La Casa de Carnalismo or Casa Carnalismo (the House of Brotherhood) was a militant Chicano community group in

East Los Angeles East Los Angeles ( es, Este de Los Ángeles), or East L.A., is an unincorporated area in Los Angeles County, California. As of the 2020 census it had a population of 118,786, a drop of 6.1% from 2010, when it was 126,496. For statistical purpo ...

in the U.S. state of

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

that was organized in spring 1969. According to one account, the group's leadership found that "the heavy flow of

heroin Heroin, also known as diacetylmorphine and diamorphine among other names, is a potent opioid mainly used as a recreational drug for its euphoric effects. Medical grade diamorphine is used as a pure hydrochloride salt. Various white and brow ...

and seconals into the

barrio ''Barrio'' () is a Spanish language, Spanish word that means "Quarter (urban subdivision), quarter" or "neighborhood". In the modern Spanish language, it is generally defined as each area of a city, usually delimited by functional (e.g. residenti ...

was an obstacle to consciousness-raising and organized political action." Three members of the group, Rodolfo Sanchez, Juan Fernandez and Alberto Ortiz, all in their early 20s, were charged with shooting and robbing a drug dealer (who was in fact an undercover federal agent) at the

Estrada Courts Estrada Courts is a low-income housing project in the Boyle Heights area of Los Angeles, California. It is located between E. Olympic Blvd. on the south and E. 8th St. on the north, and S. Lorena St. on the east and S. Grande Vista Ave. on the w ...

housing project Public housing is a form of housing tenure in which the property is usually owned by a government authorities, government authority, either central or local. Although the common goal of public housing is to provide affordable housing, the d ...

in July 1970. The agent of the U.S. Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs, Robert E. Canales, was paralyzed from the waist down in the shooting. They were charged and sentenced in federal court to 40 years, 25 years, and 10 years, respectively, for "conspiring to assault and rob a federal agent of federal monies." Leftists thought it was a "frame-up," and they became known as the Carnalismo Three, or Los Tres. In 1971,

Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (BATFE), commonly referred to as the ATF, is a domestic law enforcement agency within the United States Department of Justice. Its responsibilities include the investigation and prevent ...

(ATF) agents asked a paid

police informant An informant (also called an informer or, as a slang term, a “snitch”) is a person who provides privileged information about a person or organization to an agency. The term is usually used within the law-enforcement world, where informan ...

named Eustacio "Frank" Martinez to infiltrate Carnalismo, which the ATF believed was the "overground name" for the

Chicano Liberation Front The Chicano Liberation Front (CLF) was an underground revolutionary group in California, United States, that committed dozens of bombings and arson attacks in the Los Angeles area in the early 1970s. The radical militant group publicly claimed r ...

. Martinez found that main preoccupation of La Casa de Carnalisimo staffers was immigration counseling and that he saw no connection to CLF.

References

1969 establishments in California Mexican-American organizations {{US-history-stub