Of the ethnic gangs that rule America’s inner cities, none has had the impact of the
Jamaican posses.
Spawned in the
ghettos of
Kingston as
mercenary street-fighters for the island’s politicians, the posses began
migrating to the United States in the early 1980s, just in time to catch and ride the crack wave as it engulfed the country. Feared and honored for being “harder than the rest,” they would lay claim to their new American territory with outlaw bravura, and the raw dancehall music born of their world would define “gangsta” culture for a generation of angry sufferers in Jamaica, American, and England. Laurie Gunst spent a decade moving with the possemen, and
Born Fi’ Dead is her unique account of this netherworld, the first to bring to life Jamaica’s international gangs.
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