Samenvatting

During an ethnographic research on the Rollin 200 Crips, a Dutch ‘gang’, Sin – one of the author’s informants – was shot and killed in Amsterdam. In this article, the author focuses on the ways in which the Rollin 200 Crips interpreted and made sense of Sin’s death. Several narratives of interpretation could be discerned in the aftermath of his death. Firstly, speculations and rumors about the motives brought feelings of uncertainty and suspicion to the fore, contrasting the otherwise instrumental logic of violence the Rollin 200 Crips communicated during the author’s fieldwork and in the media. In addition, Sin’s death produced a number of narratives about the ‘realness’ of Dutch gang life. For these reasons, Sin’s death represents an impressive, important and meaningful moment during the author’s fieldwork and, more generally, in the history of the Rollin 200 Crips.