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Nuestra Familia (Spanish for "Our Family") is a criminal organization of Mexican American (Chicano) prison gangs with origins in Northern California[8]. While members of the Norteños gang are considered to be affiliated with Nuestra Familia, being a member of Nuestra Familia itself does not signify association as a Norteño. Some law enforcement agents speculate that the Norteños were possibly a spin-off of Nuestra Familia in an attempt to divert prison official attention from NF[ Nuestra Familia was organized in either the Folsom, California, or Soledad, California, Correctional Training Facilities in 1968.[9][10] In the late 1960s, Mexican-American (Chicano) inmates of the California state prison system began to separate into two rival groups, Nuestra Familia[8] and the 1957-formed Mexican Mafia, according to the locations of their hometowns (the north-south dividing line is near Delano, California.) Nuestra Familia were prison enemies of the Southern Latinos who comprised La Eme, better known as the Mexican Mafia. While the Mexican Mafia had initially been created to protect Mexicans in prison, there was a perceived level of abuse by members of La Eme towards the imprisoned Latinos from rural farming areas of Northern California.[11] The spark that led to the ongoing war between Nuestra Familia and members of the Mexican Mafia involved a situation in which a member of La Eme allegedly stole a pair of shoes from a Northerner. This event put into motion the longest-running gang war in the state of California