Arnold Mireles and Roel Salinas may have lived in the same neighborhood, but they walked on different sides of the street.
For years in South Chicago, Arnold Mireles’ good intentions had been set against Roel Salinas’ shabby building operations, with a collision of character and purpose that would–police say–prove to be volatile.
Mireles’ work–his entire life, it seems– was about community.
Salinas, to hear police tell it, was about money and being able to operate without Mireles’ meddling.
And Mireles, who was reporting possible housing code violations and photographing alleged drug dealing at the buildings Salinas owned, apparently interfered with that.
According to police, Salinas sought to buy peace of mind. He allegedly hired two neighborhood toughs to assassinate Mireles, and on the night of Dec. 29, they stalked him and put a bullet in the back of his head.
Now all three–the landlord and his alleged accomplices–face murder charges.
Last week’s charges highlight the dangers that often go along with community activism in neighborhoods marked by dilapidated housing, gangs and drug activity. While a contract slaying is an extreme example, many activists say that threats and intimidation aren’t unusual.
The arrests also shed light on the type of epic neighborhood battles that play out quietly at community meetings and in Housing Court almost every day. In this instance, the conflict seems all the more dramatic not just because of the murder allegations but because the two antagonists are such vivid neighborhood characters.
Mireles, 35, facilitated community policing meetings at three churches in South Chicago, and he translated for Spanish-speaking residents. He tutored and mentored neighborhood children.
“He set the example,” said his father, Jose Mireles, who migrated from San Luis Potosi, Mexico. Jose Mireles was an accountant in his homeland but worked for 30 years in the steel mills after settling his family in South Chicago in the late 1950s.
Arnold Mireles, who was born in Chicago, didn’t seem to care about money. At the time of his death, he had no income but donated $10 to the family holiday grab bag to buy a gift for his brother.
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His work was such that his friends at the Juan Diego Community Center, 8802 S. Exchange Ave., tallied a list of what he did. It numbered 18 activities–everything from helping immigrants become U.S. citizens to building community gardens.
Salinas, meanwhile, was racking up more dubious kinds of tallies: housing code violations and court dates. He was among the first landlords arrested under the city’s new anti-slumlord ordinance in 1995 and the first to be convicted.
Mireles, according to other activists, helped secure that jail time.
Salinas, 62, was convicted in October 1995 of criminal housing management and sentenced to a week in jail, a week of home confinement, probation and community service, which he performed at an after-school program housed in a building he owned.
Though his home on South Marquette Avenue was in excellent repair, neat and well-kept, Salinas was loath to do repairs on his own buildings, court records show.
Since 1990, the city has taken him to court almost a dozen times. In July 1997, Salinas sold one of his troubled buildings — the one at 8822 S. Exchange Ave. — to 19-year-old Miguel Martinez, one of the two alleged members of the Latin Kings street gang who are charged in Mireles’ killing.
The cost: about $60,000.
Following the arrests of the three, activists in other parts of the city said that while the Mireles case is shocking, there are risks inherent in this type of work.
Ted Smukler, lead organizer for the Northwest Austin Council, noted that several years ago two of the council’s leaders received death threats by phone after targeting problem properties.
And just last summer, about 40 community residents were harassed by 20 young men who presumably were part of a neighborhood drug operation. “The same group had torn off the block club’s sign,” Smukler said.
Salinas’ buildings in South Chicago irked local activists because they seemed to draw drug dealing and gang activity.
Then there was the condition of the buildings themselves. According to files, Salinas’ buildings are roach- or rodent-infested, with toilets leaking and windows broken. Smoke detectors often are missing, walls are cracked and hot water can be scarce.
Court files reveal another alarming pattern. No sooner would Salinas comply with city demands– thereby avoiding a massive fine– than he would be hauled back into court on another series of violations for the same property.
Consider the problems at 8822 S. Exchange. In 1992, a year after he acquired the building from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Salinas was called into Housing Court for 23 alleged code violations.
According to court records, inspectors found the same kinds of conditions they had found before and the city sought $4,600 in fines. After ruling “full compliance” in June 1993, the city settled for $50.
But the city was back after the Exchange Avenue property in 1995, filing two complaints. One alleged “defective lead bearing paint” in two bedrooms and the living room. A second and more comprehensive complaint brought by the city listed 25 alleged building code violations.
The city sought a $12,500 fine but settled for $400 in January 1997.
The Exchange property was in court again in October 1997 when the city filed a complaint with 31 alleged code violations: rotting drywall, broken lights, missing smoke detectors and inadequate hot water.
Mireles was after Salinas constantly, often forcing him into Housing Court. And Salinas confronted Mireles, according to neighborhood residents, as did Martinez after Mireles was spotted taking photographs of the Exchange building.
“We weren’t shocked (by the charges) because we were aware of past problems Salinas was giving Arnold the past few years,” said Evelyn Mireles, one of his two sisters. “It’s just a shame they thought this would be a solution.”
Martinez and Ruben Alvarez, 17–charged with carrying out the slaying–lived at the Exchange Avenue building and had done some odd jobs for Salinas. In the Mireles hit, according to prosecutors, Alvarez was the shooter, and Martinez drove the car.
On the night of Dec. 29, Mireles–who was meticulously organized and cataloged the thousands of pictures he took of the area houses–was preparing photos for Housing Court and worked late at the community center in the hours before he was killed.
His assailants, police said, waited for him, shooting him as he walked the short block from the community center to his spartan apartment.
Police and prosecutors have not said where Salinas was the night of the killing. But he was no stranger to the streets that Mireles often walked.
Once, he even attended a community policing meeting. Residents, though, started to talk about one of his blighted properties, and he left abruptly.
Salinas is a native of Nuevo Leon, Mexico, and has lived in South Chicago for the past two decades, said Leonor Avila, a court watch participant. According to Avila, Salinas told her that he had worked for a factory and was retired.
When Avila saw him in court in the fall, Salinas promised he would fix all of the houses, she said.
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“He said sarcastically he was going to sell one to the Juan Diego Community Center,” Avila said.
Angelina Espinosa, Avila’s sister who also went to Housing Court with Mireles, had a response.
“I told him we don’t need that garbage,” she said.