'm gonna take her home like a good little boy. Don't worry. They left her on 4.30 a.m In the car it was Sammy the cousin driving There was Francisco in the passenger seat.

And in the back was Danny, Frank, and Brandy. Sammy said they were blasting loud rap music, but not loud enough to not hear Brandy. She was begging, saying, I won't say anything. I don't know you, please don't do this. She was pleading for her life. Francisco in the passenger seat didn't find it heartbreaking.

In fact, he found it annoying. He leaned back and started stabbing her in the stomach with a knife right there in the car. Sammy, the driver got pissed and told him not to, not because he was a great person, but just like Uncle Joe, he didn't want blood on his property that he would have to clean up later. So Francisco stopped stabbing Brandy and started strangling her instead. She stopped struggling at one point, but she was still alive. They drove all the way to the canyon, parked, where it was quiet, over in embankment, everyone got out. Sammy said immediately Francisco started stabbing her. Force turned onto the ground, face down stabbed her

over and over in the back of her neck and the back. Danny and Frank were just standing there watching and Francisco starts struggling so he tells Sammy to hold her down by the hair while Francisco stabs her more. Once he was done, he picked her up and threw her down the embankment. She was still alive. They grabbed the knife and drove off. Brandy was alone in the dark and she did not give up. She stood up and tried to climb, and when she fell back down, she stood up again and tried to climb. And when she fell back down, she stood up again and tried to climb.

But because of the fact that she had been stabbed close to 30 times, she was fatally wounded, bleeding profusely, her hands were cuffed behind her back and coupled with the steepness of the hill that even when you're not bleeding, even when you're at your best physical state, and your hands are free and you can do whatever you've got gloves on, it would be hard. She kept getting propelled backward whenever she tried to get up again. And then finally she felt one last time. Sammy said on their way back home, Danny said, without emotion, without remorse, he said, we're serial killers now.

After Brandy's body was identified, the police start their search. They find out she was with her best friend. They find out what time she left, what bus stop she went to. They start investigating and they get a call. Then a man named Jose Martinez knew about what happened to Brandy Duval. So they start questioning Uncle Jose and they piece together the story. Danny was on the run. He refused to turn himself in and be arrested. Maria found out what was going on before he went on the run, and she begged him to turn himself in. She told him, whatever happens, we have to face this together,

we have to give it up to God, but he refused. He said he couldn't pair the idea of sitting in prison for the rest of his life. Yeah, boohoo, we don't care, Danny. So he goes on the run, and honestly, the crime itself obviously doesn't make any sense whatsoever But the whole thing was just bizarre even for investigators because they had spent their whole careers cracking down on gang activity They said Brandy's murder wasn't even quote business like it's not a gang hit

It was literally pure evil pure dripping brutality her body was dumped where she was probably gonna be found There were a ton of witnesses. It doesn't even make sense It was so blatant. It was so in your face that the investigators were shocked. So the trial, finally, they're all arrested and the main ones that would be facing the death penalty would be 20, everyone in the car, basically except for Sammy.

So Sammy, the reason that the driver, the one that held Brandy's head down while she was getting stopped, the only reason that he's not the one getting charged with the death penalty was because he was the first to talk. So they were like, okay, we're gonna give you a deal since you're the first to talk and everybody else is getting the death penalty. So we had 25-year-old Danny, Bang Martinez, 25-year-old Danny Bang Martinez, 25-year-old Francis go poncho Martinez and 17-year-old Frank Little Bang, vigil junior, who was going to be charged as an adult. You know how there were other gang members there, right? They would all be arrested, but they would accept plea bargains in exchange to testify against these three.

So the main star witnesses were Uncle Jose and the cousin Samuel. These were the main star witnesses were Uncle Jose and the cousin Samuel. These were the main star witnesses. Everyone in the family was pissed about it, right? I guess. I don't know. Peace about what? That the family members were. Turning on?

Yeah. What? Yeah, it's really bizarre. Especially Samuel, because Samuel was actually indicted for two murders. So when he was arrested for Brandi DuVol's murder, he was already a suspect in a different murder case. So him getting a plea deal just didn't sit right with a lot of people, right? Yeah. Not too long before Brandi's murder, he was involved in the murder of a 19-year-old girl named Venus Montoya. So Sammy and his friend

that was part of the gang, his name is Alejandro Ornila's and he went by speed. They decided that they were gonna go kill a snitch. So this guy had snitched on them and they got to the apartment where the snitch allegedly lived and they just started shooting inside the apartment from the outside. And there were eight people inside. Only one died. And it was a completely innocent person, Venus. She was living there with her little child and her twin sister and that night was actually supposed to be the best night of her life.

Her boyfriend John was there and he had actually proposed her. So they were sitting on the bed and this was a night to remember for her and then boom, glass shatters, chaos breaks, instinctively John shot down under the bed, reached up, pulled Venus down, but at the same time that he pulled her down, she had been shot in the head and blood and brain matter splattered everywhere. 19 more bullets were fired into the apartment with an assault rifle. Venus was completely unrecognizable. Her fiance, John, held her in his arms while sobbing, and he was screaming, don't do this, don't do this to me. held her in his arms while sobbing and he was screaming, don't do this, don't do this to me.

And when he heard the police sirens, he had to rip himself from his fiance and run away because he too had warrants out for his arrest. Meanwhile, Samuel and Alejandra walked away and told all their gangfriends what happened and Alejandra bragged. He said, and I quote, I smoked that bitch. Later the authorities would tell the jury, this is the ugly side of life. My don't expect you guys as jurors to like it, but you will be exposed to a world where someone can kill an innocent 19 year old mother of a little boy and not be ashamed. During the trial of Alejandro Ornila's for the murder of Venus, he was found guilty, by the way.

One of his female relatives stood up and flipped off the family of the victim and screamed, that fucking bitch deserved to die if she was hanging out with snitches. Should it be pulled from the courtroom by a riot squad? Antonio, yeah, I know, we thought we liked Antonio, right? Antonio Martinez, Danny's little brother, actually weighed in to the author, Steve Jackson, about this murder, and he said, Venus was no innocent bystander.

She was smart enough to make decisions not to be around gang members. Gangs are synonymous with violence, and she damn well better have known what she was doing was life-tharning. Everyone sees her as this innocent little girl, well fuck that dude. If she had died in a drunk driving accident, everyone would have thought that she was an idiot, but because she's hanging out with gang members getting drunk, that's different. Like, whose fault is any of this? The cops, because they set us up against each other and sometimes innocent people get hurt? Or is it her fault?

Because she thought it was cool having a big gangster around, and then she wound up dead on the floor. Or maybe it's her boyfriend's fault for not telling her that she was in danger because of him. And then in the end, he quietly said to the floor, or maybe it's her boyfriend fault for not telling her that she was in danger because of him. And then in the end, he quietly said to the author, or is it our fault for hating so much that we shoot moms in their houses? And then he said, yeah, it's our fault. I don't know, just give me, really, I'm confused. It's just kind of bizarre to me, like how can you say brotherhood, family this, family that, and then treat others' lives like they have no value?? I mean I believe that you can't use the word love or act

like you even know what love or loyalty is if you don't even value human life. I think what's interesting is the book does shed a light to the parents of the killers and their reactions to their child's children being rapists and murderers. In the case of Francisco it seems that his parents were more upset that he was going through this than the fact that a life was brutally taken. Other members of the family blamed Brandi DuVal, saying that there must be some blame on her and her parents too, because why was a 14-year-old girl waiting at a bus stop at that time in this type of area? I don't even know what's wrong with people. And then you have the more

complicated emotions like the ones that Maria had, so Danny and Antonio's mom. She said, she was ashamed and angry with her son, but she didn't want him to die in the death penalty. She said she admits that not wanting her son to die is selfish. She said, I don't want to sit through a trial and listen to what they did to that poor little girl, but I want him to be alive first to little boys. She begged him to take some sort of plea deal and he refused because he didn't want

to turn on his best friend. So basically the prosecutors were like, hey, we're going to give you life in prison without parole like you're not ever getting less than that for this. You're not going to die though. So we'll give you that, but you have to write a written statement of your involvement and everybody else's. So he would be implicating his friends, and it wouldn't be good for their trials. And he refused. He refused to be a snitch. Those were his words. Yeah, and it's also suspected that Danny thought that he could somehow beat his death penalty

murder charge. Like, I don't know why he thought that. That boggles my mind that he thought that. His attorneys had to repeatedly tell him that you were fantasizing that's not going to happen. You're not getting away with this. and he's had to repeatedly tell him that you were fantasizing, the deal was a good deal. What about compassion for that girl's family?

and they're going to make me say something to hurt Francis go in his trial and I can't have that Maria said with tears and eyes things are shitty for Danny But nothing compared to what that little girl went through there is no excuse and I feel for that family And I think of her mom all the time So I know this is interesting, but Maria had to show up in support of Danny's trial to show the jury and the judge that Danny's own mother was still supporting him He had someone that loved him cared for him. It was to humanize the defendant, right? But she would be hearing all the disgusting, wild, demonic things that her son had done, and she was not allowed to show any shock, tears, emotion, or anything, because the jury would take

that as even your own mom is disgusted by you and your actions. So the attorneys had her basically trained to go to trial by reading and watching the most gruesome violent films with violence against women as she could find to desensitize herself. What did she say about that? It was rough. It was horrific. I think even the mentality that you have to be into to even get to that point where you're reading about this And I think I'm sure as she's reading about this she's probably picturing her son doing that so It's really crazy and I don't know how to feel about that like the whole thing is strange She even said even though she's doing all of this to support her son She feels so guilty about what her son did to Brandy Duval. She said she thinks about Brandy's mother all the time.

She said that she felt guilty and sorry for whatever deficiencies that she had as a mother for her son to end up like this. She said she was the one that exposed the kids to the gang life and now they were sucked in and no matter how hard she had tried to pull them out, it didn't work. She said on the same hand, as a mother, she still loves Danny and she can't abandon him, no matter what he did. She feels ashamed for even hoping that the state won't kill her son after what he did

to her. Very real. Real. She said. It's complex. Look, Danny is not the victim here. He had his chances, just like Antonio. He could have stayed in college, he could have given up the gang life, he could have stayed

out of state, he chose to mess his life up. That little girl did not choose what happened to her. I don't know. What do you guys think? I've never had a child so I don't think I can even begin to think how I feel or what I would do. But I think in this position where I have no children and I know that a love for a child is completely different. But I don't know. Anybody in my life that I love so much, like my partner, my parents, my family members, I don't know.

I can't even imagine the feel like this level of violence towards a child, maybe from Maria to feeling as a parent that you feel like you're the part of the reason why they did this. So you need to take accountability and try to fix them? I don't know. Maybe it's just love and support, maybe I don't know. What are your thoughts? For me, I think it's like the serial killers. You know, on one hand, you see how it's the system, it's the parent, society, everyone fails them as a child,

and for that reason, their life is altered, but in the end, there's millions of people who have been failed over and over again by life in the world, and they would never hurt a fly. So there were a lot of talks during the trial that it wasn't these guys who killed Brandy. It was the system who failed the guys. And it's almost like taking accountability away from these guys. It's like, oh no, the system killed Brandy.

I think that's a slap in the face to the victim's families. And to give you more context, these weren't the only victims. So we have Venus that was murdered. We have Brandy Duwall so we have Venus that was murdered. We have Brandy Duwall who was raped, tortured and murdered. But apparently just one week before the murder, the gang members had gangbed another minor. She withdrew her police statement because she was terrified. A lot of victims were too scared to even go to the police. They knew the police probably wouldn't believe them. None of them were perfect victims. They

had their own criminal histories. And even if the police did believe them, there wouldn't be enough police protection to protect them against being a snitch. More women came forward during the trial to say that they were gangred by the members of the gang, or they had witnessed the gang being of other girls. There were girls that were actually part of this gang, so it wasn't just guys, right? One of the girls said that she felt like she was one of the guys and, and I quote, right, one of the girls said that she felt like she was one of the guys and I quote, me and the homegirls would be in one room getting high. And the guys would be in the back room pulling a train.

We knew what was going on, but I guess we kind of got caught up with the guys calling the other girl bitches and hos. We sat back and we didn't think too much about it, because the guys respected us. They'd take a shopping and buy us things. I liked all the money. We would steal and rob for them and if the girls didn't go along with it, we would beat other girls up. The gang also forced minors into sex work for them, sex trafficking basically, to make money, and the girls in the gang would enforce them. So if the minors didn't want to be sex trafficked, these girls would beat them up.

And when the gangs got tired of these girls, the female gang members were in charge of throwing them on onto the street and threatening them, that if they told another soul they would die. She also said that Uncle Jose knew about everything, about the constant gang rapes force prostitution sex trafficking everything, she said that he would take a cut if any of it happened in his house. So like I said, really bad guy. The gang member that testified said that it was all sick and crazy. She says now after having children of her own, she realizes just how low and she and everyone else had sunk.

She said at that time, it was like nobody else was real. Like other people weren't real to them. Their lives didn't matter. That is like the selfish, most selfish thing I've ever heard. I'm glad you're learning, but that's really bizarre, I think even kids know the concept. And out of everyone, she said Francisco was the worst. He always ordered the girls to beat up other girls, and she said, what we did to young girls affects me really badly.

I prayed to Brandi and asked her for forgiveness. I don't know if I will ever be able to forgive myself. A few things to note during the trial. Oftentimes for many of the trials, the courtrooms were jam-packed, but nobody, no press, no media, no courtroom watchers, nobody wanted to sit on the defendant's side, even if they weren't supporting him. So literally the room was not balanced. Everyone was standing near the prosecutor's side in the back of the room. They didn't care that there were empty seats. They did not want anyone to think that they were supporting the defendant, which I totally get. But I think the visual of that must have been something. Frank was found guilty as an adult. This is the 17 year old. And when his verdict was read, Frank the 17 year old

turned to the jury while he was being escorted out of the courtroom, smiled and nodded at them. What? It was bizarre. His lawyer later tried to argue that he was just scared and trying to pretend to be tough, but others argue, no, that's just no remorse. That's sick. Francisco, his trial was a shit show, he was found guilty, and during his trial his attorneys tried to seat a young woman at the

defense table right next to him. So a lot of, so annoying, so a lot of crimes against women, the defendant is usually a man, and they'll sit like a female paralegal or a female attorney next time Even if she's not the main one on the case because you know, it's like look at this woman who is not scared of this man It didn't work so she wasn't even taking notes She didn't participate in any of the courtroom discussions. It was very clear what the defense team was trying to do and Yeah, she was visibly uncomfortable when our Francesco with lean over and whisper something to her and eventually is the day's past she would be one seat away then another seat and then at the

complete opposite end of the table where frances go is so if anything it did the opposite of what they were trying to accomplish yeah during his trial frances go lashed out of the prosecutor screaming at him fuck you you fucking pussy fuck you bitch that's not even bad. Later, he smirked at Brandy's family. Smirked at them, and one by one nodded at her mom, her stepdad, her grandparents almost as a, I see you, threat. Later during a recess, he straight up laughed in their face and mouth, fuck you, to them.

During his trial, Brandy's family came out of the courtroom to find their cars surrounded by a dozen young men who looked to be gang-affiliated. Some of them were sitting on the hood of their car. They were terrified. They rushed to get a police officer, and by the time they came out, everyone dispersed. Sometimes while leaving the courthouse, they found themselves being followed by young men and cars being stared at. Family and friends had set up a cross

where Brandi's body was found, and the family would visit all the time. Angela said she made it a mission to bring back every single piece of rock or brand or soil that had Brandi's blood because she didn't want it to be there. She didn't want people stepping on it. She didn't want people to see it.

And then one day they went and on the cross memorial, someone had vandalized it and wrote and wrote bitch. It was traumatizing and it revictimized her entire family. I don't know what was wrong with people. Francesco also threatened one of the gang members. You know, remember Smiley, he was initiated. Yeah, during the trial, he turned to him and said, you aren't going to be Smiley much longer.

Meaning he's probably gonna get beat up. Or worse. Oh, and that's not all. Francisco had various women that he had children with, whom were all present to support him, and he had a wife that he had children with, and they all testified as character witnesses. It's bizarre because the concept doesn't make sense.

So, they, all of them are testifying, being like, he was a great boyfriend, and he is a great father to our kid. But the kids are like all the same ages. So the fact that he constantly cheated on his wife and had children with other women and then constantly cheated on them and then had children with other women, that itself negates the whole fact. At one point, one of the baby moms and his wife got into a fight in the courtroom. They had to be separated. And then later they slashed each other's tires outside the courtroom. And then his wife brought papers requesting a restraining order against that

baby mom so that she couldn't attend the trial. But then the wife accidentally put a different baby mom's name on there. It was a lot. it was a lot. We also find out that Francisco was cheating on his wife with her cousin. This is all coming out, okay, during the character witnesses and stuff, so it's like really not good. She testified that Francisco was abusive. Whenever he got mad, he would physically assault her,

screaming and I quote, bitch this bitch that. So I thought they were trying to show that he's a good person. Yeah, so they brought up his wife and then the prosecutor was like, oh yeah, well we bring you the he's a good person. Yeah, so they brought up his wife and then the prosecutor was like, oh yeah, well we bring you the wife's cousin. Oh. Yeah, so it was really just so messy.

Her name is Gina and she said that she would frequently black out during these fights, mainly assaults, really. One time she tried to confront Francis goes mother, like this is how you raised your son. But she didn't take it seriously. Gina testified that Francis go told her after the murder that Brandy got what she deserved, and he said, and I quote, fuck that bitch, it's her fault. Francisco's wife would testify as a character witness during his death panel to hearing later,

and she tried to support him, but there was a lot that was coming out. She admitted that he constantly cheated on her, abused her, and when he got a mistress pregnant, he laughed in her face about it. The wife found out on the stand, because the prosecutor was like, oh by the way, did you know this? So he was in prison and talked to a therapist, and he said that he loved his children, but he felt no attachment to them. He said that children are the mother's responsibility and the mother alone.

He also stated he would not be sad if you, his wife, left him while he was in prison because he would just start another family I think the defense was trying to humanize Francisco by showing that he had children, but ironically enough His wife would always refer to the children on the stand as She would say things along the lines of Francis go always makes an effort with my children She wasn't even thinking it was always my children not our children. In the end, trying not to get the death penalty, Francisco said a few words and said, brandy didn't deserve what happened to her. People thought that was weird. That wasn't even a question. That wasn't even part of the problem or the debate. The judge has said,

even for a gang member, Francisco was unique. While the panel knows all too well, the insidious nature of the gangs, as a surrogate family and the difficulty of inherently resisting its embrace of a gang, for a man like this defendant, Francisco, it must be acknowledged that not every gang member rises to the level of barbaric malevolence attained by Mr. Martinez.

And with that, he was sentenced to death. But later his sentence would be commuted to life in prison without a problem. No. Brandy's family were really upset. I feel like he was the most vile person the whole time, right? But he's one mutilated her kicking her, punching her. The broom. Yeah, stabbing her, everything. It's because Colorado decided that, so the way that they did death penalty charges was that you would get convicted of a crime, a death penalty crime, and then you would go forth in front of three judges who would determine if you were to get the death penalty, and Colorado was like, hey, that's really bad. So either you're going to retry everybody on death row, or they're going to get life in prison without parole. So it was commuted to life in prison, and Brandy's family said it was a slap in the face.

They said what did we go through all of that for? Also, Francisco's wife complained that he didn't get a fair trial, so there's that. Oh, another side note, when psychologists came in to talk about how horrible Francisco's childhood was, this is the defense's therapist that they're like, look, we hired a therapist. We said he did this because he has PTSD and stuff. Francisco asked to not be present in the courtroom because he didn't want to listen to it. And then the prosecutors brought forth therapist who claimed that Francisco told them that he liked to shoot people because he liked to watch their bodies twitch. There was also a slight mini debate, a weird one, where prosecutors

alleged that Francisco called himself P.P. Psycho Pancho to his therapist in prison. But then the defense argued that they doubted Pancho knew that psycho even started with the letter P. So that can't be true. So they're like, no, our clients too dumb for that to be true. It's weird. And then during Danny's trial, which he was found guilty and convicted to life in prison with no possibility of parole, he did not get the death penalty for some reason. I think the main argument with his attorney was he did most of the assault, but he didn't do the torture and he didn't do any stabbing, which I don't really. His defense attorney tried to blame his parents for being

the bad ones that led him to this life, and he said something about Danny's father. And Danny's father was in the courtroom, and he stood up, making a commotion, and he said, well excuse me, and he stormed out. So Sammy, the star witness, Danny's cousin, he received 248-year sentences to run consecutively, thankfully not concurrently, so that's like a hundred-year sentence. David Warren, the one who bit Brandy's breast, he's a gang member that was there, but was not in the car during the murder. He tried to convince the judge that he was a changed man by saying, This happened so many times during court cases when I read what the defendant says in their last moments, I'm just so mind-boggled. He said, I pray to God to someday ease my mind because I will have to bear this cross forever. Like this is a burden for him to think about this crime all the time.

You know, it's like sometimes when we fight, it's like it's frustrating. It's like your partner doesn't get the point. Now imagine that, but on someone's life. Like you kill someone and at the end of the day, you still don't fully understand what you did. And now imagine the victim's family. Listening to this. Exactly.

And you can't even stand up and scream. Exactly. Like you're just sitting there listening to this guy being like, I have to think about this all the time and it's such an unpleasant memory. The judge was not impressed. Yeah, the judge retorted. There is a basic decency that we all expect in people. It's not hard to know that hurting someone or killing someone is wrong.

It's not hard to know that taking advantage of a 14 year old girl is wrong. These are basic things that are not a result of your upbringing or environment. You are sentenced to 32 years in prison." His brother, Marice, who happened to be there received 16 years, and Jacob Smiley, the new gang member that was initiated that night, got 21 years in prison. They are all out now. Maria, Danny's mom said, she prays to Brandi Duval, and she said, I tried to tell her how sorry I am. She knows and acknowledges that even if the state had killed Danny, it's still better than what he did to Brandy. Maria also said, they don't see what they're doing to us, the gang members.

I tell you what's in the purse of every gang mother. It's filled with paperwork from courts. There's a calendar full of when their sons have hearings or trials. We can't keep good jobs because what kind of job is going to let you have all that time off, so you can go to court to support your son. But these sons, they don't have to see their mothers, or children struggling on food stamps or welfare. They sit in a warm, comfortable prison with their buddies, with a color TV and three hot meals a day. Every one of those boys is getting off easy compared to the destruction that they have caused. Maria doesn't want anyone to think that she feels sorry for herself. Not

when the families of Venus and Brandy have suffered more, but she thinks that's frustrating because nobody is waking up. Because just a few weeks after this, another 14 year old girl was kidnapped from that same street and gangrooped by three gang members, but she was not murdered. She was released. And as we know today, gang culture, gang lifestyle, gang affiliations are still raging. There's still a big problem. Antonio seems to have moved on with his life. I mean, as much as he can, he has a career, a family.

He feels a tremendous amount of guilt for the life he used to live, but also for feeling like he didn't bring his brother with him to try to change him harder. He's trying to be there for his brother's kids. He said this about Danny. I had to protect myself though. I love Danny, but it would have been like trying to save him by chasing out after him into traffic. We both would have gotten hit.

Brandy's mother, Angela, had a long painful road to healing, and I'm not sure that you can ever really heal from something like this. But she said for a while, she was just so angry. It ruined her whole marriage. So she was remarried, and this is Brandy's stepdad, but he had kids of his own. And she said that she would look at him every day and say, it's not fair that you get your kids, and I don't get mine. She would see other girls getting ready for prom or girls with their mom and she just would feel angry and not at that, but at the world.

She would see girls flirting with guys near the street and she wanted to scream at them as she drove past my God. Do you know what you're doing? Don't you know what's happened? But she knew that kids would never listen. They would never listen to her. She thought, maybe, just maybe, if everyone, gang members, parents, teachers, kids, politicians, they all heard what happened to Brandy, then maybe some of this madness would be stopped.

And as for Angela, sometimes she'll feel warm breeze or a butterfly, she'll see a butterfly, and she chooses to believe that it's Brandy saying hello. She said she used to be fascinated with her daughter because at 14 Brandy was so wise and mature, and she would even joke with Brandy. Brandy, when I grow up, I want to be just like you. Angela said, she was my life, and I would give up my life for just five minutes right now to tell her how much I love her. Brandy's grandfather grimly said, I would have gladly given my life to save her if only I could have been there. Her grandparents have since passed and her mother died in 2008 of cancer. And Frank, the only minor who has charged as an adult, laws have changed since then,

and he is up for parole. He has the chance of parole. The others will rot in prison. I don't know, it's just, I can't say firsthand, because, but like we've seen firsthand, yet basically the destruction that joining a gang and like what this life and this type of environment

can do to an entire family. It's not even just a family, it's like multiple families. By one person joining a gang, it's just so heartbreaking. Sorry for the passion on this one. Please stay safe. I know it's new year. Just be safe and I'll see you guys on Wednesday. on this one. Please stay safe. I know it's new year. Just be safe and I'll see you guys on Wednesday.