![]() The Koala Brothers imitate the gangs from Central and South America, although their structure is a lot more basic, making it difficult to charge them with being an organized criminal group. ![]() If we find them carrying a knife, we slap them with a €600 fine, but there is little else we can do except keep monitoring them Basque police source ![]() “Many of them come from broken homes where there was, or still is, violence between spouses,” said a social worker from Bilbao who requested anonymity. and they start building up a criminal record.” That is the typical background of LHK members. “The problem is the remaining 15% that keeps going in and out of the courthouses, with the additional factors of early school leaving, dysfunctional families and bad company. “If you move, I’ll slash you,” said one of the assailants, holding something in his hand that might have been a knife, although it was hard to see.Ĭésar San Juan, a professor of criminal psychology at the Basque Country University, says that 85% of minors who commit acts of violence do not do it again. They surrounded us and stole our phones and money.” The young couple did as they were told. “I was out for a walk with my girlfriend when four guys came up to us. Javier (an assumed name), remembers his encounter with gang members last summer. They also use the cover of night to commit robberies and beat anyone who is unlucky enough to cross their path. And they don’t just hang around busy areas filled with nightlife. On days like these, members of LHK – the acronym used by the gang – get together to pick fights. The day of the beating was a Sunday, a day rife with social gatherings and alcohol consumption. And they knew about their taste for violence and for hitting people for the sheer pleasure of demonstrating their superiority. But residents of Barakaldo and other neighboring towns were familiar with them. That is, until things get out of hand and something really serious happens.īut who exactly are the Koala Brothers? Nobody in Amorebieta had heard about them before the assault on July 25, which the gang members recorded and shared on social media. In the other two Basque provinces of Álava and Gipuzkoa, there are also gangs whose members meet to fight, commit petty theft and assault people as a way to have fun and as initiation for new members. In the Basque Country, violent gangs are not exclusive to the province of Bizkaia. The Koala Brothers imitate the gangs from Central and South America, although their structure is a lot more basic, making it difficult to charge them with being an organized criminal group And in January 2018, two 14-year-olds were arrested in Balmaseda and Bilbao for their alleged involvement in the murder of an elderly couple inside their own home. The assailants, who were 13 and 14 years old, were part of another gang that called itself The Ghetto Family. The victim was kicked and pushed he fell to the ground and hit his head against the sidewalk. On December 23, 2017, a former soccer player for Sociedad Deportiva Amorebieta, Ibon Urrengoetxea, died after being robbed by two youths in downtown Bilbao. This is not the first such incident to take place in the area. The underage suspects are being held in juvenile centers while at least three adults have been sent to preventive prison at Basauri penitentiary. Alexandru Andrei Ionita, 23, remains in critical care at Cruces Hospital in Barakaldo. Thirteen of them have been arrested and could spend a long time locked away after the events of July 25, when they beat a young man into a coma at a park in the nearby town of Amorebieta. But the group, which includes some of the original members from two decades back and new ones who joined in recent years, has just crossed a line. The Basque city of Barakaldo, in northern Spain, has already known two generations of Los Hermanos Koala (The Koala Brothers), a youth gang whose members – aged 15 through 38 – engage in petty theft and minor assaults.
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