Search the Community

La Puente - The Bridgetown Gentlemen La Puente was one of those many so-called hicks towns that where out there in the boonies. Back then the area was filled with muddy river beds, and rail road tracks criss-crossed the flat hills topography of the East Los Valley. Packed-dirt sidewalks were the norm in many of its neighborhood streets. It was a stereotypical Mexican place where you could fence in your property, raise chickens or goats, and hunt racoons or roadrunners just a short distance from the roads and homes nearby; the place was like country living. After WWII, La Puente became a boom town. The place was prime marketing land for the realty companies which came in and divided up everything into "tracts" and laid it all out into "grids" on the map. So many families from LS and elsewhere moved to the East Vinewood area in the 1950's that for a time the place was called "kidsville," because there where just so many little folks on its streets; kids ruled; they owned the streets. Architecturally and economically, the La Puente area went through intense developments and grew so much during the 1950's. La Puente for a time was the classical white urban area of the leave it to beaver kind of epoch. But just like its twisted name of "LA" instead of "EL," it also had another story brewing under its topside look. White on the outside, Brown on the inside. Chicanos who came in droves during the 1920s, 30s, and by the 1950s, the time when the homes and freeway construction were taking place, Chicanos made La Puente their home. And so first the Pa'Chucos put in together as the Old Town Puente Gents, and then in later years, they went on to generate the Puente 13 Tinflanes in the 1950's. Crime has always existed in East Vinewood & Mirror Park, and it continues to effect the civilians living in the area on a daily basis. The area has been very heavily competitive in the tagger scene, with there being upwards of $25,000 in damage on public and private property during 2019. Gang members of La Puente 13 have made an abundance of noise in the area, with there being multiple occurrences of drug trafficking and identity theft which were investigated and documented thoroughly. Throughout the lifespan of P13, they were known to follow through and put in work for the Mexican Mafia in which led to an abundance of crime to arise, crimes such as murder, extortion, and drug and arm trafficking wasn't anything out of the ordinary. Varrio Puente 13 La Puente 13 had a total membership of 3,000 foot soldiers at one point, with a total of 12 different cliques operating in different areas of East Vinewood & Mirror Park. Although, it's membership has taken a toll due to the nature of multiple cliques expanding and becoming their own neighborhood, first of which to ever do it was; Happy Homes Puente. Although there's an agreement in place that all cliques which were once part of Varrio Puente 13 continue to represent it on the yard. Varrio Puente has had many indictments thrown at them which had a large number of their foot soldiers arrested for racketeering, being part of its methamphetamine distribution ring, fraud and identity theft. Puente 13 has became smaller and smaller over the years, and currently the most active cliques reside on Bridge Street & Mirror Park, identifying themselves as the Parkside Los Gangsteros (PLGS), and the Little Happy Homes (LHH). They have also been known to consume local tagger bangers and tagger crews by dragging them into the dope game, and convincing them to start representing the neighborhood in order to become part of a bigger organisation to become a more threatening to their enemy crews.