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The Paradise Hills gang has been holding down the largest territory in San Diego since the '60s. It extends from the National City border on Rachael St. all the way to the Meadowbrook housing project on the Lomita Village border. (This, if anything, should be Lomita’s turf due to its proximity to them, and its relative distance from the heart of PH.) The size of this territory can be verified on any map. The PH gang has been squaring off with every single clique in National City for 50 years....since the days of the original 65th Street gang. Not to mention Lomita, Encanto, Skyline and every other gang in Southeast. The gang has Eme representation with members among the big homies as well as dozens of "good to go" validated types.
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The PH gang started off as the 65th ST gang and claimed Paradise Hills or PHLS. "PHLS" was originally an abbreviation for "Paradise Hills" and NOT shorthand for PH Locos. The original members designated themselves as LOKOTES (see enclosed old-school photos) but when the whole "locos" thing came around in the 80's, law enforcement mistakenly applied that to them. The newer members picked up on that since it was trendy at the time and it stuck. The mid to late '80s saw the largest membership of the gang where they were as deep as any gang from Logan, Shell Town, OTNC or Otay. During this time, they shut down the entire Southside Mob (SSM- at the time regarded San Diego's most violent gang) and sent them back to the protection of their National City sponsors, where they were absorbed. LA cliques like East Side Longos and Clarence St. were also run out of town when those gangs tried to move into the vacancy left by the SSM, despite the assistance given to the Longos by the Lomita 70s and to Clarence St. by VCV (Chula Vista). The PH gang had never until very, very recently had any lateral cliques, only "generational" cliques, with each up-and-coming squad of peewees adding their own appendage to the PHLS brand. Chicos (CLS), Little Locos, Malditos (MDS) etc..jpeg)
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One exception came in the early '90s when the drugs took hold of the varrio in a bad way and in-fighting broke out among the gang. A crowd of PH boys shunned the hard-drug use in favor of strictly dealing them and called out their homies to do the same as drug use had become a priority over putting in work with a large segment of the gang. This led to a big disagreement at a meeting with the older gente from the gang and the result was the creation of the "Parkside Winos" as they congregated 24/7 at the Park drinking and flying the PH flag. They were also the only PH members putting any work during these years, which was a lot. Although the Winos clique eventually patched things up with the rest of the gang, there was a bit of bad blood left over. It was during this time that the PH gang got their well deserved reputation as brawlers, which was a follow-up to the war with SSM in which the SSM was known to shoot at anything that moved while PH boys were known to put a stomping on anyone not wearing a Pittsburgh Pirates hat.
Today the gang is broken up into two cliques. One reps the Meadowbrook projects, while the other one reps the old hood back on Reo. The old 65th St. Gang has been making a comeback as well and claim PH right alongside with the youngsters on Reo.
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Due to its geography, (dead ends, cul-de-sacs, alleys, new construction mingled with extremely old sections of the city, etc) PH has developed its own, very unique flavor among the neighborhoods of Southeast. The gang was big trendsetters back in the heyday of gangs in SD. They were arguably one of the first in Southern Califas to ditch the old cholo-look in favor of the "Levi's, t-shirt and ball cap" look instead of the "creased-up vato with a brim and Stacy's" thing. This makes sense as the gang has always identified with the street-fighting ethos..jpeg)
~ Rene J. de PARADISE LOMAS ~