Weekend America

Gangster Confidential

Michael Montgomery

APRIL 26, 2008

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(Courtesy Harper Collins)

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Until 2002, Rene Enriquez was one of the kingpins of a merciless, ultra-violent, cold-blooded crime syndicate -- the Mexican Mafia. He's currently serving a 20-to-life sentence for murder. And for ordering another killing, he's serving a concurrent 15-to-life sentence.

The Security Housing Unit (SHU) of Pelican Bay State Prison is where the worst of the worst are sent. Enriquez spent 10 years there. But even in a cell with no windows, no fresh air and limited contact with others, he was able to run mob business.

In May of 2002, Rene decided to walk away from the life. Not only that, he decided to share Mexican Mafia secrets with law enforcement.

Producer Michael Montgomery met Enriquez in 2005 and convinced him to record an audio journal. The one-time mafia shot-caller shares his thoughts in Montgomery's recently released radio documentary, "Gangster Confidential."

Enriquez had just transferred from the SHU to a prison near the Mojave Desert. This is how he saw the transition, and his life now:

---

Audio from Enriquez' diary: "I can come out here and walk without my shoes, with my feet on the grass here. I can come out and see the mountains every morning when I come to breakfast. I can come in the yard and bask in the sun and get a tan. You know how pale I was when I came out from Pelican Bay? We looked like vampires. That's what we called each other, 'You look like a darn vampire!' Because you had no exposure to the sun at all. You have no direct exposure to the sun."

Desiree Cooper: So Rene, when you recorded that, you'd already become a government source. You'd made it out of "The Shoe," which is solitary confinement, and you sounded so happy in that less restrictive environment. Yet we find out later that you were actually high during that interview. Why?

Rene Enriquez: You know, I think it was a facade, really. I was regretting my decisions for having left, and I was at a place where I felt I was lost and abandoned. I go from this individual with this great amount of respect and awesome amount of power to just becoming a regular Joe -- and I had never been a regular Joe all my life. Naturally, without cognitive and behavioral therapy, I regressed right to what I knew again, which was associating with individuals in the same sub-culture and participation in narcotics use and dealing drugs. That's what I knew best.

Michael, I'd imagine your position as a documentarian -- it was not unlike law enforcement in that, here's Rene, giving you information that you have to trust. How do you learn to trust what he says over time?

Michael Montgomery: I did not actually know that Rene was high during that interview for some time. And I think that's a good thing, because had I known that day or the day after that he was high, and that he was using drugs and really getting caught up in this group of gang drop-outs dealing drugs, I think I would have walked away from the project. But it didn't happen that way. And in fact, the very act of Rene revealing this to me showed to me that he was moving out of that mafioso, tough guy, 'no weaknesses' mentality. Actually, I think that that was a very, very critical moment in our work together. The other question was where he was heading. Was he going to continue to evolve and go in a positive direction, or was he going to have another relapse. And I think that was a concern. My concern, and also a concern for law enforcement.

Rene, let me ask you, by cooperating with the government, by telling your story to Michael, you gained some benefits. What did you gain by doing that?

Enriquez: I no longer have to worry about so-called brothers plotting my death or me plotting theirs. That's simplistic freedom. I guess physically, I'm no longer in "The Shoe." I'm still incarcerated, I'll probably remain incarcerated, although I'm eligible for parole.

I guess what I'm trying to gauge is how is your everyday life different now?

Enriquez: My day's devoted towards different things. I read my Bible every day -- I'm not trying to hoodwink anybody to say I'm this reformed person or I'm a rehabilitated individual. I'm not far removed from the individual I used to be. There are no swans in the system. The only difference between me and those other individuals is that I've chosen to extricate myself while they continue to wallow in it. So, I'm really learning how to be a man again.

What's helping you with that journey to learn how to be a man again?

Enriquez: You know, there are a variety of individuals. My handlers... Mike Montgomery has played a large part in it, and he's invested his trust in me. This recording became cathartic to me, therapeutic.

When you did your audio diaries?

Enriquez: Oh, definitely. When you listen to the first audio diaries, I would not even speak in an emotional manner. It was just really mechanical. But Mike sat me down one day and told me, 'Rene, this is a chance for you to speak to yourself and speak to the world and teach them about really who you are and what this life is, and something about the subculture that this world doesn't know about.' So he made this really a self-revelatory thing -- and that's a self-educational, epiphanous occurrence for me. My wife has a large part to do with it. Each step along the way, she teaches me when I go astray.

Your wife?

Enriquez: Yes, my wife. I'm married. I won't say her name -- I don't want to disclose her name for security purposes. One time, when I was talking about past victims and my wife becomes irate and she says 'How dare you speak about that individual that way? That was somebody's father, that was somebody's son that was somebody's uncle. You affected a lot of people other than that one person that got killed.' She says, 'How would you like it if somebody killed your son, Rene? How would you feel?' It was at that moment I got a lump in my throat. It was if somebody had hurt one of my children, that's how I would feel.

That never crossed your mind before?

Enriquez: You have to become a hardened individual in the business. Violence is our status mobility system. It's a brutal world. Prison is a brutal world. It's a place where there is no place for weakness, for emotion, for consideration, for empathy.

Michael, I want to know, how have you seen Rene change over the past three-and-a-half years?

Montgomery: I think that the tape that Rene slowly starts compiling, these audio diaries, really reveal a multi-dimensional man -- a multi-dimensional man who was always there, but was really stuck in this dark, solitary world of gang secrets and of violence. One of the things I recall a prison official saying who had known Rene, is saying that he had never seen Rene smile, ever, until he finally dropped out of the mob and started cooperating with authorities.

Rene, you eventually went from providing information to being a witness, which was not necessarily required of you. Why did you go further?

Enriquez: You know, there's so much that tips the scales against me. There's so much negative that I've done in my life. Here's something positive that I could do for society. Here's something that I could do for the people who have put so much faith and trust in me, and it is an educational process for me. It was just something that I could do that would be viewed as a successful, pro-social contribution that I've made to society. Here's something that I can do to give back. There's very little -- I can't give lives back, I can't redeem what I've done.

You know, it sounds wonderful, listening that you have had this epiphany, you're trying to change your life. But you killed people and you're responsible for a lot of deaths.

Enriquez: Ultimately, I am responsible for quite a bit. Acknowledging participation in specific acts I cannot do, but I think it would suffice to say that I am a very bad man.

How are we supposed to react to you now?

Enriquez: You're right to be reserved in your judgment, and even condemn me in some senses. There is going to be a large group of people who will never believe what I say, and that's OK. I'm not doing it for anybody's benefit but my own. Ultimately, if I serve a life sentence that I agreed upon, then that's what I merit because those people did die. So if you never agree upon accepting me as a member of society, or a board or a judge or a district attorney doesn't, then that's fine. Ultimately, I have aspirations of being free one day, and I hope that comes to pass.

Michael, I want to ask you: If you were on the parole board and his case came before you, what would your decision be?

Montgomery: It's difficult for me to give an answer without hearing from what law enforcement say and what others say about whether or not Rene poses a danger to society. Given what I've seen with Rene, he certainly deserves a shot at parole. The critical factor is whether or not he still poses a danger to society. Rene says he doesn't. I think in his current situation he isn't a dangerous individual. It's difficult to say if he's in society, where he hasn't been in a long, long time, how he will respond to getting work that maybe doesn't challenge or stimulate him. But if I were on the parole board, I would want to look very, very closely at what the people, law enforcement agents and investigators close to Rene say. And if you talk to those people, quite a few of them say that they believe one day, maybe not tomorrow, maybe not next year, but in a few years from now, if he stays on this current course that he should be released and allowed to go back into society.

Michael, I want to thank you for being with us, and Rene I want to wish you success in your journey.

Montgomery: Thanks very much.

Enriquez: Thank you -- it's been a pleasure and an experience.

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