Ryan Carter
Between caring for his infant son, Deven, and scurrying between
jobs as a cook at Universal Studios and the stock room at Target,
life is busy, and 18-year-old Luis Gonzalez is tired.
But it beats the inside of a juvenile detention camp.
He is determined to stay away from the life he once knew --
tagging, smoking pot and running with a gang.
So far, he's a success story, his former probation officer said.
Gonzalez, who was raised in Los Angeles, was recently released from
two years of probation that were part of his juvenile court sentence
for stealing a car. He has vowed not to go back to that life as he
makes his way as a busy father.
"He's figured out that it's work," his former probation officer,
Frank Imperial, said on a recent visit to the small Burbank apartment
where Gonzalez and his girlfriend, Michelle Caudillo, raise their
cheerful five-month-old son.
Things started to go wrong for Gonzalez after his father died in
1998. Gangs, drugs and drinking were his ways to deal with the loss.
Stealing cars was a result, which ultimately took him from juvenile
detention camps to courtrooms to his probation, which ended in May.
Gonzalez said his environment was a big reason that he kept
getting into trouble.
"I was hanging around with a bad crowd," he said.
It took its toll. He wondered how would he explain to his child
about the embarrassing, random police visits that were part of his
probation.
In time, Imperial, who deals with all of Burbank's juvenile
probationers, saw that the young father had resolved to turn around.
"He had faith in me. He would talk to me as if he knew me. I
didn't want to do him wrong," Gonzalez said of Imperial.
His girlfriend agreed.
"Mr. Imperial saw something in him that nobody else did," she
said.
Imperial sensed the former gang member wanted to change and
helped him focus on work.
"I needed work, and that actually helped me out a lot," he said.
"Now, I think about my baby. I feel loved."
