Las Bombitas de Pharr-San Juan-Alamo

History Channel's Gangland: Trinity of Blood

A very brutal documentary on the Tri-City Bombers and their violent effect on the Rio Grande Valley. I must admit, I always knew las bombitas were pretty bad but I didn't know they were this horrible. I dismiss those complaints that this is going to make South Texas look bad since it's a very fascinating look at modern gang warfare in these bordertowns and the terror they've caused with knives, frying pans, AK-47's, and hand grenades. Any information, whether positive or negative is good information. I did have a few complaints, like they framed the story from Brownsville at the beginning and they didn't mention that they were at one point considered a break dancing crew in the 1980s. Why would they frame it from Brownsville when this story begins in Pharr-San Juan-Alamo? They briefly mentioned the Po' Boys in passing, and I wish they would have gone more into detail with their bloody rivalry. But maybe that's just me since I attended LBJ Middle School and PSJA North High School and I knew students that dreamed of one day being members of either the TCB or the Po' Boys. There was some other assumptions that were made and issues that could be interpreted differently to people that are not from the Valley. Nevertheless, I wasn't aware of a lot of information presented in this documentary, like what led to the creation of rival gang The Chicano Brotherhood, some of the violent local incidents, how far their influence reaches, the ranking system of the gang, and the role of these gangs in Texas Prisons.

Now that I saw this documentary, I'm very interested to search if someone has written a history on this topic. This is an interesting primer to watch but I now think a book about this subject could be incredible and could do a better job telling this story.