This article is republished from The Conversation, an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts. Beth C. Caldwell is a Professor of Law at Southwestern Law School
The United States on three flights to El Salvador on March 15, 2025, claiming that they were members of the Tren de Aragua gang that originated in Venezuela.
have said that tattoos were not the sole criteria used when deciding whom to deport; however, showed that officials relied on tattoos and clothing .
A lawyer for Jerce Reyes Barrios, a professional soccer player who is among the Venezuelans deported to El Salvador, says the government because he has a tattoo of a soccer ball with a crown on top, which resembles the logo of his favorite soccer team, Real Madrid. The tattoo and a photograph of Barrios making a hand sign that means 鈥淚 love you鈥� in sign language are the only two pieces of evidence the government has presented of his gang ties, according to the lawyer.
Meanwhile, deported Venezuelan makeup artist Andry Jos茅 Hern谩ndez Romero has a tattoo of a crown on each wrist, one with 鈥淒ad鈥� and one with 鈥淢om鈥� written next to each crown. in his file that these tattoos were 鈥渄etermining factors to conclude reasonable suspicion鈥� of his membership in the Tren de Aragua gang. Some government sources list crowns as a tattoo common for Tren de Aragua members, but doubt on that claim.
Whether or not the Trump administration used tattoos as a sole criteria for deportation, I鈥檝e found in my own research that simply using tattoos as any sort of criteria can lead law enforcement astray.
In 2023, I analyzed the reliability of tattoos as markers of gang membership in the .
The bottom line: While many people in gangs have tattoos that demonstrate their membership, many people who have absolutely no gang ties also get similar tattoos.
Relying on them to determine gang membership has led to people as gang members 鈥� .
There are some types of tattoos that can be especially misleading.
Geographic origins
In 2017, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detained Daniel Ramirez Medina, who was lawfully in the United States under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, or DACA. The government attempted to strip his status and deport him, due to a tattoo that read 鈥淟a Paz BCS.鈥� La Paz is the capital of the Mexican state Baja California Sur, which is abbreviated 鈥淏CS.鈥� The that ICE agents presented in immigration court was this tattoo.
But they overlooked the fact that tattoos depicting the names or area codes of hometowns or countries of origin are a common way for people to honor where they came from.
This is particularly the case for people who migrate or move away from their homelands. For example, 鈥� the country codes used to dial El Salvador and Honduras, respectively 鈥� have been relied upon to allege gang membership, even as many people who have these tattoos deny any gang ties and have no criminal records. Law enforcement has also relied on tattoos of the words as evidence of gang membership.
Some gangs, such as , include a reference to nationality in the name of the gang. And in the U.S., street gangs are often based in specific neighborhoods, with many gangs incorporating the city or street where they鈥檙e based and associated tattoos. For this reason, tattoos celebrating a city or country can only lead to confusion.
Tattoos of have also been used to designate people as gang members, even though these tattoos are clear expressions of cultural identity and do not necessarily have any nexus to gang membership. While some gangs do use specific Aztec symbols to identify members, it鈥檚 virtually impossible to distinguish a tattoo of cultural or geographic significance from a tattoo indicating gang association.
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In the case of Medina, U.S. District Judge Ricardo S. Martinez, a George W. Bush appointee, in place and that he be protected from deportation because ICE鈥檚 鈥渃onclusory findings鈥� that he was a gang member were 鈥渃ontradicted by experts and other evidence.鈥� Furthermore, an immigration judge who reviewed all the evidence had already concluded that he was not in a gang.
Martinez was clearly disturbed by ICE鈥檚 claims, writing, 鈥淢ost troubling to the Court is the continued assertion that Mr. Ramirez is gang-affiliated, despite providing no evidence specific to Mr. Ramirez to the Immigration Court in connection with his administrative proceedings, and offering no evidence to this Court to support its assertions four months later.鈥�
Religious imagery and pop culture
Tattoos of popular Catholic religious images, such as the Virgin of Guadalupe, praying hands and rosaries, to label people as gang members, a move that would seem to be clearly overbroad.
While some gang members may be Catholic, no one would even try to allege that all Catholics are gang members. At least one of the deported Venezuelan men , along with tattoos of a clock and the names of his mother and niece with crowns atop the text.
Tattoos have also become an important way for people to celebrate popular culture. Tattoos of a woman鈥檚 lips, for example, have become popular among gang members and non-gang members alike. A number of professional athletes, , have tattoos of their partner鈥檚 lips. However, this is also a tattoo to categorize people as gang members.
, tattoos of stars on shoulders, crowns, firearms, grenades, trains, dice, roses, tigers and jaguars are common among members of Tren de Aragua.
The issue, of course, is that these symbols are also popular among people with no connection to the gang.
Imprecise methodology
Understanding the problem really comes down to math. While it may be true that many gang members have tattoos of the images listed above, it is also true that many non-gang members have similar tattoos.
The involves making inferences about probabilities based on available information. The probability that a gang member has a certain tattoo isn鈥檛 the same as the probability that an individual who has a certain tattoo is a gang member.
The U.S. government seems to be wrongfully equating the two.
Writing about the broader problems of discerning gang membership in 2009, sociologist David Kennedy argued that 鈥渢hat clearly distinguish a gang and a football team, or a gang member and his mother鈥� suggests that taking 鈥渓egal action, based on imprecise language [is] something of a problem.鈥�
This problem becomes magnified when there鈥檚 no due process for the accused 鈥� which is exactly what happened to the Venezuelan men whisked off to El Salvador.
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