Mister Untouchable is an ambitious youngster making a name for himself on the streets of South East LA. They called him “Lazy,” but he is anything but that — embarking on a spree of strongarm carjackings and robberies that land him in YTS, where he sparks a religious revival during the prison’s darkest hours.

Each housing unit contains four isolation cells. These cells are smaller and cage-like, located behind a wall of bars, a steel door, and a chain link mesh wall. “This is where we kept the incorrigibles,” I was told.

A view from the watch tower in the northwest end of the prison.

YTS wasn't any ordinary school, or was it a school at all? Their gang rivals were awaiting their arrival. Would they be a victim or a victimizer?

South east Watchtower

Toilet with no privacy in the gym.

"The Westside Crazies were the first gang that didn’t get along with anyone around here. We were always getting ambushed. A lot of my buddies died in this neighborhood."

"I am a Yaqui Indian from Sonora, Mexico. I’ve always been very proud of being a native. I’m proud of my indigenous tattoos. Our race has always tattooed our faces to show loyalty and appreciation for the tribe. I started growing my hair long at YTS."

"There was this rumor that they were going to bring a bus load of Norteños into YTS from Preston Youth Correctional and Paso Robles. There’s going to be a lot of killings, I remember thinking."

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Berge was a Juice Ward at YTS. Some juice wards found a good job in the kitchen, polishing doorknobs or working as a porter to mop up spilled blood. As Berge shares, often at night, juice wards would gather silently in a mop room when others were sleeping. They'd pray with staff members at night and lay hands on their shoulders.

Junior, photographed in 2023 by David William Reeve, holds a gun that he used for personal protection during his years at YTS.

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YTS is experiencing an unprecedented lockdown as calm had fallen over the prison in the wake of Officer Ineasie Baker's murder. Conflicts between correction officers and wards came to an unspoken truce. Wards were confined twenty-four hours a day. The prison has four housing units. Cells are about 8 x 6 feet and hold two bunk beds and a toilet.

We used a master set of keys to enter a locked wooden door to the North East watchtower. Clearing cobwebs and crunching dead bugs under our boots, we passed an open, dry refrigerator and felt our way through the pitch darkness to a narrow stairway.

Since 1959, the institution's secrets have been tightly kept. To the outside world, YTS was a school for troubled juveniles, 18 – 25, where they earned a high school GED, welding skills, or played on the basketball team. The State of California grappled with rampant violence and an inability to prevent daily fights and stabbings among rival gang members.

The San Bernardino Sheriff’s Department now uses the empty prison as a training center. An orange jumpsuit clad, tattooed, mannequin is used to practice handcuffing and takedown maneuvers in the gym.

These photos show the prison as it was in it’s last days, somewhat frozen in time… as if the prison was closed and everyone simply walked away. Most rooms in the prison’s administrative buildings look as though someone started to cleanup, then abruptly stopped and never returned. This is the case in the picture above. An odd arrangement of photos tacked to a brick wall, a boxing trophy from 1987, a broom tucked under a sofa. The floor is covered in spider webs and thick with debris. This is the reception area where visitors would enter the prison.

"You could look in my eyes and no one was there. At least, no person. No people. If you see my photo from back then, look at the eyes. There’s no one there. There’s no one there! That’s from YTS. I remember the day… it was not long after I got there the first time. Each cell has a little mirror — a high polished metal (because they won’t put glass). I remember looking in but it wasn’t me reflected. I don’t recall looking in mirrors after that.'

"We hung out between Echo Park and Silver Lake. Our territory ended at Glendale Boulevard. When you passed Glendale Boulevard that was Echo Park guys: our enemies. Back in the 1970’s, this was 18th Street Gang territory but they died out because Temple Street and Echo Park Gangs came in and ambushed these guys so many times, they got eliminated."

"YTS was the most hardcore of the Youth Authority institutions. It was Gladiator School. I knew I couldn’t back down from fights, but I’d never been a fighter. I was scared shitless. Most of these kids grew up in gangs and loved to fight."

"My mom was covered in blood. She had two knives stuck in her back. I just lost it. I couldn’t register that what I was seeing was true. I was terror-stricken; not even there. I fell to my knees beside her and could see she was still breathing. I took the knives out of her back, called for help, then called my Dad."

"YTS had some crazy games being played. White dudes getting jumped by black dudes, race riots, whites on Mexicans, Southsiders … you had to look strong. The whole thing about YTS is that you never show weakness of any kind."

Juveniles called YA Babies recall their first look at the high barbed-wire fences and watchtowers unfolding across the horizon in the quiet of the bus rambling along Euclid Avenue.