Chinatown Legacy Tours explore Chinatown's underground during decades of gang rule
CHINATOWN, New York (WABC) -- There was a time when you couldn't walk the streets of Chinatown without worrying if the wrong look would lead to gunshots when gangs ran the neighborhood.
Now there's a tour of the area that takes you back to that time, given by the people who lived that life themselves.
The Chinatown Legacy Tours bring people through the neighborhood as it looked in the 1980s and '90s when ruled by gangs.
The tours exploring what had been in Chinatown during its darker days decades ago are guided by people including Woody, a former Chinatown gang member, and former commanding officer for the New York City Police Department's 5th precinct, Michael Lau.
Woody served 20 years in federal prison for racketeering, and Lau was involved in taking out two of the four major gangs.
"My mom was robbed by a drunken," Lau said on a tour. "That actually made me become a cop. My father got assaulted once, I think, robbed like three, four times. And the worst of it, you're Chinese and you can't even walk in Chinatown."
The tours of underground Chinatown bring visitors to the Flying Dragons' former headquarters. In an illegal gambling house on the tour, visitors can see the holes in the floor from the slot machines, and the original security cameras that are still there too. Today, it is a gym called the Chinatown Fight Club.
"The drug dealers, the restaurant owners, everybody and anybody that had a little bit of money would come and they would play at the pai gow table," said Woody. "It was about right here in the corner. That was always the biggest table."
ABC News producer Roger Lee is a co-founder of the Chinatown Legacy Tours. He hopes to bring business back to the neighborhood where he grew up.
"It reveals what happens when a community is excluded, from political power, from opportunity, from protection," Lee said.
Lau helped take out two of the four major gangs as a former commanding officer.
"My mom was robbed by a drunk in front of me at the age of 12. That actually made me become a cop. My father got assaulted once, I think robbed like 3, 4 times. And the worst of it, you're Chinese and you can't even walk in Chinatown," Lau said.
Meanwhile, Woody, who was shot twice, the first time when he was 19, was released 10 years ago and has plenty of regrets.
The tours allow Woody to reflect more on what he did when he was part of those gangs. He uses the tours to make sure people know the damage these gangs did.
"Shootings, the violence, the drugs," Woody said. "Now that I've seen what the drugs have done to the community and stuff like that, I was like, 'Wow, I contributed to this.' That's why when I do the tours, I tell people, I don't try to glamorize it."
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