My life wasn't an easy life, in fact it would begin in
tribulation. Forced to leave home at four years of age, I
would spend the next 19 years attempting to discover why...Yes, along with my younger brother, we endured nothing but
hunger, abuse and loneliness because my mother was a
junkie. In fact, she was more into her drugs than into her
By the time I was 4, my 15-year-old brother Jerald, who had
endured the same and had left home before I was born,
returned one day. And, while my mother was in one of her
drug binges, removed my younger brother and I from
our "home" and into the world.
We began our journey on the tough streets of South Central
LA, California, enduring six months of living in abandoned
buildings while my older brother hustled, conned and did
odds and ends to feed us in an attempt at survival... until
he, in fact, also gave up the fight...
This is when California Child Protective Services arrived
in my life...my younger brother and I would soon be mired
in the web of the CPS...a name intended to mean, "we
PROTECT" the little ones...
I would soon discover that this "PROTECTION" only meant
further abuse and hardship. For soon I would be placed in a
tough boys home where the abuse continued and I fought it
tooth and nail, and my brother? Well, he was sent to a
foster home where adoption was soon his destiny.
Yes, alone... scared... wanting what little love and
comfort I had experienced from my brothers... I would
battle with the storm's tide while my little brother was
ripped from my life and placed in a foster home.
And so, at four and a half years old, I grieved for my loss
and my three-year-old brother's loss. I grieved for the
loss of a mother who did not care. I grieved for the loss
of the only Father Figure I had --my older brother--who had
also given up on us.
With no real love, no family, carrying the burden of so
much, I would never find peace and solace. Yes, I would
soon become angry and sad, yet feeling that I had to show
strength.
From one boy's home to the next, seven years would flash by
and yet, I would not see my friend, my playmate, my comfort
and half of my very heart... my brother again...
And so, as my desperation continued, I ran away from a
boy's home located in Riverside, California. I was eleven
by then and seeking love, family and a father figure and
soon discovered that there were others just like me...
Sanbernadino, California, they called themselves the i.e.
5x crip [i.e. =Inland Empire].
The I.E. 5xCrip was a tough group of sixty 16 to 19 year
old gang members. They seemed to care about me. And all I
had to do was to "Jump In" and I would have a lot of father
figures and a family I could call my own...
Jumping Into this group was not what I envisioned at the
start. Though I was told what "Jumping In" was and meant,
the beating I took...took a while to get over. But I
did "get over" it and was soon not only PROUD that I had
endured, but eager was my entire being to prove that I was
a part of it all... yes, a part of this family...
My first "Family Chore" was selling drugs...from marijuana
to heroin I moved it all...while the "Family" or "Crew"
gathered the profits..
And, so, I lived in vacant houses and learned to "Skim" the
top... I would add stems to the ounces of pot I sold, and
cut the heroin and cocaine. By the time I was fourteen my
volume grew and I had mastered the business. I had not only
grown my "Business" but was smoking the dope and snorting
the cain...
After three years of selling dope and doing things that
were crazy when we weren't selling dope, like setting a
semi-truck carrying 800 bales of hay on fire while it was
running down the road just for a few kicks, I discovered I
had a GRANDFATHER IN NEW YORK! Yes, a grandfather!
WOW!! Really, I had discovered there was a MAN out there I
could claim I was related to... Some one that was an
elder.. a REAL father figure and I was tired of the
streets, the games, the loneliness and the living on the
edge. Yes, I thought, I could go there and my life would
change! Yes, it was worth the thought! The trip, the fact
that it would be a relative and that he must be looking for
me! And so, with the thought that my life might change for
the better...I teamed up with a homeboy [another, close
gang member] who had a ride and convinced him that the
BUCKS were greater in New York (even though I had never
been there!) and left California for New York City. He was
high on the thought that the cash was LARGER in NY.
Even though I had a bankroll of two thousand by then, we
would siphon gas all during the trip!
We arrived in the Bronx, NY and found where my Grandfather
lived and soon were knocking at his door.
Though he seemed surprised, his face lighting up when I
introduced myself as his grandson, even asking "which one",
my "grandfather" invited us in for an hour and then
notified me that he "had to get back to what he was
doing"...
And so, it was back to doing what I knew ...
I lay low for a while and then got busted for selling drugs.
I would spend the next six months in Warwick State Training
School for Boys, a place that was pure insanity, until the
California CPS was notified and I was released into their
custody.
[note from Rock: a glorified name for a place of hell - I
was there for 6 months in 1965],
When I arrived back in California, CPS delivered me to
another another boys home located in Redlands. I was there
for four days before the opportunity arrived for me to
split the place.
I hitch hiked home. That is, to the place I remembered best
as home:
South Central Los Angels....
...and joined another gang...
The Latino: South Side Baldwin Parka..
Now, though I have gray-blue eyes and dirty-blonde hair, I
am Latino and speak enough Spanish to communicate with
ease.
I jumped in once more and moved up some...
While a member of South Side Baldwin Parka, I was shot in
the face, had a fellow gang member try and slice my arm off
for defending homeless people that stayed in the vacant
building the gang occupied and "Jacked" stores during the
Rodney King LA Riots.
I was sixteen years old and the Devil was my partner. Every
drug I sold, every store or business I robbed, any dollar I
made, was made in anger and getting even with anyone who
even reminded me of my hopes... and getting even with
anybody and everybody remained the motivating force for my
life...