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Monday, July 26, 1999

Clean slate granted with tattoo removal
Program helps those whose tattoos hinder them from leaving gangs, getting jobs
By Novelda Sommers
Caller-Times

BANDERA - A nurse slowly pushed the plunger of a syringe, its 1-inch long needle buried in the skin on 22-year-old Jimmy Gonzalez's cheekbone.
   A bulge appeared under the green teardrop-shaped tattoo below the outer corner of his left eye.
   Gonzalez sucked in a deep breath between his clenched teeth.
   "I ain't never putting on more tattoos, never in my life," he said, as the nurse deadened the area for tattoo removal.
   Gonzalez, of Beeville, was one of about 60 people who participated Saturday in the kickoff of a statewide tattoo removal program at the Chukka Creek Feed & General Store just outside of Bandera.
   Doctors from four Texas cities practiced using a machine called an infrared coagulator to remove tattoos by burning them with bursts of infrared energy.
   Corpus Christi will be among the first of 14 Texas cities expected to offer the program, which aims to help those whose tattoos keep them from getting out of gangs or getting jobs. The Texas Attorney General's office received a grant of $90,000 from the governor's office earlier this year to start the program, officials said. The money will pay for two infrared coagulators and about three months worth of medical supplies for each of the 14 sites.
   Each site is expected to sustain itself through donations and volunteer help.
   Local program delayed
   In Corpus Christi, David Gray, an emergency room doctor, will perform the procedure. Gray, who said he has used the machine before, worked on removing tattoos from 12 people on Saturday. Katie O'Connell, an occupational nurse at CITGO Petroleum Corp., also received training at the event.
   CITGO last year donated an infrared coagulator to start a local program, and Gray volunteered to perform the procedure. But the program was delayed after the Attorney General's office announced that it would start a statewide program, offering doctors some protection from lawsuits. Meanwhile, the waiting list in Corpus Christi has grown to about 200.
   O'Connell said she hopes to have the Corpus Christi program operating by October.
   The state's program is modeled after a successful one that the Bandera Police Department started four years ago, when officers in this town of about 900, located 40 miles west of San Antonio, first offered gang tattoo removals at its City Hall.
   Reforming gang members
   Bandera police officer Shannon Robles said she got the idea after befriending an 18-year-old gang member who wanted to get out of gang life but couldn't land a job because he had obvious gang tattoos.
   The man was what local police refer to as a transplant, she said. His family moved him from San Antonio to Bandera to get him away from his gang friends.
   "He was a hard-core gang member," Robles said. "He was saying that his 16-year-old girlfriend was pregnant, and he couldn't get a job because of the tattoos."
   So Robles called Tolbert Wilkinson, a family friend and a San Antonio plastic surgeon who had once removed a scar from her face.
   Wilkinson agreed to do the work, and the man got a job at a restaurant, Robles said. The man also told his friends, who then wanted their tattoos removed.
   The Bandera program mushroomed, with Wilkinson performing the procedure monthly, first at City Hall, and then at a local doctor's office.
   "Now there's a waiting list of like 500 people," Robles said.
   Dozens from Corpus Christi
   About 300 people from across Texas have gone through the program, said Police Chief Lynn Holt, and about 50 of those were from the Corpus Christi area.
   "If we can do it closer to their homes, we can get more of them out of these gangs," Holt said.
   Bandera officials screen applicants to be sure they are undergoing the procedure for the right reasons, Holt said. The state program will have a similar screening process.
   "The kid has to have a commitment to get out of gangs, and stay out of gangs and get employed," he said.
   Wilkinson, wearing blue jeans and a white western shirt, moved through the crowded general store here Saturday wearing a microphone headset and talking to other doctors, each at one of four tables with an infrared coagulator. Wilkinson's wife owns the store, a rustic building with wood floors and a big front porch. It sits at the entrance to the couple's ranch.
   One corner of the store was screened off for people with tattoos on body parts that they did not want others to see. A young woman emerged in a hospital gown.
   Removal process
   Wilkinson stopped to watch Gray work on 25-year-old Richard Gonzalez, of San Antonio, who had dragons tattooed on both forearms.
   Gray pressed the tip of the infrared coagulator's wand to Gonzalez's tattooed skin. He pulled the trigger, and the tip of the wand lit up for an instant with bright, white light, leaving a circular blister.
   Gray repeated the technique dozens of times, obscuring the images. Several times, the burn made a popping sound.
   Gonzalez said this was his fourth treatment since March. Gray said it would take at least four more.
   Gonzalez said he'd gotten a good deal on the tattoos from a friend who was a tattoo artist. A year and a half later, he decided he didn't want them anymore.
   Gray said the best that Gonzalez could hope for was that in a year, mottled blue scars would be where the tattoos once were.
   Turning a life around
   Jane Rowley, a Lubbock plastic surgeon, performed the procedure on Jimmy Gonzalez.
   The doctor teased him because he trembled from nervousness.
   Jimmy Gonzalez said he was a former member of a Crips gang in Beeville. He's gotten out of the gang, he said, and is grateful for a chance to get rid of evidence of his former life. The teardrop is a tribute to his dead grandfather, he said, although gang members who claim to have killed someone use the same symbol. A Beeville police officer told him about Saturday's event, he said.
   "I'm going to change and find me a job," he said.
   Bee County Sheriff Robert Horn, who attended Saturday, said he wants to work with the Corpus Christi program to help Bee County residents.
   "It's just like everywhere else," Horn said. "We have some who are remorseful. They're embarrassed, a lot of them can't get jobs."
   Other uses
   Don Osur, president of Redfield Corporation, the company that sells the coagulators, said the machines initially were used for treating hemorrhoids.
   "We sell more for hemorrhoids than for anything else," Osur said, adding that at least 100 of the machines are used by Texas doctors for removing hemorrhoids, genital warts and for treating nasal problems.
   But the New Jersey-based company branched out, he said, after the Food and Drug Administration approved the use of the machine for tattoo removal in 1991.
   Texas is the first state to buy the machines for a statewide program, he said. The state has contracted to buy 28 of the machines - two for each city in the program, he said.
   The machines use infrared radiation to scatter the pigment of a tattoo. Applied for a second or less, the radiation heats the skin to about the same temperature at which water boils, causing a second- to third-degree burn. The pigment scatters and is absorbed by the body, Osur said.
   Osur said government officials from several other states have asked for information about the Texas program. Most tattoo removal programs use lasers, which are more expensive and less portable than infrared coagulators, he said.
   "I'm actually amazed," he said. "I never imagined there would be this number of people. There's a need for it. I think it's the start of something that's really going to expand around the country."



Staff writer Novelda Sommers can be reached at 886-3774 or by e-mail at sommersn@caller.com

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