one is located at pelican bay. >> many of them are in here indeterminately. they'll never leave shu until a committee decides they are not a part of a gang anymore. >> this officer works at the shu. he told us a simple lapse on his part could result in gang warfare. >> if i were to pop two doors at the same time and they were, the mexican-american from los angeles and a mexican-american from sacramento, the odds are very, very good they would immediately commence to fight because that is expected of them in prison. that's the rules of the game. if word got out that they had an opportunity and didn't go after someone, they would have some explaining to do. that's just life in prison. >> they are restricted to their cell for 23 1/2 hours a day. they only get a half hour outside in their little hard yard right next to their cells and then they're right back into their cells. >> despite the restrictive conditions in the shu, gang members still find ways to make weapons, sometimes carving them right out of their own cells. >> this was made by an arian brotherhood

be sending a flamboyant homosexual is pelican bay. >> inmate adolph green was out on the pelican bay yard when our producer noticed him and asked for an impromptu interview. >> i'm flamboyant homosexual that wants to prefer to find a black girl and we call each other girls. you understand. some of the dudes around here, they call you girl, come here, girl, and this and that. but then you have those that's smile in your face and laugh at you behind your back. you walk around the track and you hear somebody call look at that punk. [ bleep ] >> green told us that those who are open about their sexuality face retribution from other inmates. >> you have people that are undercover. you got people that hiding in the closet. that's doing each other. but the minute they see somebody that's flamboyant that's out, that they don't understand, then they have something against that. and to go through this here every day, every day, where a bunch of people telling you what you can and can't do, who you can live with and who you can't live with because of your sexual preference, is wrong. because ha

teda boyle is a retired lieutenant from pelican bay.as a watch commander on the day of the riot. >> the kind of people that were there were guilty of some of the most heinous crimes. murder, strong-armed robbery, rape. >> within the 275-acre penitentiary is the security housing unit known as the shoe. a prison within a prison. shoe inmates spend about 22 hours of every day in solitary confinement. locked up in an 8 x 10 windowless cement cell with little human contact. inside the shoe are about 1,000 level-four prisoners, what boyle calls the worst of the worst. inmates that other wardens don't want or can't handle. dangerous gangs founded within the penal community. >> because of their gang leadership, they have the authority to authorize other people in the community to commit these types of crimes. >> and on that day two alleged gangs go to war. it's sunday, and it's raining. 200 shoe prisoners are released into b yard for exercise. boyle says that the entire prison is on edge dating back to a smaller racially charged riot six months

that violence could be against other inmates or against officers. >> it was here in pelican bay's most secure unit that we came across perhaps the prison's most dangerous inmate. >> my name is scanvinski hymes. i got the name from my mother. she wanted me to have the name no other black man in america would have. >> hymes was originally sent to prison for possessing a weapon in a youth facility. at the time our cameras profiled him in 2000, he had been locked up for more than 12 years, almost half his life. >> everything is the same. nothing really changes too much. i mean, wake up in the morning, eat breakfast, go to the yard. when i get bored, i got -- i got to get into stuff, you know? >> the stuff hymes most frequently gets into is provoking officers to extract him from his cell. each inmate is assigned a security risk classification score based on his disciplinary record. the average score ranges between 19 and 27 points. >> i probably have the highest classification score in this prison system, i'm over 2,000 points now. i have caught over 30, almost 40 felonies in prison. you kn

i think that's what pelican bay is about.rongest are the ones that are going to make it, you know. >> while leon refuses to disavow loyalty to his gang, the prison sees a slow but steady flow of inmates who do through a process called debriefing. they not only break the code, they smash it to bits. >> it's basically when existing gang members want to get out of a gang inside a prison. and in order to do that, there's a whole debriefing process they have to go through. and it basically entails the inmate coming in and confessing everything's he's done with the gang and sometimes even, you know, throwing some people under the bus and confessing against other people. so it's really a deadly thing for someone to do inside a prison. >> when inmates debrief, they must write a lengthy account of their criminal history both in and out of prison. the review process can take months. but if accepted, the inmates will be allowed to live in the safety of a protective custody unit and be granted many more privileges than they would have ha

it was so explicit that we actually have the three generals behind the walls at pelican bay in writing and with their signature on very specific gang directives that were in the possession of one of our arrested suspects. >> reporter: the gang members had nicknames such as pistol, monster and bam-bam. sick are at large. gang -- six are at large. gang task force members seized guns and drugs. the gangs were selling two pound of methamphetamine a work worth thousands. a percentage of proceed along with protect money made its way to the leadership behind bars. the multi agency task force believes it has put a dent in gang operations in san jose after one of its leaders decided to cooperate and reveal the gang's internal workings. >> we have so many cooprators and source -- cooprators and source documents with this gang, we hopefully are deterring them from putting down a foothold in this city. >> reporter: the gang members go on trial in san jose starting april 13th. abc 7 news. >>> overseas now. the u.s. is investigating claims the islamic state terrorism group isis was behind a string o

it was so explicit that we have the three generals behind the walls at pelican bay in writing and with their signature on very specific gang directives that were in the possession of one of the arrested suspects. >> the nuestra familia gang members each had nicknames such as pistol, monster and bam bam. six are still at large. there was an organized chain of command. drug task force steams seized drugs and guns and money during the arrests. the gangs were selling 2 pounds of methamphetamine a week worth thousands of dollars. proceeds and protection money made its way to the leadership behind bars. the multi-agency task force believe they have put a dent into gang activity in san jose after one decided to cooperate and reveal the gang workings. >> >> we had so many cooperatetors and source documents and history with this gang that we hopefully are deterring them from putting down a foothold in this city ever again. >> the gang members go on trial in san jose starting april 13th. in san jose, david louie, abc7 news. >> no questions asked. that's the promise this morning from one city lea

happening here but the orders were coming from 400 miles to the north from behind the walls at pelican bayhat's where three so-called generals of the nuestra familia street gang were calling the shots. >> they went so far as to say this is how you do a killing, this is how you do a robbery. and these were directed from behind the walls of the jail of the prison. >> reporter: they were written in code and smuggled out in the body cavities of inmates leaving on parole. known as kites they were found in possession of one of the top street gang leaders in san jose. >> we've written hundreds of these communications that had never been seen on this level and in this depth. it was so ex mrisplicit that we actually have the three generals behind the walls at pelican bay in writing and with their signature on very specific gang directives that were in the possession of one of our arrested suspects. >> reporter: the nuestra familia gang memts had nicknames such as pistol, monster and bam-bam. six are still at-large. there was an organized chain of command. they seized cash, drugs and guns. they were

it was so exitsity that we have the three generals behind the walls at pelican bay in writing and withture on very specific gang directives that were in the possession of one of out arrested suspects. >> the gang members each had nicknames such as pistol monster and bam bam. six are still at large. there was an organized chain of command. drug task force steams seized drugs and guns and money during the arrests. a percentage of crime proceeds arks long with protection money paid to the gang made it to the nuestra familia leadership behind bars. >> we had so many cooperatetors and source documents and history with this gang that we hopefully are deterring them from putting down a foothold in this city ever again. >> the gang members go on trial in san jose starting april 13th. in san jose, david louie, abc7 news. >>> a san francisco judge says he will consider a a change of venue request in an effort to move a sexually predator out of a walnut creek neighborhood. the 71-year-old was placed into a home in january by a san francisco court. the decision upset neighbors and the contra costa

. >> the groom, raul vidal has been in california's pelican bay state prison since age 18. >> i was involved in a gang. street gang. drugs, violence, all that. and got in a shoot-out. there were six guys in the car. and they say i shot at. and actually they gave me -- six life terms for that. >> because of his gang affiliation, vidal is assigned to the secured housing unit where contact visits are not permitted. >> right now here together you stand free and apart from all other people in this world because right now you stand within that charmed circle of your love together. >> vidal and his bride were childhood friends and had reconnected five years earlier. though it's unlikely vidal will ever be free, laquisha agreed to marry him anyway. her son reuben stood in as best man. >> you have a ring picked to go on your hand. >> oh, my gosh the ring. >> she sees me, she opened up her house, her heart, she gave me her family. >> i raul take you laquisha. >> i raul take thee laquisha. >> to be my wedded wife. >> to be my wedded wife. >> to have and to hold from this day forward. >> to have and to

. >> when we first met ivory taylor at california's pelican bay state prison, he had to be flanked byfficers for his interview in a secure housing unit, or the shu. >> hi, guys. okay. you got it. look at our man right here. you got this rambo camera. who do you work for? >> msnbc. >> nbc? >> msnbc. >> tell us who you are. what's your name? >> they call me double life because i've got two life sentences, a life without the possibility of parole. and 25 to life. and they call me godzilla because i've got more points than anybody else in the prison system. i fight everybody. i'll fight anybody who will fight with me. and i've been in the hole 19 years straight. >> taylor spent all those years in the shu because of a list of violent infractions rivaling any inmate we've ever profiled on "lockup." >> i've had my nose broke, hip broke, shoulder broke and foot broke, all in confrontations with the police, distractions, yard distractions, hospital distractions, shower distractions. anyplace you can get in a fight, i've gotten in a fight. >> when our crew later visited taylor's cell, he felt c

they tried to come up when i was in pelican bay, wanted me to go back to the main line.man. >> officers. >> ready. >> once back in the privacy of his own cell, angel begins his daily workout. >> i was standing on the toilet. it's easy to do like this. if you don't work out, you going to go crazy in here, you know what i mean? it's like -- >> how long do you work out? >> maybe two hours. i start with 1,000 push-ups, right? after i do that, i come and do these. >> fights inside the prison can initiate a lockdown at any time, revoking yard privileges for all inmates, making the in-cell workout their only option. >> they call it burpees workout. we do different kind of stuff. we do burpees. we do abdominals. we do arms. tomorrow we get yard. we only get yard two times a week. that's our routine every day. we get bored. and we don't know what to do, so we work -- so working out is wasting the mind out, you know what i mean? my english is not too perfect. so after, that birdbath and everything, we wait for chow. it's just wasting time. we got a long time to go. >>> coming up o

our producers first met him seven years ago inside pelican bay, california's toughest maximum security if you are the governor, if you are the president, if you do something to me, it's on. >> he's bucking right now, he's struggling. >> hymes is a career inmate with 19 of his 37 years spent behind bars. >> turn around. turn around. >> nope. you all use that force on me. >> officers in several california prisons have gotten plenty of opportunities to document his bad behavior on videotape. while most inmates try to deal with prison life the best they can, hymes has fought the system all the way. >> ha, ha, ha. going to be like starting a whole new life. i can go anywhere. i can get a passport. i can do anything, you know, if i want to. i'm not under supervision of law enforcement at all times like i have been. so basically i can do anything i want to. >> although hymes has reached the end of his sentence, the stakes are higher than ever. >> hymes has two strikes against him right now, and i think he is aware that if he commits another crime and is prosecuted for that, it could very well

pelicans. looking over here northbound still slow but the rest of the bay, the approach to the bay bridge, lookings 280 past the 880 interchange. >> looking good. watch out for the pelicans. they could be playing the warriors in the first round of the playoffs. another look at local news 25 minutes from now. >>> welcome back to "today." it is friday morning, march 20th, 2015 it is the first day of spring. hope it is beautiful where you live. before we get to this we have the deejay warm cookies handle now. >> continuing suggestions on what i should check into my hotel with now. >>> there is a new app out called words u. it changes the vocabulary of your text messages -- >> like a thesaurus? >> in a sense. you download the app to the phone. which we did. i say al roker is one funny guy. let's see what this changes it to. before a, k-- let's see what it changes to. al roker is one mirthful guy. willie is tall with great hair. willie is lanky. i like lanky. >> i'll tell lanky. >> lanky is like -- i don't like lanky. >> you're thinking of janky. >> okay. willie is janky. let's see what it turns into.