By Edward Lewis,
The Citizens Voice (Wilkes Barre, PA)
While an inmate at the U.S. Penitentiary in Lewisburg in the mid to late 1990s, Hugo Marcus Selenski wanted to join the prison gang Dirty White Boys.
For unknown reasons, Selenski was denied membership. As the name implies, the Dirty White Boys is a white gang but does not practice white supremacy philosophies, said Robert Walker, a consultant and expert on prison security threat groups and prison gangs.
However, the Dirty White Boys are associated with the Aryan Brotherhood and Texas syndicate prison gangs that are heavily involved in white supremacy.
“The Dirty White Boys are not primarily known as a white supremacy group, but they are known to associate with the Aryan Brotherhood, the Texas syndicate and, possibly, the Mexican mafia,” Walker said by telephone from South Carolina on Wednesday. “They have some white supremacy philosophies, but they’re not out there dealing death to any non-white group.”
Selenski, 29, was incarcerated for seven years in federal prison for committing a bank robbery in Plains Township in June 1994.
According to records from the Federal Bureau of Prisons, Selenski began serving his sentence at the Federal Correctional Institution in Allenwood, a medium security facility.
In June 1995, Selenski was stabbed multiple times by three African-American inmates over a drug debt he owed. He was transferred to FCI-Fairton, N.J., later in 1995. He assaulted a correctional officer there.
Selenski was subsequently transferred to the U.S. Penitentiary in Lewisburg, where he attempted to join the Dirty White Boys and met fellow inmate Paul Raymond Weakley.
Weakley, 33, of 49 1/2 Pulaski St., Kingston, has been reportedly identified as one of two informants assisting authorities in their investigation of five buried bodies at Selenski’s home at 479 Mount Olivet Road in Kingston Township.
Weakley was sentenced to 120 months and three years of supervised release on charges he transferred a destructive device in Battle Creek, Mich., in 1992. Weakley was released from the custody of the BOP on March 15, 2002.
While at Lewisburg, police sources said Selenski wanted to join the Dirty White Boys but was denied entry.
Walker said inmates join prison gangs for self-protection, and are involved with drugs, gambling, prostitution and extortion.
“If he was trying to get in the Dirty White Boys, he may have been assigned to kill someone,” Walker said. “They may not have trusted him. Prison gangs are not going to allow just anyone to join.”
Walker explained most prison gangs have a “blood in and blood out” requirement, meaning prison gang candidates have to “shed someone’s blood.”
The Dirty White Boys are believed to have originated in the federal prison system in 1985 and stem from a prison softball team’s name.
“They are small and they’re not very large in numbers,” Walker said.
The Dirty White Boys are primarily involved in the drug trade inside and outside prison walls.
“It’s their source of income,” Walker said.
Police sources have said they are working under a theory that the deaths of three unidentified human remains found buried at Selenski’s home were drug related.
However, that has not been confirmed by Luzerne County District Attorney David W. Lupas.
Although Selenski was not officially a member of the Dirty White Boys, he might have followed their beliefs, Walker said.
“Once you’re in a prison gang, you follow gang leaders’ orders whether you’re in prison or you’re not,” Walker said. “You’re a gang member for life.
“A prison gang may have such a hold; they can tell a gang member outside that they want this guy dead or that guy dead.
“Not to follow those orders, that would have resulted in their own death,” Walker added.
Selenski was released from federal custody in January 2001.
No arrest has been made related to the five bodies unearthed from the Kingston Township property.
Two of the five bodies have been identified as that of Michael J. Kerkowski, 37, a Tunkhannock area pharmacist, and his girlfriend, Tammy Lynn Fassett, 37, of Meshoppen, Wyoming County, who were reported missing in May 2002.
Note: Robert Walker is the Police1 chat room administrator and owner of the gang identification web site, Gangs OR Us