Documenting the life of a New York gang leader paralysed by…

New photobook ‘Say Less’ is a complex yet humanising look into a life wrecked by gun violence and organised crime.

In 2021, Long Island based photographer and paediatrician Dr Greg Gulbransen was in The Bronx taking pictures of large-scale ride outs of young people on bicycles, when he noticed a concerning abnormality. A considerable number of people, particularly young men, were in wheelchairs, and his background as a physician found him immediately asking why.

“I heard they were spinal cord injuries and I was like: ‘What do you mean? They’re falling out of windows? Hit by cars?’” Gulbransen recalls. “They were like: ‘No. They were shot.’ One of the mottos of the bike riders at the time was ‘bikes up, guns down’, and I realised that there’s a lot of gun problems here.”

The revelation came at a tipping point in the USA. In 2020, firearms surpassed car accidents as the leading cause of death for children and teenagers. It’s a stark statistic, made even more immediate by the fact that between 2019 and 2021, gun deaths rose by 50 per cent. “It became a real story of gun crime getting worse,” he continues. “So I decided, let’s figure this out – let’s dig a little deeper.”

After asking around Gulbransen was introduced to Malik. As the leader of a local Crip gang, Malik had been one of the area’s most notorious and feared presences, but had been left paralysed from the shoulders down and requiring round-the-clock care after being shot by rival gang members.

“Malik is the third generation of gun violence, and his son might be the fourth,” Gulbransen says. “In 1996 his grandfather killed a policeman with a gun, and his father was also arrested and put in jail for gun violence. Malik did something with guns – I don’t know what, I never asked him, but he must have done something because there was revenge on him and that’s why the rival gang wanted him dead. They got his brother a month later then his good friend a month after that.”

Striking up a friendship, Gulbransen returned to visit Malik over the next few years, bringing him food and chatting, while taking pictures of him and his fellow gang members, who regularly checked in to take care of their leader. Now, after three years of making the project, a number of those images are presented in his newly published photobook Say Less, which is a complex, unnerving, yet humanising look into a life wrecked by gun violence and organised crime.

The book follows Malik in his daily life, and provides a close up look at the real effects of gun violence and gun accessibility. Despite having stricter restrictions that most other regions of the USA, guns remain ever present in New York City, especially in its more deprived areas. The book’s back cover features a very telling quote from Malik’s mother, responding to a question asking how hard it is to get a gun. “In this city? It’s like buying a quart of juice.”

“Being paralysed from the mid-thorax down, there’s nothing he can do other than work his phone,” Gulbransen explains. “He has bed sores, open sores, exposed bones. He gets catheterised three times a day, has to have his diaper changed – multiple people do that, they have to pick him up and carry him into the shower each day.”

Most pertinently though, the project examines the complexity of the human experience, and how our environments shape us. Within the tough landscape of life in the Bronx Projects, crime and violence are ever present. Guns appear everywhere in the book, as do drugs. Yet there are also plenty of moments of tenderness – Malik being lifted by his mother from his bed or attempting to hit a two pointer from his wheelchair while out with some friends. While gang life ultimately left him paralysed, it was what he knew, and what he could rely on.

“In the South Bronx, it’s a very common part of daily life,” Gulbransen says. “You join the gangs young – like aged 13 or 14 – and you join to have friends, but also for protection. I asked why they have guns, well [they replied]: ‘Someone can come in and shoot us, and why shouldn’t we be able to shoot back?’”

“It’s a dangerous place to be,” he continues. “Gang life is a way to survive, but it’s also a way to die.”