The violence, the signals and the "look" come straight from Los Angeles.
They are all unique to Salvadoran gangs that, for more than a decade, have run loose on Southern California streets.
Their symbols are as familiar to some as the Hollywood sign.
But when CBS 2 News' I-Team traveled to El Salvador earlier this year, they were surprised to find those familiar Los Angeles marks in El Salvador.
I-Team's Drew Griffin tells us why members of the most violent Los Angeles gangs can be found in that country.
CBS 2 News' Special Assignment: L.A.'s Dirty Export aired Monday, June 08, 1998 at 11 p.m.
Just as El Salvador was rebounding from civil war, an import from the U.S. has begun to threaten the fragile nation -- the country is now fighting a war with gangs, said Griffin.
It started about five years ago. El Salvador Police Chief Rodrigo Avila told Griffin that the gang problem in his country began when the United States started deporting gang members back to El Salvador after they committed crimes in America. The problem is that they are returning home without any lessons learned.
"Some of them commit crimes in the States, serve short terms or detained there for a little while over there and sent back to El Salvador," Avila told Griffin.
According to Griffin, the deported gang members have touched off a wave of violence in El Salvador that has now surpassed the murder rate during their civil war.
One former gang member told Griffin the gangs use bombs as well as guns to gain territory.
Avila said this deadly combination of weaponry is the result of a blending of two violent cultures: the battle-hardened guerrilla fighters of El Salvador and the crime-hardened gang members of Los Angeles.
With the problem getting worse and the public outcry growing stronger, El Salvador is publicly wondering what to do next, said Griffin.
Police often meet planes carrying deported gang members and criminals arriving in El Salvador. The gang members are fingerprinted and questioned at the airport, and told they will be watched. But since their crimes were committed in the U.S., El Salvador is powerless to do much more.
Alex Sanchez from Los Angeles-based Homies Unidos told Griffin that the policy of deporting gang members is not helping either country.
In El Salvador, there is little to stop the gangs from expanding their violence. The country remains relatively poor and programs to help deported gang members reintegrate into Salvadoran life are few, said Griffin.
While in El Salvador, the I-Team visited a halfway house filled with men trying to get out of the gangs. The dirty building barely had any furniture, and the tiny staff that ran the program struggled daily to handle the growing number of occupants looking for help.
Members of the 18th Street and the Marasalvatrucha gangs also live together in the building. But for them, it is a place where they come to heal wounds before heading back into battle -- while every day, more planes arrive from Los Angeles carrying more troops that again will fill Salvadoran streets with violence.
Compiled by Channel 2000 Staff
L.A.'s Dirty Export
CBS 2 News Special Assignment
The 18th Street Gang and Marasalvatrucha Gang are two of the most violent in Los Angeles, reported CBS 2 News' Drew Griffin. But many of the gangs' members have returned to the land of their ancestors -- El Salvador. 
Soldiers and heavily armed police are once again patrolling San Salvador's neighborhoods and yet the gangs continue to grow. And as their numbers increase so will the crimes, said Griffin. Many gangs have already moved into some neighborhoods and turned entire blocks into ghost towns. 
"They've been here since they were little kids," said Sanchez. "They were brought by their parents so now that their parents are here, their children are getting deported to a place where they don't know. So it's up to them to defend themselves and the only way they can is to get involved in what they know what to get involved with, which is to the gangs in El Salvador."