Locked In with Ian Bick - I Was a Latin King — This Is How I Survived Prison | Steven Johnson

Episode Date: February 5, 2026

Steven Johnson grew up in Connecticut surrounded by instability and a rough childhood that pushed him toward the streets at a young age. As a teenager, he joined the Latin Kings and quickly rose through the ranks, eventually becoming a chapter president before landing in Connecticut state prison. While serving time in the late 1990s and early 2000s, Steven made a decision that could have cost him his life — walking away from the gang while still incarcerated. In this episode, he shares what prison was really like during that era, how he survived the consequences of leaving the Kings behind bars, and how that choice completely changed the course of his life. After his release, Steven never looked back, building a new path rooted in discipline, accountability, and staying out of the system for good. _____________________________________________ #LatinKings #PrisonStories #GangLife #LifeAfterPrison #TrueCrimePodcast #JusticeSystem #RedemptionStory #lockedin _____________________________________________ Than you to AVA & LUCY for sponsoring this episode: AVA: Take control of your credit today. Download the Ava app and when you join using my promo code LOCKEDIN, you’ll get 20% off your first year—monthly or annual, your choice. _____________________________________________ LUCY: Go to HTTP://LUCY.CO/IANBICK and use promo code IANBICK to get 20% off your first order. _____________________________________________ Connect with Steven Johnson: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/steve.john.247800 YouTube: https://youtube.com/@newslifeandbeyond?si=9xofBYhgZMzYNf4b _____________________________________________ Hosted, Executive Produced & Edited By Ian Bick: https://www.instagram.com/ian_bick/?hl=en https://ianbick.com/ _____________________________________________ Shop Locked In Merch: http://www.ianbick.com/shop _____________________________________________ Timestamps: 00:00 Worst Jail Memory That Still Haunts Him 00:36 Meet Steven: Life, Background & Podcast Journey 03:20 Growing Up in New London, Connecticut 07:00 Family Life, Poverty & Early Struggles 13:41 Drugs, Trauma & Losing Stability at a Young Age 19:49 Teenage Hustles, Survival & Dropping Out of School 25:05 Entering Street Life & First Crimes 28:59 When Gang Culture Took Over Connecticut 32:32 Deeper Gang Involvement & Losing Control 36:04 Becoming a Latin King 40:03 Gang Leadership, Power & Expanding Influence 44:00 Trying to Change — Then Getting Arrested 54:05 County Jail Reality Check 01:03:33 Leaving the Gang While Locked Up 01:09:19 Transfer to Cheshire Prison & Daily Routine 01:14:02 Getting Sent to Virginia Prison 01:18:04 Prison Politics & Surviving Without Trouble 01:25:01 Life Lessons From Prison & Walking Away From the Gang 01:27:01 Life After Prison & Staying Clean 01:33:01 Rebuilding Family Relationships & Finding Purpose 01:40:11 Final Reflections & Advice to the Next Generation Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Standard, the Subaru Forrester Hybrid. Visit Subaru.com slash hybrid to learn more. Maximum range based on EPA estimated combined fuel economy and a full tank of fuel. Actual mileage and range may vary. The worst thing that I ever seen while I was in jail, I was in Cheshire. He was in the wait room, and this kid from Bridgeport had a problem with somebody prior to come into jail. So that kid actually ran into him in Cheshire. So while he was doing the pull-downs on a pull-down machine,

A dude came up behind him and slid his hole, you know, from behind, slit his holes. He gave him the whole buck 50. You know, you can see the meat hanging and, you know what I mean? And, you know, it's funny. I don't know if you witnessed, you know, going down in jail, but everything just gets quiet and everybody just walks away. Today, you're about to hear how Stephen Johnson went from leading a Latin Kings chapter to survive in Connecticut State Prison and why walking away from the gang while locked up

was the most dangerous decision he ever made. This episode dives into prison life in the late 90s, gang politics behind bars, and the moment that changed his life forever. Even welcome to Lockton. Thanks so much for coming out here today. Thanks for having me, man. Yeah, and thanks for the awesome care package, man.

You guys came in with a full box of swag. I got my Ian Bick hoodie. It's actually a custom hoodie made you. I made it myself. Oh, you print them out your house? Is that your business, too? Well, see, when we started our podcasts, we figured that we would have to have merch, right?

So, you know, we looked around all different places of where we can get our merch made. You know, we tried the Amazon. We tried the local people that we know that do the kind of stuff, you know, that we wanted. And we found out that it was too expensive. You know, by the time we pay for, you know, it to be made and we get it and we ship it and all that, we make nothing off of it. Which is fine by me because the way I looked at it is, you know, if you get people wearing your merch, it's free advertising too, right? So you kind of get that, you know, on the long run, you know what I mean, out of it. But, you know, and it wasn't meant to be like, you know, to make money off of it.

But we figured if we could make our own merch and save us a whole lot of money, you know, and a lot of time, you know, because then I initially reached out to my cousin, which lives in Maryland and he does that kind of work. And he does embroidery, you know, cups and tumblers and all that type of stuff. So we started buying all that stuff, having it shipped to us and all that. And we realized it was costing us too much. So I figured I might as well try to learn how to do it myself. So I took a trip up to his house and seen his operation and cut out the middleman. That's so, I mean, that's smart. That's, I mean, merch is expensive.

Oh, yeah, definitely. We invest a ton into buying merch, but it barely sells. Merch is a hard business. Oh, yeah, definitely. Unless you're like a big brand, like a bar stool or any of those. So it's more just for advertising. Exactly. Like the wristbands, the stickers, the figures.

I think the figures are cool. We give them one a guest ass for one. We give it or we do giveaways. So it's just like a cool concept. Yeah, definitely. So the thing we learned out of it, right, is that nobody really wants to buy our merch. However, they like custom merch.

And now that I learn how to make my own merch, I can make merch for them too. Do you guys bring stickers? We do all kinds of shit. Oh, I'll use you guys for the sticker business. Yeah. Yeah. Because we order stickers all the time.

Yeah. We were actually looking at like a sticker machine the other day, but it was like two or three grand. Yeah. You know, anything's, investment, right? You got to put, you got to put that money into what you want to work, you know. Yeah. Tell everyone about your podcast. I'll be going on yours after this. We got a podcast called News, Life and Beyond. Initially, when we started out, our podcast, we started out on street life,

you know, people that have been to jail like your podcast, you know, because I know a lot of people, you know, in my area that have been to jail. You know, I have, you know, excellent stories that we would love to hear. You know what I mean? I'm sure you go through that where you, you know, hear these amazing stories that you would would have never heard of if you didn't talk to these people right and uh so we started that way around but we noticed we weren't getting as many people that wanted to talk about those kind of things you know a lot of the friends and you know people that i know that have been to jail i've been to jail for long periods of time they still have people in in the area that they've hurt so they don't want to get up on on the podcast and say something that's

offend somebody and stir up the same drama that they had from back in the days or whatever, you know what I mean? So it started getting to be kind of hard to find guests to do that. Then we branched out to the music aspect of it because I know a lot of people that are into music, rappers, local rappers that are trying to make it, you know, that don't have any kind of promotion or anything. They don't, they're not signed to anybody. So they really can't, you know, branch out like they want to. But they're really talented people, you know, so I figured, you know, we maybe we can give them a platform. So we started doing that for a little while and, you know, we got a couple of people to come and, you know, then we, I'm sure you've been

through it where you get a bunch of people that'll say they're going to come, they want to come. And then when it comes time to do it, I heard you mentioned on your podcast, when it comes the time to do it, they don't show up or, you know, something like that. You know what mean? So you have to deal with that aspect of it. But, you know, little by little, we've been trying to keep it going, you know, when we don't have guests, me and Adam will get on there and we'll, you know, make a fool of ourselves and, you know what I mean, and try to, you know, make our own content. Sometimes it's good.

Sometimes it's bad. You know, but we're learning as we go along. You know what I mean? Yeah, at least you have a co-host. That's cool. This is a podcast that, you know, me and haven't been friends for 33 years. You know, we've been through so much together, you know, with, you know, legal and illegal. You know what I mean?

We know each other, you know, like the back of our hands. So, you know, we figured, you know, with our rapport, we'd be able to have a good podcast where we can be able to coincide with each other and talk back and forth and keep it flowing and try to keep it interesting. It hasn't been as interesting as I think it is supposed to be, but we're learning. You know, we're still no idea. I didn't know where, you know, if you look at the beginning of our podcast until now, you can definitely see the progression, you know what I mean? And like I said, this is all stuff that me and him just done just on a whim. He just said one day, you know, let's start a podcast and we're like, okay, we're trying out. You know, what do we need? Do we need

We need some mics. We need some of this. We need some of that. You know, so we've been going through steps and learning as we go along, you know. I love that. Yeah, we haven't really got a lot of views and, you know,

interaction or anything, you know, most of the local people that we know are haters because nobody wants to see you get ahead before them, you know. I call it the crab in the bucket syndrome. You know what I mean? Everybody's, you know, trying to pull everybody else down to get to the top, you know what I mean? So, you know, it is what it is.

It takes time. We keep it pushing and we're, you know, we're going to, you know, eventually, figure it out, hopefully. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, you're doing more than the person that doesn't do anything. Definitely. That's all that matters. And I do it all with a 40-hour job, too. Yeah, that's awesome, man. Good for you. Where are you from? Where'd you grow up? Yeah, I grew up in New London, Connecticut. New London, Connecticut is by the sub-base, the crying area. If anybody doesn't know anything about an EB, electric boat,

Pfizer has a big, you know, company down there or whatever. I grew up. I grew up. up, you know, and I guess like a, I guess you would say like a good, you know, childhood for the most part in the beginning. You know, I grew up down by Ocean Beach. I don't know if you ever been to Ocean Beach, but close to there. A lot of people know about Ocean Beach, you know, from like Harford and all that because some of the local schools in those areas usually bring the kids to the beach for, you know, because they don't have beaches in their area. So they bust them down there for field trips and shit like that. So that's how some people in Connecticut know about it. But so I grew up, you know, a normal childhood, I guess, from the first start of it.

You know, I did good in school. I wasn't like a popular kid or anything, but I knew everybody, you know, because I talked to everybody. I had friends all over the place or whatever. My parents weren't strict. So they kind of raised me on the, you know, be home before the lights come on, the street lights. you know so it gave me plenty of freedom to venture out and you know be the curious kid that i am you know so you know i spent my summers you know going to the beach and on my way to the beach i'd raid people's backyards for fruit you know because i didn't have money or whatever so you know pears

apples whatever you got in your yard i'm raiding on the way there you know me and my friends are jumping the fence when we get to ocean beach to get in the park because we don't got no money you know stuff like that fishing you know all that type of thing you know the basic kid stuff, you know. My family, I had a pretty big family. I'm half Puerto Rican, half black. I raised up with my mom's side of the family, Puerto Rican side. The black side of my family, I don't really know too many of them.

I knew who my father was, my grandparents, but, you know, I didn't really have any relationship with them growing up. My mother met a guy when I was one years old, and she ended up meeting this guy and taken off with him, you know, away from my father because my father was, you know, pretty abusive, I guess, and an alcoholic. So she met this guy, kind of kidnapped us from him, from my real father. And, you know, he didn't fight for her to try to get us back. He just let her go or whatever.

So I was raised by my stepfather for about 13 years. he was in the household. He was, I would say, a good role model because he taught me a lot of things, like how to be a man as far as taking care of the household. They had a very traditional relationship where he would go to work. She would stay home. She never had a job or anything like that. Her house, her job was to take care of home, have dinner cooked, make sure the house was clean, make sure that, you know, us kids. were, you know, okay or whatever, but, you know, we weren't his kids, so that was on her anyways,

you know what I mean? I was raised with just my older sister, which is two years older than me in the household, but I also have another brother with the same, my mother had three kids by my real father, me, my brother, and my older sister were all a year apart. She traveled back and and forth from Puerto Rico having us. So I was born in Puerto Rico. She moved back to Connecticut. Actually, no, she had my sister in Puerto Rico and me, and she moved back to Connecticut. I had my brother and my little sister, which has a different father, myself. This episode is brought to you by Redfin. You're listening to a podcast, which means you're probably multitasking, maybe even scrolling home.

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Smooth caramel maybe. or white chocolate mocha. Whichever you choose, delicious coffee awaits. Find Starbucks Papuaino drinks wherever you buy your groceries. Father that raised me. So, you know, we had a normal family, you know, did all the things. My father, like I said, had a job at EB, and he made decent money on the side. He used to have his little side hustle selling cocaine or whatever he did.

You know what I mean? I don't know exactly what he used to do, but I know he used to do something now that I'm older. You know what I mean? He ended up going jail for it later anyway. So that kind of put the nail on the head for me, for me, you know. So growing up, my family, like I said, had a big family. So my family lived all throughout New London. My aunts lived in projects, you know, low-income housing in one area.

My grandmother and my uncles lived in another project area and another area of New London. And we had cousins that lived in another part of New London in the low-income housing area. So it got to the point where when we had family functions, we would travel between these places. As we travel between these places, you know, we always had this thing where we'd always, all the cousins would stay over the other cousin's houses or whatever, whatever, which got me to hang in their neighborhoods, right? So although I came from like a suburban type of area, I hung out in all the rougher neighborhoods in my area because of all my family being there. You meet people, you know, you start hanging out, you know, that type of thing or whatever.

So it helped me, although I was not popular in school, I met a lot of people from different areas and got to rub elbows and have foreign relationships with all these different people, you know, that are going through different things in life. or whatever. So growing up, like I said, I met a lot of people and come around maybe the 80s. Crack era, drug epidemic going around. Most of my family got into the drugs, whether it be selling it, doing it, you know, whatever, the case partying or whatever. They all partied together. They all, you know, did their hard drugs and stuff like that. As the years went by, the families separated more and more because, you know, the ones that were doing well wouldn't want to be associated with the ones that weren't doing well, vice versa.

The other ones that weren't doing well looked at the ones that were doing well as snooty and uppity or whatever, you know what I mean? So, oh, I don't want to be around them, you know? So it broke the family apart into sections, right? my father started making a lot of money he was young he was originally from new york he met my mother they you know they did their thing or whatever but as the years went by and he started getting his more status on the street making more money being more flashy started wearing the jewelry and the thurs and buying the Cadillacs and BMWs and all that type of stuff what happens they start hanging out in the bars.

Girls are throwing themselves at you because now you got money. You know what I mean? He wasn't the greatest looking guy. So, you know, looking at it now as a man, I can see where it went wrong at. You know what I mean? As a kid, you wouldn't know that because you don't know these things. So eventually he started cheating on my mother. You know, she found out they had a big fight and broke up.

He took off with this girl. started a new family with her, ended up getting married with her, having kids, all that type of stuff. My mother stayed bitter over it for her whole life still to this day. Before they broke up, they had my little sister. She was like one years old when they broke up. I was about 13. So they break up. You know, he starts his family with her.

My mom doesn't know what to do with herself because she spent her whole life being a home homemaker, never had a job, never had an education. The farthest she ever made it to in school was 10th grade. So she had no high school diploma, no job skills, no nothing. The only thing she's had the whole time of her life was a welfare check and food stamps. You know what I mean? Because, you know, everybody had it back in those days. It's free money, right?

So, you know, now she's hit with raising kids on her own. She's got to figure it out, right? It's too much for her. So she started getting it heavy into the drugs. I think she already was doing drugs before that. You know, I think they were all, you know, they were all doing drugs together. You know, I don't think she got into the too, too hard drugs, like heroin or anything like that. But she got into the cocaine and crack and stuff like that.

Eventually she caught a drug habit, which caused us to kind of go into a spiral where we lost everything. You know, we had nowhere to stay. You know, we started couch hopping. with family, friends, or whatever, you know what I mean? Everybody would put us up as much as they could and help us out as much as he could. But, you know, there's only so much person could do, right? You know, they'll try to help you out, but you've got to eventually figure it out yourself, you know? Well, she was having trouble figuring it out.

So we bounced around for a few years, which eventually caused me to quit school. Although I was so good in school while I was going to school, you know, I used to get all A's and Bs. I, you know, I did plays in school. I tried to do athletics, one spelling bees. Like, you know what I mean? I was very active in school up until about seventh grade when, when that time happened. So now we're bouncing around so much that as I'm trying to go to school and trying to learn or whatever, you know, we'd only stay in one area for a good, you know, a month or two before we're moving to the next spot. You know, so I bounced around from to London to Gras and to Norwich, which was all, you know, in the area or whatever.

where we find eventually we got to the point where nobody would help us out. So she had no choice but to reach out to the state for help or whatever because we ended up in the shelter. Eventually, you could only stay at the shelter for so long before, you know, they kick you out. So the state eventually started putting us in hotels, you know, for like six months at a time. So we'd bounce around from, we'd go to grind and stay in a hotel for six months. and we'd go to Norwich and stay in a hotel from six months. You know what I mean? And so we bounced around for a while on that.

My aunt and her kids started going through the same situation. She started doing, you know, pretty much the same situation that happened with us, happened with her family too. So her and my mother stayed close. You know, all of us. My aunt had two boys and a girl, the same as my mother. So we were all close. We stayed all together.

because we were all going through the same thing. You know, so they kind of relied on each other to, you know, get high together and take care of the kids together as much as they could and try to figure it out together. And, you know, eventually we finally got out of shelter. Everything was good. We got an apartment right down, not even two houses from the same shelter we was just at. I was excited. You know, we finally had an apartment. We finally had somewhere to go.

I had my own key to my own room. You know what I mean? Which sounds kind of stupid. But to me, it was like, oh, my God, I finally got my own again, you know what I mean? Instead of sleeping on somebody's couch or some other kids bed or, you know what I mean, where wherever we were staying at the time. So, you know, it was exciting, you know, it lasted for about a week. My aunt got a boyfriend.

He started hanging around with some of my uncles. They started a party in one night doing drugs. ended up OD and her, my aunt's boyfriend ended up OD enough of a speedball, which is cocaine and, what is the cocaine and cocaine and heroin mixed together. And they inject it. So he ends up dying in our attic, right? I'm sleeping in my bed. Like I said, I got the lock on my door. My aunt comes knock on my door like, I were like two in the morning. You know, I go answer the door, she's like, Steve, I think Mike's dead. I'm like, what do you mean? Mike's dead.

She's like, I think he's dead. You know, she's got deers coming down and everything. I'm like, okay. I'm like, I'm 14 at this point. You know, I don't know what to do. So I'm like, all right, well, let me go see what's going on. So, you know, I go upstairs. You know, we had a, uh, the apartment we had at an attic where the landlord told us we weren't

supposed to be up there but they didn't listen you go up there and they had it used to be a boarding house so they had a couple bedrooms with beds in them and stuff no sheets or anything just regular beds you know like you know somebody used to sleep there back in the days or whatever so they went up there to get high and uh so we go up there me my uh my cousin my older cousin which is her daughter my sister my little cousin which is her my aunt's son and we and we're we're my aunt's son We see him laying there on the bed with no sheets on it. You know, he's got like a green outline around him, around the mattress from where his body started already deteriorating or whatever, where it's turning, making the mattress turn colors. You know, so we're poking at him.

You know, Mike, Mike, get up. You know, I smacked him in the face a couple times. Mike, get up. He's not moving. You know, I put my hand next to his nose to see if he's breathing. He's not breathing. And, you know, my girl cousin and my aunt's daughter, she looks down at his feet. She says, he's got my socks on.

We all bust it out laughing. You know, it's so, you know, now that I look at it, it's so crazy, you know what I mean? That, you know, you could go through something so traumatic and find some humor in it to try to, you know, kind of pull yourself out of that or whatever, you know. And, you know, going through life, you learn to think about these type of things and reflect on them and you look at them a little differently, right? So because of that happening, obviously the landlord kicked us out. So we're back to square one again. So, you know, my mom goes back to the state.

State decides to put us in another hotel this time in Norwich, Connecticut. We went to Norwich, Connecticut as kids because they have a park called Mohegan Park, which has a lake and a zoo and picnic areas and all that shit. So, you know, when we were younger, we saw. to go there and have picnics and stuff, but it was always so far, it always seemed like such a far ride as a kid, which was, it wasn't even far. It was only like 30 minutes away from New London, but because I've never been out there as a kid, you know, it seems like amazing because you go in there and they've got all these big buildings and, you know, graffiti on the buildings and you see

bums on the street and, you know, it was a little different from New London, you know. And so when we finally moved there, they moved us to us, ratty-ass hotel. dead in the middle of North Norch. You know, it's got pissy hallways, you know, the rooms, you know, probably they sell rent them to crackheads and prostitutes maybe because they got holes in the walls and there's rats here, you know what I mean? You look out the back window and it's just a tar roof with fire escapes and shit, you know, some shit you'd probably see in New York or whatever, you know what I mean?

And I'm looking at this place like, wow, where the fuck are we? You know what I mean? Like, you know, this is crazy, you know, so. Um, you know, I met, I met my wife's brother and him, his mom was pretty much in the same situation. They got different mothers. So he grew up, you know, away from her or whatever. He starts me, you know, introducing him me to people in the area or whatever. And, you know, so I started making friends and, you know, whatnot or whatever.

I go back to, I'm in high school at this point. Well, should be in high school. You know, like I said, I wasn't going to school because we were. moving around so long. So now that we're finally in a place that we're supposed to stay at, because we only stayed at that hotel for about six months, and then we finally got an apartment again, I tried to go back to school, you know, high school. You know, I started to start from the scratch again, told them I was in ninth grade, even though I was supposed to be in 10th because I wanted to start from the beginning so that, you know, I'd be able to make it through without,

you know, like a normal kid, you know. And that did last long. ended up going there for like maybe two weeks or whatever and and uh somebody snitched on me for trying to sell some joints in school so i never went back because i was i was scared i'd get locked up or whatever and uh so that was the end of that so um living with my mother now you know i'm getting older you know she's got a new boyfriend um you know they're alcoholics together and they fight all the time they you know domestic violence like a motherfucker you know what I mean like you know they're always fighting to the point where you know it got it got so serious one time I had to fucking you know step in and be like

you know this is not going to happen no more you know what I mean I'm getting older I'm like you know you're not going to be beating on my mother and shit you know what I mean I end up in jail for that too but um you know uh so looking at it I'm getting older you know now I'm 15 or like 15 And it's probably in 90, maybe 1990. I realized I got to start figuring out my life and doing something with myself. If I'm not going to go to school, I got to get a job, I got to hustle, I got to do something. I need money in my pocket to get my own place and all that type of stuff. I met my daughter's mother.

And she, her and her mother took me in. And I started living with her. I got myself a job, you know, at a chicken farm. And, you know, and it was a really disgusting job, $5 an hour, much overtime as you want. But they used to take us all over to state, New York, North Carolina, you know, working or whatever. And even though it was only $5 an hour, I used to work so much that I'd have a decent paycheck at the end of the week. You know what I mean? At least $500 or $500 or whatever.

And at 15 years old, you know what I mean? That's pretty decent to me, you know what I mean? especially in those times, maybe not now. So, you know, I started making a little bit of money or whatever, and it wasn't enough. It wasn't enough. My aunt, she ended up getting an apartment in the same building that we got an apartment, and she met a weed dealer. This guy had so much weed.

You know, I didn't know. I've never seen so much weed in my life, you know what I mean? But, you know, at that young age, I figured, you know, it's a lot of weed. When I was in New London, me and my friends used to dabble into trying to sell drugs or whatever, but it never worked out. You know, we tried to get in the crack game and, you know, we'd get packages, you know, from people and end up messing it up by getting beat or, you know, it gets lost or something, you know, some dumb or whatever, you know. So, you know, I never really made any money in the beginning on doing that. So once we got to his house and I've noticed he had all this weed, I was like, you know, he'd probably not. not going to notice if I take a, you know, eighth or a half ounce here and there or whatever because

he's got so much. And sure enough, you didn't. So, so I started dipping into a stash and, uh, you know, started, you know, selling weed and stuff and making a little bit of money. And, uh, I realized that, you know, that's the way to go. You know what I mean? It's easy. You know, you make a little bit of money. You know, I don't have to ask nobody. I'm buying StarCics to buy myself clothes and sneakers now that I've never been able to have before, you know, um, Eventually that, you know, went a little further when I started realizing that I can make more money selling cocaine and crack and stuff like that. Around, yeah, around that same time, gangs really started hitting my area, New London, Norwich Groton area. all the friends that I grew up with all started branching out into their own separate gangs.

You know, some of my friends became 20 love. I don't know if you heard of 20 love before to Hartford gang. Some of my friends became Salitos. One of the hardest parts of getting out of prison wasn't just a stigma. It was trying to get an apartment with no credit. I'd walk into places ready to do the right thing, and it didn't matter. As soon as they ran my credit, it was basically game over. history, bad history, deposits I couldn't afford. It felt like I was being punished twice.

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Thanks to Eva. Now go get yourself good credit. I heard of Salitos, Hartford. Used to be a big gang back in the 90s. Latin Kings. I've heard of that. A lot of my friends became Latin Kings. Some kids became Crips.

Some became blood. You know what I mean? What else do we have out there, Nietas? You've heard Nietas. Some of them turn Nietas. notes that they have out there. Plus we had all our little local gangs. We had one called Poison Clan into London, you know, M-O-B.

Another one called M-O-B that they used to call themselves. So everybody started doing their own little exploration with that where, you know, back in those days you had all the movies coming out too, colors and, you know, American Me and, you know, the Scarface movies and, you know what I mean? and, you know, everybody starts thinking this is the way to go, you know, the paid-in-full movies, you know what I mean? You know, everybody's all my friends are starting to, you know, make money on the streets, and, you know, some are getting bigger than others, and you know what I mean? And then it starts to get a little territorial, too, on top of that. And so me and my friend, from third grade that I used to hang out with a lot,

He's, me and him started a little local gang of our own called Los Fudios. We used to wear black and blue beads, uh, kind of like the Latin Kings used to wear, you know, all the gangs had their own colors. Solido's used to wear blue and red. Nyatazes used to wear blue, red and white, 20 love used to wear black and green. You know what I mean? So everybody had their own signifying colors that they'd wear, you know, just like the bloods and the grips with the red and blue.

And, uh, so we started our own little, little gang. and started recruiting a lot of, you know, young kids that were bullied by other people and stuff like that because, you know, they all want to be a part of something to help protect themselves, right? And, you know, if they look up and, you know, think you're cool enough, if they want to be down or whatever. So we started getting a little bit of numbers, you know what I mean? And, you know, as kids, you know, you see all these movies where they have all these gangs and people are jumping people. and beating people down and, you know, having cag parties and all that type of stuff. And so, you know, we all emulated all that ourselves, you know. So it got to the point where, you know, we started gaining a little notoriety in our town.

And the Latin Kings had to step to us and said, you know, you can't, you know, have this gang. You know what I mean? with my friend that I started the gang with was hanging around with a high-ranking Latin king at the time in the area and he was like, you know, why don't you guys just become kings? You know what I mean? If you want to be, you know, we're already established, you know, we already got the numbers, you know what I mean? You get connections.

You can, you know, all that. You know, he made it sound real good to him. And so he came to me and he's like, yeah, we should all just become kings. And I'm like, well, most of us aren't Latin. you know, I'm black and Puerto Rican. He's white in Puerto Rican. And most, you know, a lot of the other people that were with us, Adam being one of them, were white kids, you know what I mean?

That had no Latin descent. So you're not supposed to be a Latin king. And with, although that happens. So, um, me, my friend became a Latin king. And we all stayed with the Los Fudios things. But eventually he kept talking into it, you know, Steve, you know, you should come, you know. you're in Norwich and they don't have a lot of Latin kings at the time Norwich I only had like maybe three or four Latin kings or whatever they just pretty much gotten out of jail and started you know the chapter up there or whatever and he's like you know I'll introduce you to them this and that blah blah blah you know you'll get in there you'll get a position right because you know they have seven positions open and they only have four Latin kings right so so you know eventually he talked me into it you know I'm like whatever you know we'll do it so So, you know, I became a Latin king with him.

He introduced me to the Norwich chapter or whatever. And sure enough, just like he said, right off the rip, I got a position. It was a low position, but, you know, it was a position nonetheless, right? And so my OG that put me down, his name was Joey, rest in peace. He's not with us no more. He had just gotten out of jail, and he's been out of, he's been in and out of jail. whole life and pretty much was tired of it. You know what I mean?

He really didn't want to be in the lime light no more. You know, he's, I think he was pretty much just still in the gang because he didn't know what else to do maybe or something or who knows. But once I became a king and we started hanging around together, you know, he got to the point where he was like, you know, I don't even want my position no more. You should take it. And I'm like, I don't know how to be a president of a gang or anything. Like, excuse me, they don't call it a gang.

they call it an organization, but, you know, I'm like, I don't know how to lead people or tell people what to do or whatever, whatever. He was like, try it. I mean, I'm like, all right. So I became the president. As I said, I got a lot of friends. Adam's got a lot of friends. So as I, you know, got the position, now a lot of more people are starting to join us. Like King Infinite said, right? It's not supposed to be a gang. You know, they have paperwork, and I've read the paperwork that tells all the rules and how it started and what it was med for and all that. And I dug it. You know what I mean?

I was really into that. That made sense to me because coming from a broken family, that's what I wanted, a family. You know what I mean? I wanted people that you can branch out with, and you know what I mean? You have connections everywhere and you know people, and you can, you know, I mean, and when I saw how they treated each other, it was nothing but love from what I could see, you know, so I had no choice but to go full-fledged in it, you know, I read all the rules. I wanted it to be exactly like in the rules. And as I went along, I started noticing that we'd get a lot

of people that would come to us that have beef with other people. So they'd come to us for protection, shit like that and try to get down so that we can, you know, handle, you know, help them with their problems or whatever. And I was okay with that because I've always been one to, you know, kind of put my friends under my wing and try to protect them and take care of them as much as I can and shit like that, you know. So as these kids are coming to me and trying to get down with us, you know, a lot of the gangs will turn you away because they don't think you're gangster enough. They don't think you're tough. They don't, you know, you, you know, you don't have no money or whatever, whatever. But I always looked at it as more of, uh, everybody has a use.

You know what I mean? You might not be able to fight, but you might be able to help us start a business one day. You might be able to help us do whatever it is that you're good at. You You know what I mean? Because this isn't supposed to be a gang. It's supposed to be an organization. We're supposed to uplift Latin people, right? So why would we turn somebody away just because they're not tough if it's supposed to be that, right? As we went along and got bigger numbers, it became to be too much for me as in I took it so seriously that I stopped hanging around with all. the people that I knew, if you weren't a king, I didn't mess with you no more. Not that I didn't mess with you that we weren't friends or anything, but I just couldn't be around you. I couldn't hang around you because in my mind, if you have problems with somebody and, you know,

I'm with you hanging out, I have to protect you if something happens like some other gang or whatever, you know, has beef with you or whatever. So now if I protect you, then now that brings them into it. You know, now they have to protect you because they got to protect me. You know what I mean? So it was like I have to associate myself with just kings because I don't want to bring that life on to the family because we're trying to get away from that. As I got deeper into it, being the president, I felt I had to take care of everybody. So anybody that needed a place to stay, they stayed at my house.

Anybody need money. I'd put some drugs in your hand and, you know, try to help you get some money. money if, you know, or, or what, you know, not necessarily drugs, but any, any way I can think up to try to get you some, help you get some money, you know what I mean, based on something that you're able to do, you know, I would be the one to try to put that on my back and try to figure it out for you, you know what I mean? So I got to the point where, you know, now I'm taking care of all these people, you know what I mean? But I'm making it work. It's happening, but it's causing me to get hot in the streets because now I'm involved in so much stuff that

has nothing to do with me at all. You know, Joe Schmoe, that's the king, you know, goes across town. He, you know, somebody trips him or steps on his sneaker and he thinks it's disrespectful. So now he's got to defend his, his, you know, colors and, you know, beat him down or whatever. And this guy knows this guy. So now it's a big problem. And, you know what I mean? And I got to get involved into it.

You know, it got to the point where, um, I couldn't walk the streets without getting pulled over. Frisked. I couldn't drive down the street with a girl in the passenger seat. I would have to put a magazine up and pretend I'm reading as we're driving by police because if they see me in the car, they're going to pull us over and search the car, all that type of shit. You know what I mean? It started getting really that bad, you know. But it's kind of my fault because one of the things, one of the rules is you're not supposed to.

to deny your colors. So I was full-fledged about it in front of police. You know, I wouldn't take my colors off. They asked me if I was a Latin king. Yeah, I'm a Latin king. You know what I mean? And, you know, it got to the point where police used to come to my house sometimes. Knock on the door.

Say, Steve, we're having the carnival downtown. You know what I mean? Or whatever, whatever. You better keep your people away from there because there's supposed to be some 20 love there. And I heard you guys got beef together. So if we see you guys down there, we're going to arrest you on site, you know, shit like that. Kayak gets my flight, hotel, and rental car right,

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You know what I mean? And because I was so full-fledged and I invested myself so much into it, I wanted to branch out to other chapters and meet people from everywhere. So me and my chapter, we used to take field trips. We go to Bridgeport, hang out with the Kings there. We go to Hartford, hang out with the Kings there. We go to fucking New Haven, hang out with the Kings there. Waterbury, you know what I mean?

All over the place, New Britain. You know what I mean? We travel around, meet people. People, you know, sometimes we'd get a little money with them. They'd come to our, you know, our town, get a little money with us, you know, whatever, whatever case may be or whatever. And by doing that, I met a lot of high-ranking members, too. Are you familiar with Beatrice, Koianney? No, what's that?

Or who? It's a female. Okay. Italian woman, ironically. She became a queen in New Haven because her sons went to jail with drug. habits and ended up becoming kings. And by becoming kings, the kings helped them become clean and fix their lives up and stuff.

So because she saw that, she wanted to be a part of it. Her being an older lady, she was probably in maybe her 60s at this time. her being an older lady and wanting to have change within the organization, try to steer people into the right way, like I was saying, you know, where you're not supposed to be selling drugs, you're not supposed to be doing anything bad, you're supposed to, you know, try to be opening up businesses and helping the Latin community in any way that you can and all that type of stuff.

And because I was into that idea so much, You know, I started rubbing elbows with her or whatever to the point where, you know, she even came down to Norwich with a bunch of Latin queens from Waterbury and a couple people from, I think they were from Meriden. And we did an interview with the Norwich Bulletin, which is the local news paper in Norwich. This interview was about police, you know, messing with us so much. You know, we couldn't do anything without the police messing with us. And it was, she was, at the time, she was doing a lot of AIDS awareness programs and food, food drives and, you know, community events where she was trying to clean up the image, you know, to not portray it as a gang anymore, you know, to wanted to move to a, you know, a legitimate organization that is what it's supposed to be for. So she comes down, we do this interview with the Norwich Bulletin, talking about. about the police and how they harass us and, you know, all that type shit or whatever.

They never, during the interview, all right, let me back up. Before this happened, the first day I became a king, right after my initiation, I told my new brothers, I'm having a keg party at my sister's house. You should all come, right? We could all hang out, you know, get to know each other more. You know, this and that, blah, blah, blah. They had a gang on the west side of north, called West Side Lunch Mob, just a local gang.

They ended up coming to the party. And one of the kids from the West Side had beef with one of the kids that were, was a king already that I had met that night. So when they came to the party and saw them, it became a problem, you know, where they wanted to fight them and all that other type stuff or whatever, whatever. We were outnumbered probably maybe 30 to 5.

So my OG, Joey, called to the New London Chapter. The New London Chapter brought up two car loads of people. As soon as they got there, we opened up the trunk. There's guns, bats, golf clubs, you know, all kinds of weapons and shit. But, you know, we start going walking down the street to go back to the party where all the kids are at or whatever. You know, everybody sees us. And we're like probably about 15 deep. You know what I mean?

And they can everybody's got the guns out and everything. And, you know, everybody's like, oh, my God, it's the Latin Kings. You know, everybody starts jumping out the windows and, you know, all that type of shit or whatever, whatever. Everybody starts running away, you know, not never happened or whatever. Somebody shot a gun off, you know, got the police to come and all that shit. everybody's scattered, you know. So being this was an unplanned thing, you know, the cars that came and dropped off all the weapons and everything left, you know, where they're all, you know, with the police coming now,

so now everybody's get out. Most of these people leave from this area, so they don't even know where to go. You know what I mean? Most of them from the London, they'd never even been to north. So they're like, all right, where this place, you know, they got the cops coming. We've got to get out of here. Where are we run? You know, I mean, so everybody's scattered this way, that way, you know, whatever, whatever.

they actually got one of the chicks from the party to get in the back of a police car, drive around with the police car, and pick out people as she sees them, you know, going down the street. Oh, he was part of it. He was part of it. You know what I mean? So they picked up so many of us that we had the whole Norwich police station clogged. They had to send some of us to the state police barracks. And it was crazy. So that, you know, that was my first time getting arrested with them for that shit.

And so that was that was a charge that I got for that. And why did I say that? There was some reason why I won't say that. Oh, so because because that happened while I'm doing the interview with the Norwich bulletin, they asked me, we heard about that in a situation on Lake Street, Norwich, where you guys had the big shootout and this and that, blah, blah, blah. If you guys aren't supposed to be a gang, explain that. I explained it the best way I could.

You know what I mean? It was our party. You know, we were there. You know, the kids came and they started problems or whatever. It went a little farther than it should have. We were just trying to protect ourselves. You know, obviously, you know, for the illegal person, they don't look at it as a good excuse, right? Obviously, it's supposed to call the cops, right?

You're not supposed to do that. So, obviously, that wasn't a good. good enough explanation or whatever but that was the best i could come up with at the time they never posted the story anyways it wasn't it wasn't a thing so like i said i'm i'm into this latin king thing and uh you know now we're starting to catch beef with other gangs and stuff they had another local small gang called uh lords of the underground uh a bunch of young kids that we didn't even want to have problems with because they were all younger than us anyways and you know what I mean so um we got word that we had to tell them they had to kind of like with us you guys got to stop that

because they had a hand signal kind of like a crown that kind of you know to the untrained die if somebody seen them doing it in public they would assume they were a king type of thing so it was like whatever you do is going to reflect on us so you got to just cut it out or become kings. So being that I was a president at the time, I went and I had a meeting with them. I brought some of the guys. And I made sure we all went strapped.

You know, I made sure that they pulled the guns out during the meeting and, you know, let it be known that, you know, you got to stop it or it's going to go further than you really need to. You know, in those days, once you start getting a little power, you start getting a little cocky, right? And I think I was a little too cocky, but obviously it didn't scare him enough because when we left, you know, I started hearing the streets, you know, they were going around saying, you know, fuck the Latin Kings, all that type shit or whatever, whatever, me being cocky and

the guy that I am, I, you know, I guess we got to show them, right? You got to show them what's up, you know? We got to make it known that we were serious. So, you know, it sounds so dumb now. But like I said, they were kind of younger to us. So, you know, I don't want to be going around beating kids up and shit. And, you know what I mean? So I figured maybe if we shoot the house up that they'll get the hint.

Wasn't trying to hit anybody or anything. Just, you know, pop a couple shots or whatever, you know, let them know what's real. You know what I mean? It didn't work. Before we jump back into this episode, quick shout out to Lucy. I've been using Lucy breakers, and what I like most is a little capsule inside each pouch. When you're ready, you just break it open and it releases a fresh hit of flavor and hydration. It actually lasts instead of fading out after a few minutes.

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And if you don't want to wait, just head to lucy.com slash stores to find Lucy near you and grab a today. And here comes the fine print. Lucy products are only for adults of legal age, and every order is age verified. Warning, this product contains nicotine. Nicotine is an addictive chemical. I didn't do it myself, but I sent a couple of people. They handled the mission. You know, they got away. Nobody got shot. Thank God. When the kids, when the cops went to the kid and, you know, asked what was going on. He told him, he made up some story about he stole one of our girls so we were mad at him or some dumb shit or whatever. But he said to the cop, I read in the statement, that he saw me, two cars pull up to his house.

He saw me get out of the car. He saw, I had a bandana on my face. I whipped the bandana off my face like in the movies and I pulled out the burner and shot up the house, jump back in the car. took off, whatever, whatever. So they did an investigation for like a good month where they pulled in a couple people that they thought were involved in it or whatever. They gave their statements, shit like that. One of the kids that gave a statement was a young kid.

He was probably like 16 years old and, you know, he was probably scared. You know, looking at it now, I can't blame him. You know, he's probably, they probably threatened to put him in jail for the rest of his life. life, all that type of stuff or whatever. So he wrote a statement saying that I was in the car with him and that, because me and him were in the car, we weren't, we didn't, weren't involved in it, but we were in the area driving around as kind of backup. Like if anything happened, you know, we can divert the police from the cars to get away

or if the kids had guns and ended up being a shootout or whatever. whatever we could have their back. You know, so we kind of like circled around the area, but not in the actual, you know, next of the house, like a couple blocks away, which they ended up getting statements from people in the areas and saying that they seen the car in the area. So, so he wrote a statement saying that although me and him are in the car and I didn't, I didn't shoot nobody or whatever that we were in the area. So that gave me motive and put me.

in the vicinity of the crime. So, a month later, you know, shit's getting really crazy, you know, on the streets and, you know,

I'm not, I'm not making as much money anymore. And I'm starting to get tired of taking care of people. And, you know, my son's mother, my oldest son's mother, was pregnant.

She was about to have a baby within a couple months. You know, we had just got an apartment together, you know, me, her, and my brother, and his girl, you know, two couples.

You know, everything was going good. You know, I figured I got to stop selling drugs, you know, because I want to raise my kid. You know, I don't want to go to jail and all that shit. My father talked me into going and applying at a Weyman and Gordon where he was working at at the time. So I was like, yeah, you know, I'll go check it out. It went in for interview.

And as I was in the interview, the cops were raided my house. go figure right now that i'm trying to change my life around and trying to do something you you know it comes back to bite you i guess right so you know as i'm in the house you know my my beepers blowing up you know what i mean we had beepers in those days uh you know i i call and i find out that my house got raided police are looking for me they don't know why they're looking for me but they know they're looking for me and like i said this was like a month ago so i didn't you know i wasn't even thinking it was nothing that that you know like that or whatever. Again, me, being cocky, I had a little bit of money stashed at the house.

You know, I know I can't run forever. I'm about to have a kid soon. I got to turn myself in, right, to get this shit figure out at least what it's about, you know, because I don't even know what it's about. Find out it's for the shooting. And I'm like, oh, shit, you know, so now they give me like 13 chargers, you know, you know, how they do. They'd just rack. up every charge I can think of to charge you with and whatever it can stick can stick, right? So, you know, although I didn't do it and, you know, I'm in jail for it, I have no way to bond out because I didn't think it was this and I didn't have that much money. They gave me a $300,000 bond. I was on probation at the time, so they gave me another $300,000 bond on top of that for the

violation of probation. So I knew I wasn't going nowhere, you know, I'm hit, you know, I'm going to be in jail for a while or whatever. You know, so now I'm in the county jail for the first time, for the first time. This isn't my first time in jail. I went to jail prior to this for like six months, you know, but it was like a little pre-release jail. You know, I was even in there for six months before I was, I was in there maybe a month before I got my first furlough already, you know, so I don't even really consider that a bid.

But this is going to be, it's going to be my first bid. So while I'm in jail, you know, like I said, I'm a Latin king. You know, I go to jail. As I'm going through intake and all that, you know, I don't have anything. I'm broke. You know, I meet a couple of brothers or whatever. And, you know, we start, they give me some food and all that shit. And, you know, things are normal or whatever or whatever.

But as I'm going to court for the next couple months or whatever, shit is really going crazy. Like, I'm hearing in the streets that those same kids that we had problems with are still going around saying fuck the Latin Kings, nobody's doing anything about it. Everybody in my chapter, they're all separated doing their own things. Nobody's even claiming it no more. You know what I mean? A couple people around the streets were spreading rumors saying I snitched on somebody or it was just a whole bunch of stupid shit. going, oh, my wife, my, my son's mother comes to see me pregnant still. She's about to have

the kid any day. I have now no contact visit, so, you know, I'm seeing her through the glass or whatever. Got to see my son when he was finally born for the first time, through the glass, couldn't hold him or anything. So that was kind of heartbreaking or whatever. My brother turns from Latin King to Crip. And now he has all his Crip buddies hanging out at my house, you know, with my daughter there. One of them has big pit bulls that are unmanageable, you know, shitting all over the place and run around. And, you know, my daughter, my, my son's mother comes home from the hospital with the baby, you know, she's got all this chaos going on. So she's calling me crying and everything, you know, And I'm cussing my brother out.

Like, what the fuck is, you know, it was wrong with you? Why are you doing this shit? You know what I mean? But they figured I wasn't going to be coming up but home anytime soon anyway. So whatever, whatever, right? So, uh, so I, you know, as, as I'm going through this, you know, and I'm looking at the whole situation, like, you know what I mean? Here I am facing.

They were, they were trying to give me 13 years. And, um, I'm thinking to myself, like, if I'm going to do 13 years, in this place. I don't know if it's a good idea to be, you know, putting my life on the line for all these, you know, people that want to fight for, you know, dumb-ass reasons in jail, because you know how it in jail. You know, the dumbest shit people fight for, right?

So it's like, do I want to waste my time, you know, fighting with people for this whole bid? You know what I mean? So, King Infinite. Yamava Resort and Casino at San Manuel is California's number one entertainment destination for today's superstars. Catch the Jonas Brothers return to the Yamava Theater stage

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it's great for affordable touch-ups on the go. Get this new must-have concealer at Sephora or at Sephora.com today. Neff actually mentioned it in his interview. Around that time, there was a worldwide thing going on in the Kings where they sent a message down to the

jail saying, anybody that doesn't want to be a king no more, drop your colors, go about your life, because we only want people that's going to be, you know, into it, into it, you know what I mean? Which made sense, you know, because even I always thought that, like, you know, if you're not really into it, why are you here? You know what I mean? So, so me and a couple other of the kings that I know from from new london we all decided well fuck it you know let's drop our colors you know what i mean so we all dropped our colors um you know i call my father about it you know he's like oh my god are you fucking crazy what are you not supposed to do that why you're in jail you know what i mean because i kind of did the backwards you know what i mean i got down in the streets got out in jail

most people do it the opposite way right they go in jail get down for protection come out to the streets and then they uh you know don't want to have nothing to do with it right so so i'm like you know it'll be fine or whatever, whatever. You know, I'm still cocky because, you know, I've been doing all this shit and, you know, I haven't had a scratch on me my whole life. I've never been beat up. I've never been stabbed. I've never been shot.

You know what I mean? So I'm like, you know, I'm feeling kind of, you know, invincible in a way and in my own way, I guess. So I'm thinking they can't do nothing to me anyways. Plus, the person that was running the pod at the time, was a crackhead that I knew from back in the days that I didn't respect anyway. So, you know, so I'm looking at all these, all these brothers and shit. And, you know, I hear brothers and, you know, other pods at this time,

20 Love was getting really deep in the jail. So they were getting to the point where, you know, they were feeling like they had the more numbers. So then, you know, they're going to try to get people packed up and all kinds of other shit like that. And so I hear brothers getting smacked up in other pods and nobody's doing nothing. And, you know, most of, some of the brothers are going around, uh, you know, messing with, with gay guys. And, you know what I mean? There's a lot of shit going on, which I kind of feel hypocritical about because as,

you know, as I became a king and I used to recruit people, I used to always tell them, like, what goes on in our chapter or a local chapter is probably going to be different everywhere you go. You know, we all love each other because we all hang each other with each other every day. We have a special bond. And, you know, we make money together. We eat together. You know, when you go to other places, people run things differently. So there's always going to be some people that you may not agree with the way they run things or, you know what I mean?

So those was that this was a situation like that where I should have probably thought like that. But at the same time, I'm looking at it like, fuck no. Like, you know what I mean? I'm not dealing with this shit. So I dropped my colors. When that happened, so many people started dropping their colors that they got nervous, I think, and was like, you know, our numbers are going down. We need these people back because now we're going to look like food, right? When you're the low man on a totem pole, you know what I mean?

That's when, you know, all the wolves come, right? So they decided they're going to recant that and, you know, everybody got to take their colors back or whatever or get terminated. the two kids that that were down with that dropped their colors with me one of them said oh you know my my grandfather's dying it's his last dying wish he's on his deathbed that that i don't that i don't be part of the family no more that's why i dropped my colors so they gave him a pass they were like all right we we understand that which you know i guess it makes sense right the other kid um i'm becoming christian you know i'm trying to get into god You know what I mean? I want to live a godly life. And, you know, I don't feel it's part of me for it. And so they gave him a pass. Eventually, he ended up taking the colors back anyways. But they came to me and they asked me, and I'm like, I already made my decision. You know what I mean? I said, you know, I'm in here about to do 13 years for the family. You know what I mean? Everything that I thought the family was wasn't, you know, at the time. Like I said, I don't know about every other chapter. But in my chapter, but in my chapter,

That's how it was going on. I was like, you know, I'm not going to, I'm not going to do it, you know. And they're like, well, if you don't, if you don't take your colors back, you got to take your termination. I was like, well, when I got down, I, you know, I knew that was part of it anyway. So do what you got to do. It was like, all right, well, we're going to talk to the, we're going to send a kite to the other block to the higher up and see what he says and this and that, blah, blah, blah. And I was like, all right, well, you do what you got to do. So, you know, they send the kite up.

They send the kite back. The higher up guy says, no, he's got to take his termination or, what do you say? You got to take his termination and pack up. You know, pack up means. Go to the shoe. Get out of there. No, you got to take all your shit and move to another block. You got to go to CO and say, you know, I'm not safe here.

You know what I mean? Move me. You know what I mean? And I told him, I was like, again, you got to get. I wasn't scared of any other ones in my block anyway. So I'm like, cocky, do what you got to do. I said, I'll take my termination because as a man, I agreed to that when I became a king. So I'll let you give me a termination, which, you know, I didn't do nothing major.

So, you know, I don't think I deserve death or anything like that. But you could give me a bounce, which is, you know, they hit you in your ribs for, you know, 30 seconds or a minute or whatever, depending on who makes the call or whatever. and then that's that, you know what I mean? But they wanted me to take that, you know, 30-second beat-down thing and then pack all my shit and move out of a block like a punk.

You know what I mean? So I'm like, I'm not doing that. I said, I'll let you give me the beat down and then that's that. You leave me to fuck alone after that. You know what I mean? So, you know, they sent the kite back telling him what I said.

The guy sends a message back. Like, you know, well, if he's not going to pack up, he's got to leave in a body back then. And I'm like, Do what you got to do, you know what I mean? So for like a good, maybe like a good two weeks, you know, anytime I went to the chow hall or whatever, you know, I didn't have no shank or anything. I wasn't that advanced into prison yet, so I didn't know nothing about how to make a shank yet or anything. So I just had my pen. I had a big pen. You know, anybody come at me. I'm stabbing them in the eye or in the neck or whatever, you know, whatever I can do. You know what I mean? By any means necessary, I'm going to try my best, I guess. So for two weeks, you know, they give her me the side eyes and the, you know what I mean? And the, you know, little grumbles under their breath, you know what I mean?

Like you got to go and you know, all that type of shit. And I'm like, whatever, you know what I mean? And, you know, finally, I don't know if they changed their mind or if they were just the ones that were there was just too scared to do anything or I don't know what the case was. But eventually like two weeks later they come back and they're like, well, we decided seeing that, you know, you've been with the family for a while and you're, you know, you put in your. work and you've you know you've helped out you know family and you're here for you know getting time for the family you know we're going to let you go but you got to take you 30 seconds so i was like fine you know i mean so i took my little 30 second bounce i put my hands up they be in my ribs for 30 seconds i walked off and they left me up they left me alone after that so um i got to court for like

10 months within this 10 month 10 months my whole life falls apart on the outside my baby's mom left me after like nine months once you found out I was getting time you know I lost all my contacts to the streets and shit like that nobody to talk to nobody to call nobody said mail no no commissary money you know that shit or whatever so you know I'm going to court and they offered me 10 suspended after four and a half they asked me to ask me to cop out to that and being that I know that I'm not beaten trial with a public defender because

everything I'd bring to my public defender that I felt would help my case he'd shoot it down um what is it the kid that that house got shut up you know he got arrested like a couple times for you know doing gang shit

or whatever whatever so I'm talking to my lawyer like doesn't that help my case you know look these you know he's not fucking model citizen or anything, you know what I mean, shit like that. What else was it? There was something that he had said to me, the gun. Before that I had a, before that happened, my first charge was possession of a sold-off shotgun. I skipped over that.

But the court system was saying stuff like, you know, I'm a menace to society type thing, you know, mean where I'm carrying guns and, you know, I'm shooting at people. And, you know, they were trying to make me out to be a really, really make me sound to be real bad, you know, which that's their job, I guess. Right. So, you know, I'm showing all this stuff to him, you know, that I think could help the case and he's shooting it all down. And I'm like, yeah, he's not down for me. You know, he's, all he's trying to do is get me to cop out, you know what I mean? So I'm like, at this point, I got to just try to find the best, you know, the best cop out I can.

You know, I'm facing them 13 charges for that shooting, plus I got the violation of probation and all that shit hanging, which I had time hanging for anyways. So they offered me to 10 and after just four and a half, and they told me you could take it to trial. This is what the public defender said. He says, you could take it to trial, and we might be able to win it, but it's your life on the line. and they're going to bring up that article about the shootout that you did with the Norwich Bulletin. I'm like, what? What article? He brings up that same article that I did with the Norwich Bulletin where the, you know,

the queens and the kings came down and we did it. And, you know, they're going to portray it as in, you know, every time you got beef or whatever, you're going to shoot at somebody or try to kill them or whatever, whatever, you know what I mean? at this point I'm like yeah I'm not going to win this case with this guy I got a cop out to this four and a half you know so you know I'm like I'll just take the four and a half so I took the four and a half they shipped me from the county the county jail which was Corrigan at the time which is a level four jail he shipped me to Cheshire Cheshire is one of those old jails that have the bars on the on the,

Corrigan is just to sell doors. Cheshire is an old school jail where they have the bars on it and the little tight cells and, you know, all that type shit or whatever. So I get on this bus and we get to Cheshire, you know, now it's the big boy shit. You know what I mean?

I'm like, wow. You know what I mean? Like, now I'm really locked in. So, you know, I get there. And although I'm not a king no more, like I said, none of them really, really stressed the fact of it or whatever. Because every jail I went to, I'd still hang around with them. I'd still eat with them. You know what I mean?

They try to, you know, get me to get back down. And, you know, and I would tell them, like, you know, it didn't do me no good. You know what I mean? You know, I still got love for all, y'all. But, you know, I just can't put myself in that situation. You know, if I'm rolling with you, I want to be able to roll with you because I feel that your case, your situation is worth rolling with you for, not for stupid stuff. You know what I mean? Just because you felt disrespect.

Somebody looked at you funny or, you know, said your girl had a nice ass or whatever the case may be. You know, something stupid. So, you know, so now I'm in Cheshire. You know, I'm not getting any visits. I'm not getting any mail. You know, I have no contact. with the outside world, but I'm starting to realize that that's the best way to do time anyways, because you know, you don't have those distractions of, you know, what's what you're missing.

You know what I mean? This is your life now. Let's do this. You know what I mean? So, you know, I got myself a job doing garbage, third shift, which gave me a little bit of flow through the jail where I can be able to, you know, get, you know, to the kitchen and, you know, buy, whatever I need from the kitchen, you know, from the kitchen workers. And, you know, I used to be able to sneak sandwiches back and all that type of shit or whatever. Get the little perks that you get from, you know, getting out of the cell.

You know, I kept myself busy. I did Bible studies and went to church and signed up for anger management programs and drug, you know, AA and NA and all that to try to, you know, get my record good so that when I go up to parole, because I had, although I had a violent charge and they make you do 85%, I still had hopes that at least I can get out at that 85% mark, you know what I mean, if I do what I'm supposed to do. So, you know, I did college courses. I did, you know, all the programs that you could think of, you know what I mean?

And, you know, and that's how I got through my time, worked out a lot. I didn't really, like I said, I didn't really get into any crazy situations in jail, just, you know, stupid arguments and stuff that, you know, people argue over card games and stuff like that. But I learned early on that the best way to do your time is to do it alone, not to mess with too many people, keep, you know, keep your circle slow, you know, small. and don't get into, you know, two-for-one games and all that other type of shit where you owe people money and, you know, don't get into the gambling and stuff. And, you know what I mean? I didn't have money for that anyways because nobody was sending me money. All I had was, you know, the money I get for my state job, you know what I mean? And, you know, the little hustles and shit because, you know, eventually I got enough money so I could open up a store and shit. And I used to sell the two-for-ones and all that type of shit.

So that got me through. So Cheshire wasn't too bad. You know, they had a weight pit outside. You know, go outside at direct time and work out. And, you know, everything was pretty good. Right around 9 and when 9-11 happened, I was actually watching it on the news. Actually, let me back up. Maybe like six months before that, I got a real good job in the license plate factory.

Cheshire has a license plate factory where they make all the Connecticut license plates. And so I got a license job in there stamping the, you know, the numbers on the plates and shit. They used to pay me a dollar an hour. And on the weekends, on Saturdays, they'd let us work 10 hours over time at double time. Yeah. So, at 20 bucks? Yeah, yeah.

So at the end of the month, I think you'd make like $300 something or whatever. So it was decent money for a jail job, you know what I mean? Yeah, that's great money. Yeah, that gave me enough money to, you know, to stack up my commissary and, you know, get my little store going and all. that shit or whatever so that I didn't need any money from the outside of streets or whatever. And so 9-11 happens. I'm watching it on TV. C.O.'s come to my door and they pop it.

And they're like, Johnson, pack up. And I'm like, pack up. Where am I going? You know what I mean? I'm good right. You know what I mean? Everything's good right now. Sending you in Virginia.

I said Virginia. What do you mean Virginia? Yeah, though, you know, due to overcrowding the position, you know, the state or whatever, you know, we're sending inmates to Virginia and this and that, blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, wow, that's crazy. And prior to that, they were sending inmates to Vermont, I believe it was, a place called Stone Gap. And in this jail, it was, you know, mostly white COs, racist white COs. So they were like really mistreated the inmates from Connecticut badly. So it got to a point where they were having like, you know, protests and people writing the governors and, you know, all that, you know, trying to get that stopped, you know, so they'd stop sending people there. So I got lucky and didn't get sent there.

But they sent me to Virginia. So we get to Virginia, you know, it's a, you know, like a 13, 14 hour drive down there. They got three different buildings. In each building, they got a different state. They had Vermont people in one building, Connecticut people in one building, Virginia people in another building. But during wreck time, they let them all, you know, combine or whatever, you know, to have wrecked together and shit. So you got to mingle with people from other states and shit like that. So a lot of the, you know, the clicks and stuff up there or whatever, you know, because they have their own up there, they all stayed and did their own, you know, within their own thing.

But because everybody's from Connecticut is from Connecticut, everybody kind of bands together. You know, everybody from Vermont usually bands together because, you know, everybody's got to have a car, right? I learned that way. This episode is brought to you by Netflix. The Four Seasons is back for season two, starring Tina Faye, Will Forte, Coleman Domingo, Marco Calvani, Carrie Kenny Silver, and Erica Henningson. After a difficult year, your favorite group of friends continues their tradition of vacationing together now with a baby in tow. From the Jersey Shore to upstate New York and Italy, their getaways are sure to take unexpected turns where comedy ensues. Watch the Four Seasons May 28th, only on Netflix.

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And it's a whole lot better up there. You know, they get all the fucking good commissary, the sodas, and you could buy tobacco up there. And, you know what I mean? And, you know, everything is way better than the commissary. We got cable up there, not cable in ourselves, but you got a couple channels and shit. They show movies on the weekends, you know what I mean,

on your TV and your cell. You know, they had a couple female CEOs up. A lot of the Connecticut inmates were catching a lot of the female CEOs up there. So I tried to catch a couple of my own. I caught two of them. I didn't have sex with them or whatever, but I used to flirt with them and all that shit. So they used to let me do get out of my cell and, you know, do special shit or whatever that you, you know, not everybody else get to do or whatever, be first for commissary, you know, all that type of. stuff or whatever. And so every jail that I went to, there was always at least a handful of people

from around my town. So I didn't even really need to be in a gang anyways for any kind of protection or, you know, people to hang out with or whatever. I always had like, you know, because I knew so many people. You know, everywhere I went to, I had knew at least a few people from my town that I was, you know, usually close with. Because like I said, when I was younger, I used to float around to all these different neighborhoods and shit. So I had friends of everywhere. And although we all, went our separate ways and, you know, got into all our own different cliques or whatever, we always mean, it always seemed like we always maintained a good respect for each other enough to, if there was the problem between our gangs, we'd stay out of it or try to keep ourselves, you know,

if you're my boy, I don't want to beat you up, you know what I mean? So I think we all kind of kept that same respect where it never got to that situation. Thank God, because I would hate to have to be in a situation like that. Yeah, so I did that time in Virginia. And while I was up there, I didn't, you know, honestly, Ian, you know, I think I had, in all my jail time that I never really had any problems. I was always cool with everybody. You know, I didn't have to be the tough guy.

You know, I didn't have to stab nobody or shoot nobody. I didn't even really see nothing really crazy. The worst thing that I ever seen while I was in jail, I was in Cheshire. We was in the wait room. And this kid from Bridgeport had a problem with somebody prior to come into jail. So that kid actually ran into him in Cheshire. So while he was doing the pull-downs on a pull-down machine, dude came up behind him and slid his whole, you know, from behind,

slit his holes, even the whole buck 50. You know, you can see the meat hanging and, you know what I mean? And, you know, it's funny. I don't know if you've witnessed, you know, shit going down in jail, but everything just gets quiet and everybody just walks away. Like it didn't even happen. You know, because nobody wants to be in. involved. Nobody wants to be able to, you know, have to write a statement or, you know what I mean,

to have police, you know, say, what happened or anything like that. So everybody just walks away, like it didn't even happen. You know, see, he's there, you know, holding his face screaming and shit, you know, the SEAL is rushing or whatever and take him out or whatever. I don't know if the guy ever got caught for it or anything like that. But it was, that was the craziest thing. And then as far as like, you know, rapes and shit like that in jail, you know, I've seen the thing that you were saying with the CEO trying to get your boss. or whatever. But I didn't see anything like that either, except for when we first got to Virginia

in the Virginia house, they heard somebody screaming and come to find out one of the Virginia, one of the older Virginia guys had raped one of the Mexican guys that came from Vermont or something. And everybody found out about it or whatever. So, you know, the guy never got caught for it or anything. I guess the kid didn't say anything. So the guy was still on the compound and everybody kind of just like started like not being around them and stuff like that. Yeah, it was crazy.

That's funny. Like, yeah, I don't want to be associated with that guy. Might be the next one he tried on. You know what I mean? It was crazy. But I didn't have no crazy things go on. One time when I first got to Corrigan, I almost, I got jumped kind of. Remember I was telling you that 20 love was getting deep in the jail

So I go to court one day And I'm in the bullpen with a couple 20 love kids And the one of the 20 loved kids that was there I actually knew who's older brother So he starts talking to me and you know he's like Well you're down with you know I told him I'm a king and everything And he's like oh you know so and so And I was like yeah I know so and so actually that's my boy

You know what I mean? We grew up together you know blah blah blah and we used to hang out together. He was like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And he was like, you know, this other guy, you know, his name's the other guy. And, yeah, like, yeah, oh, yeah, I know him. I know him. He was like, yeah, that dude's a snitch.

And I'm like, yeah, so. Like, whatever. And so I don't know how that turned into him start talking about, oh, yeah, well, you, you know, you're a king and you guys can't be in the jail no more. You know, we're taking over the jail and this stuff, blah, blah, blah. and, you know, all this other stuff and shit. I'm like, you know, I'm out numbers. I'm like, whatever, though. You know what I mean?

Just letting them talk and shit. So they put us inside the ice cream truck and, you know, how tight it is in there and shit. You know, they got us all, you know, they had me handcuffed to a white guy. And then two of them were handcuffed together. And then another one of them was handcuffed to another guy. So we're all in this, in a line pretty much inside the thing. You know, you really barely can move in there. You know, so he's like, so what are you going to do?

And I'm like, what do do do I'm going to do? You know what I mean? Like, do what you want to do? So he's like, oh, so you're not going to get out of the jail? I was like, I'm not going nowhere. You know what I mean? Do what you got to do? So he tries to hit me, you know what I mean?

And I kind of like ducted it or whatever. And, you know, I start, obviously, he's the one that's the aggressor and talking all the shit. You know what I mean? So I start trying to hit him, you know, while I got this fucking guy, you know, handcuffed to me and shit. So I can't really hit them or whatever. And the other two is they're trying to jump over, you know, him to hit me or whatever. So, you know, they got a couple of licks in my head or whatever, but nothing. I think I bit my lip, you know what I mean?

And once the COs heard all the commotion going on or whatever, they pulled over and separated everybody. But then we got back to the jail and that was the end of that. That was never after that, which was another reason why I dropped my colors too, because, you know, like I said, I was so into it that, you know, I felt if you're down with me, I would never let nothing happen to you no matter what, you know what I mean? So even if you come to me with the smallest problem, it's a big problem to me, you know what I mean? So when that happened, I go back to a dorm and there's this Italian kid that was actually running the dorm or whatever. And I was like, yo, I was like, I just wanted to let you know. I just went to court.

I told them what happened or whatever. I said, you know, they're talking about, you know, they're deep in the jail and they're going to try to get us all out of here or whatever. So I'm just letting you know so that you can let all the other brothers know to watch their back or whatever if they ever get in a situation where they're outnumbered, you know, in a cell block or something. And I was like, oh, thanks for telling me, man. He's like, I'll let him know. And he walks away. And I'm thinking to myself, like, I know I said I don't want nothing to be done

because I don't want no brothers to get in trouble or anything but you can at least offer, right? He showed no kind of, you know, sympathy for, no kind of, you know, fuck that. You know, if it was somebody that came to me, I would have been like, nah, we got to do something about that shit. You know what I mean? So I was like, yeah, I didn't feel the love there.

So that was one of another reason why I made me want to get out of that shit. But, you know, the whole. situation with them, I got love for them still because it taught me, they taught me how to be a man, honestly. They taught me what it's like to be a leader. It taught me, you know, how to respect myself, you know, how to treat people who respect. You know, these are all things that are pretty, you know, common, I think. But growing up, you know, up the way that I did and not having the structure that I should have had growing up, I think that's what helped me, you know, learn these type of things on my own, you know,

which helped me to incorporate them in my life to, you know, try to make my life better. You know, like now I'm a supervisor, you know what I mean? And, you know, all the guys that work for me, they love me, you know what I mean? You know, yeah, taught me a lot, I think, you know what I mean? So I still got love for him. You know, I just didn't like that part of it. You know what I mean? Where it wasn't the organization that they said they should have been, which I'm sure they wanted to be.

But when people get power, sometimes it's hard to control it, you know. Have you been able to stay out of trouble ever since you left prison? Yes, yes. So why do you think that is, you know, why are some people able to do it? I mean, you left prison years ago, what, almost 20 years ago? Yeah. Now, why is someone like you able to do that and others aren't? My kids.

My kids did it for me. When I got out of jail, I had two more kids. And because I lost eight years of my first son's life being incarcerated, I was in the system from 92 all the way to 2003 being either in jail, on probation or on parole. and, you know, going through all that and missing out on my son's eight years of his life because once I got locked up and his mom left me, that lost all contact with him. She didn't bring him to see me. She didn't send me letters. She didn't send me pictures, you know, all that type of shit. When I got out of jail, I got out of jail in 2000 for the shooting and ended up, which I guess I skipped that.

that part. I got out in 2000 and although I did all the programs in jail, you know, like culinary arts and I did a sanitation course and, you know, all these job skills and all that shit, I tried to get out and tried to do the right thing and get a job. And, uh, but it was so many obstacles because when I got out, I didn't have anything. I had to pretty much had to rebuild my whole life. I didn't have clothes. I didn't, you know, nothing, you know, Adam, I wanted to stay away. He had a place I could live. And, you know what I mean? And, you know, I was getting up and going to work every day trying to do the right thing.

But, you know, I was only making like eight bucks an hour. And it was not getting me nowhere. And, you know, I've seen all my friends making money. And, you know, when I'd go to work and, you know, leave the house, they'd be all out on the porch, drinking 40s and shit. You know what I mean? And see you later, Steve. You know, and I just felt like an asshole, right? So I tried to dip back in the game again and tried to sell drugs.

And everything was going pretty. good, you know what I mean? But I had one of my cousins that I was hanging around with me that was really hot, which brought a lot of heat around my house, which caused me and Adam to get raided. And that was only six months after I got out of jail from doing the four and a half. So here it is, they were all my drugs, so I took the wait for it. I told them not to say nothing. I said, I'm going to take the wait for it. You know, I got time hanging anyways. They're going to take my head off anyway so let me just handle it don't say nothing you know don't fuck it up because i don't want you to say anything wrong that makes it worse on me or anything like that not saying he was going to snitch

but you know sometimes people say stuff that'll fuck the case up you know what i mean so i'm like just relax i'm going to take it all you know what i mean so they but as soon as i went into court and started going to court for it i was ready to cop out from the from the jump is on my main focus was just to get the best the lowest number i can get and that's what i told my lawyer i was like you know i'm guilty. You know, I know I got all this time hanging. They're going to knock my head off, you know what I mean? So just get me the lowest, you can get me, you know what I mean? So they offered me 10 suspended after three and a half. So I took it. You know, so six months out of jail and I'm right back in, right back to Cheshire. Yeah, it wasn't fun. So when I got out of jail

in 2000, I tried my hardest to have a relationship with my son. He was, four and a half now um because they made me do the whole four and a half uh he was living in new haven so i used to travel two and a two hours to go pick him up every other weekend i keep him for the weekend but we never really seemed to catch a we could never really seem to get that bond you know what i mean like it was his whole life it's it was always seemed like he didn't really want to be with me or whatever he used to just go because his mom used to make him go type of shit you know what i mean he was really quiet really uh you know closed my you know closed up you know as far as emotions none of my kids have emotions i don't know why i don't i think they get it for me because i

used to be like that when i was young you know i mean to you know i grew up in the era of you know my father my mother used to tell me you know if you get beat up or whatever don't come home crying because you know we're just going to send you right back out there to you know to fight them again or whatever you know what i mean you know boys aren't supposed to cry type shit you know I mean. So I think I think I kind of raised my kids that way in a way too where they have problems expressing their emotions. So me and they have never really ended up getting a bond or whatever. So when I got out in 2000, I ended up, I mean now, in 2003 when I got out for the final bid, I end up paroling to Massachusetts with an ex-girlfriend of mine, which ended up becoming my

daughter's mother. I ended up actually marrying her for, we were married for two years, and then we got a divorce because, you know, although she was like my childhood sweetheart, and we've been through everything, and, you know, I figured I'd try

to give her a shot and try to work it out and, you know, it just never really happened or whatever, but I ended up having a daughter with her. I ended up having another son with another girl that I ended up cheating on her with. So now I got two kids a year apart growing up, you know, in separate house. So I got to juggle that whole thing too, you know.

And so it was kind of like I felt if I don't change my life around, I'm not going to get a chance to raise these kids. They're going to be without me. I'm not going to have a bond with them. And their mothers, both of them weren't really the best choices for baby mommas, I guess, if you want to say. So it was kind of like I felt like if, you know, they only had me. You know what I mean? If I go away, they're going to have a rough life. You know what I mean? So I kind of had to focus on that and let that be my drive to, you know, try to do better in life and, you know, change things around. So I moved to Massachusetts, paroled to Massachusetts with her and ended up getting a job at a

temp agency. Like I said, I had no job skills or anything really like that. So, You know, it allowed me to bounce around and try different things because working for a temp agency, they send you wherever they want to send you, you know, because they get a cut out of it too for you working for them or whatever. And they can, the people that hire you, they can hire you and fire you whenever they want. They don't have to, you know, worry about giving you any kind of severance or, you know, getting sued or anything. or they don't have to deal with your insurance, health insurance, or, you know, drug tests and all of the type of shit or whatever if you get drug tested. So I'd work at places and I'd do my hardest, you know, I'd work, do the best I could at the job. And, you know, they'd always tell me how great of a job I'm doing.

And Steve, you're doing great. As soon as your probation, you know, your temporary time is up that, you know, that we can hire you on after your contract is up. we're going to hire you on and we'll give you more money and all that type of shit. And every time we got around to that point where they didn't need you no more, they let you go. You know, so they get home at the end of the day and get a phone call saying, yeah, they don't need you no more. We'll find you somewhere else to go. You know what I mean? So they ended up somewhere else or whatever.

I finally ended up at this place that they gave me a shipping and a receiving job. And, you know, I go in there and, you know, it's not actually packing like little car. board boxes and stuff like that. It's actually building crates that you put big machinery in. Like, I mean, like, stuff bigger than maybe crates the size of like a 30-foot container, a 20-foot container, you know, what those are, the storage containers of the ship. So, like, the size of that, crates that we used to build by, you know, with nail guns and shit like that. And I didn't know how to do any of this type of stuff or whatever.

So I call the contempt agency. And I'm like, I think you must. misunderstood my skills or whatever because, you know, I asked for a shipping job and, you know, this is way above my, you know, experience or whatever. And they're like, oh, well, you know, just hang on, you know, just see what you can do and try to stick it out for a couple weeks while we find you somewhere else to go or whatever, whatever. And, you know, I got this boss, this little Puerto Rican guy that's, you know, telling me, you know, he thinks he's a foreman. He's not really even the foreman, but, you know, people work there for a long time. So they assume they got seniority.

and, you know, they could tell the new guys what to do or whatever. So, you know, he's pushing me like, oh, you know, you're not working fast enough. You should be doing this faster. And, you know, and I'm like, I don't even know how to do this shit. You know what I mean? So, you know, I eventually figure it out. And, you know, God has a funny way of taking people out of my life that don't fit in it where he ended up getting canned anyway. So, you know, once he was gone, it was a lot smoother and a lot easier.

And I figured it out to the point where, you know, I became like the lead person on the, on the floor. You know, where the new boss that they hired for the position to be my boss, he was a union worker originally before he got there. So he had that union mentality where he wasn't actually supposed to do physical work. You know what I mean? He was supposed to be a supervisor type of shit. So he'd leave all the work to me pretty much to delegate who's going to do what and you know what I mean, all that. And, you know, what order's got to be out?

You know, he'd come to me and, hey, Steve, do you know what order and this and that? what's going on with it and I'd tell him whatever and then he'd go and take vacations or whatever when he'd take vacations I'd do his job for him and all that eventually they got to the point where they started realizing that why do we have this guy working because Steve could do all this shit on his own you know and he does a better job at it so eventually they can't him and gave me his job and so that that was my first supervisor position and then from that it's just been up you know I've been you know I've had a good job for a long time now and And eventually that company ended up going bankrupt.

And, you know, so I'm like, man, shit, finally made my way up to a good job. You know, I'm making $30 something dollars an hour. You know what I mean? I'm like, what do I do now, you know? So because I was there for like 14 years and knew everybody, it was a small company about 100, 100 people or whatever, and I knew everybody. And, you know, everybody liked me. So one of the secretaries ended up going to another company, like down the road and getting a job. there so she called me up Steve they got a job over here you know for the

shipping department you know it's not as much as you make before it was only like twenty seven dollars an hour some shit like that and I was like yeah I'll take it you know I'm not doing anything and all my plan was to stay on unemployment for a year and try to do some real estate classes and you know because I always wanted to get into real estate and um but after after dealing with being unemployment for a couple weeks and you know it's kind of like being on parole probation where they want you to do a check in here and do these classes and call this number every day and you know it's like wow you got to do all this shit just to get the money that

I've been you know that I've been you've been taken out of my check all this time you know what I mean so I was like yeah I don't want to do this I'd rather just get get another job you know what I mean so I ended up getting that job and stay there for about two years and then another friend of mine which was one of the guys that used to work for me at the place that shut down he used to work in my for me in the shipping department. He calls me up and he's like, hey, my boss is about to resign, you know, give up his job or whatever. You interested and you want to be my boss?

I was like, hey, yeah, why not? You know, it's right around the corner from where I was working at anyways for $30,000 more a year. You know, I was like, yeah, I'll take it. You know, so I've been there ever since. That's awesome. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so, you know, and so now, you know, I do the 40-hour week thing. And in my free time, we work on a podcast.

And, you know, that's it. Why do you think it's important to talk about your past so many years later? Because you know a lot of, and you brought it up earlier, a lot of people are hesitant to bring up old wounds. Yeah, and honestly, and, you know, I would love to get deeper into my story because there's so much more that I have to say. But I feel like I have to watch what I say because in the position that I have, you know, companies don't.

like to, you know, have you out there, I don't know, maybe what they would call it, making an ass out of yourself or whatever, or saying those type of things that make the company look different or whatever. So, you know, I feel, I feel kind of worried about that sometimes. So, you know, eventually I plan to get deeper into it, like maybe once I retire or maybe once I don't need that job no more, which is a hope. Maybe the podcast thing will, you know, pop off or whatever and I won't need to. So, you know, that's the plans. But I think it's important because it's all earning experiences, man.

You know what I mean? I've been through a lot and I don't, you know, I've heard it on a lot of people on your podcast too that say it, you know, these experiences what shape us, you know? These are things that taught us to be the person that we are and molded us and into our paths, right? So, you know, it's something good to remember. I, you know, I still, to this day, you know,

I still watch all kinds of jail shows. You know what I mean? I think that's what got me to watch your podcast. You know what I mean? And, you know, I try to, which I think you do it too in a way. That's kind of what I got from you building the cell upstairs. You know what I mean? It's good to keep it fresh in your mind to keep you grounded, knowing that you could be very well right back where you were easily in the nick of a time.

You know what I mean? Just one small mess up could screw everything up. You know what I mean? So I try to keep that grounded so that I don't slip. You know what I mean? I think that's where people slip. They get comfortable and start thinking that, you know, I could just, I could do it once.

I could try this. You know what I mean? So, and then they get rope back into it. What advice would you tell your younger self before he ever joined a gang? Yeah. Advice. I guess my advice.

would be to choose your friends more wisely. Watch who you associate yourself with because most people are out to gain what they can from you. And have more Adams in their life? No, he sucks. He sucks. No, he's all right. Now, just, you know, I just think that, you know, I think people could do things on their own without needing a helping hand all the time and, you know, relying on, you know, people to get out of situations. You know what I mean?

It's, yeah, I don't know. It's just, you know, it's just better ways to do things, you know what I mean? And slow money is the best money. You know what I mean? Always trying to chase that dollar and, you know, get that fast money. It never works out. You know what I mean? I've gotten so much more success, you know, for having a regular job and, you know what I mean?

And not having to worry about looking over my back, which I still do anyways. It's just PTSD, I think. Even on the way here, I had a cop behind me. I'm like, oh, shit, they're going to pull us over. My guest actually yesterday said that he ran into a cop at a deli. like in Massachusetts on his way here and the cop asked him where he was going and he said, oh, to do this podcast, he's like, oh, I'm a fan. Yeah.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, I believe it. You know, it's funny and I give you credit for that too because to this day, I still don't like to talk to cops, you know what I mean? If I know you're a cop or anything, I don't even want to be around you, you know what I mean? Because I get that PTSD like, you know what I mean? I don't know what it is, but I don't like to be them. I don't like to see them. I don't like them behind me.

I'm like, well, they're people too. Yeah. Yeah, and that's why I said. I give you that credit because you could look at it like that. You know what I mean? No, I think I definitely used to be nervous, and now I'm around them so often. Now I'd say I'd do even more law enforcement than prison ones sometimes. Yeah, yeah, I noticed that.

So it's good. But Steve and I appreciate you coming on the show today, man. I appreciate you having me, man. Yeah, and I'm looking forward to doing your show. And we'll have the link to all your stuff in the description in this episode. Definitely. It was life and beyond. Definitely.

Thank you.