Locked In with Ian Bick - I Was a New York Bloods Leader — Then Did 12 Years in Prison | James Pitt

Episode Date: June 30, 2026

James Pitt grew up in Rockland County New York without his mother in the picture — raised by his single father alongside two siblings while watching his dad's health deteriorate throughout his childhood. The streets filled the void. He first joined the Crips before switching to the Bloods and eventually rising to become a Blood gang leader in New York. In this episode of Locked In with Ian Bick, James tells the complete story — from growing up in Rockland County to juvenile detention at 15 to an attempted murder charge against a rival gang leader that resulted in two years county time to surviving two separate assassination attempts during his set's civil war to to a 2012 gun possession arrest where one of his own turned on him to a 10 year sentence to being pulled back on kidnapping and robbery charges five years in after a DNA match to facing persistent violent felony charges of 18 to life to being sentenced to 14 years concurrent and finally walking out on May 20 2024 after 12 years inside. _____________________________________________ #gangleader #blood #truecrimecommunity #prison _____________________________________________ Connect with James Pitt: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/american_felon_tv_/ Website: https://www.americanfelontv.com/ Book: https://www.amazon.com/Prison-Zoology-archetypes-survival-systems/dp/B0GZT34MJX _____________________________________________ Hosted, Executive Produced & Edited By Ian Bick: https://www.instagram.com/ian_bick/?hl=en https://ianbick.com/ _____________________________________________ Timestamps: 00:00 New York Bloods Leader Survived Assassination Attempts — Full Story 02:40 Growing Up Without His Mother and the Void That Created 05:19 His Father's Impact and the Morals That Shaped His Early Years 07:47 School Life and the First Signs of Trouble 13:36 Joining the Crips Then Switching to the Bloods 18:32 The Escalating Street Violence That Defined His Teenage Years 23:24 The Gang Wars and School Conflicts That Followed Him Everywhere 31:52 His Early Arrests and What Juvenile Detention Really Looked Like 39:10 The Streets Robberies and What Cycling Through Juvie Really Required 45:51 The Attempted Murder Case That Changed Everything 53:01 Jail Time and the Prison Mindset He Had to Develop 59:10 Prison Life and the Blood Politics That Governed Everything Inside 01:06:21 The Lessons Education and the Turning Point That Changed Direction 01:14:00 His Release and What Rebuilding Life Actually Required 01:17:10 American Felon and What Building Entrepreneurship After Prison Looked Like 01:18:48 His Book His Advice and His Reflections on Everything He Survived 01:20:36 His Final Thoughts and Closing Message _____________________________________________ To advertise on the show, contact [e-mail] or visit https://advertising.libsyn.com/LockedInWithIanBicka Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

My guest today grew up in Rockland County, New York without his mother, raised by his single father while watching his dad's health fall apart. He first joined the Crips, then switched to the Bloods, then rose to become a blood gang leader in New York. He survived two separate assassination attempts during his own set Civil War, got arrested in 2012 for gun possession when one of his own turned on him. Then he got sentenced to 10 years in prison. Then, five years in, he got pulled back on kidnapping

and robbery charges after a DNA match. He faced 18 to life, got 14 years concurrent, and walked out on May 20th, 2004, after serving 12 years. His name is James Pitt, and this is his story. I grew up in Spring Valley, Rockland County, New York, with my single father and two siblings, Malcolm and Yasmin. Yasmin's my twin. I actually was born in Brooklyn, but we moved up here around when I was

seven years old, I believe, and been up here ever since. Where was your mom? She got addicted to crack cocaine early on. So after we moved up here, she left and has just been my father raising us since. Did you ever run into her again down the road? Yeah, we still kept in communication with my grandma. She was staying with my grandma in Brooklyn, but, you know, she was just in and out just all over the place.

So, but we was able to keep in contact, not as much as, you know, I would have like to. But, yeah, that was, yeah, that's a. Was it odd that there was a single father raising you in that area? Yeah, for the most part, is either, you know, all the mothers were raising their children. So anytime pops used to show up to football games, you know, everybody would actually commend them, though, because, like I said, he was very sick. kidney failure. He was in and out the hospital when he was growing up through dialysis and had several transplants. So, you know, from the outside looking in, it was like, you know, it's a little different family dynamic than most people are actually used to. They're not really used to

fathers just raising their kids by themselves. But he actually did a good job with that. What did he do for work? He worked at an IT at a Hudson Health Plan. It's a insurance company out in Westchester. He was. doing that for several years until he got had the first transplant i believe after the first transplant he just took a leave of absence off of work and he didn't go back until 2008 how did that affect the home's finances um i was terrible to be honest um growing to school we really didn't have nothing we had to use a lot of organizations to actually you know um provide this certain stuff clothes, toys, toys for tots.

Big shout out to them for the, you know, growing up, they were actually worked with, you know, families to give them toys for Christmas and different holidays for their birthday. So it was very tough. I mean, we always had food, so we never really went hungry. So, I mean, we weren't rich as far as money-wise, but, you know, rich and everything else. How are you as a kid? as far as in what ways. Your character, who you were as a person, what you liked.

I mean, I'm a big nerd. I always say it. I even say it online. I was definitely into anime growing up. Outdoors, my father made sure that he enrolled us in different programs, Boy Scouts. We did a lot of fishing and hiking. So I'm very familiar about the outdoors, you know, horseback riding.

But I was still growing up, I was always quiet, you know, reserved. I'm still that way. I don't really talk too much if I don't need to talk, you know. But I really stood to myself and, you know, just family-based. It was only us three, me, my brother and my sister, mainly just in a new area. Like I said, we were transplanted to Spring Valley, Rockland County, so we didn't really have any friends or anything like that. Everybody was already, you know, situated in their groups and crew.

and everything, and we were just pretty much the outsiders. So. What kind of morals did your dad instill in you guys as kids? He, you know, a man always works for his. They take care of his family, always provide, you know, prioritize. He definitely be hands-on, like, be tough. He was, my father was, he was different, man. I love him.

I'll definitely miss him. He really, you know, I've really, you know, I really don't got a lot of words to say that can really express what he actually did, you know, at the time growing up. It was hard to realize all the stuff I was actually learning, you know, until I was able to sit back and like everything that he was teaching me is useful nowadays, you know. And I definitely miss him. You know, this is why you can see I'm so close with my son is because he set that example. Like, you've got to be there. You got to be present.

So, you know, that's, that's, I definitely miss my man. Oh, man. Did he keep you out of trouble as a kid? As far as, you know, he tried to, I'm not going to lie and say that we stayed at trouble because I wouldn't have, be on this show, to be honest. But he did what he could. Like I said, we played a lot of sports. We did a lot of activities, camping, amusement parks.

But it was just, it wasn't enough, you know, all of that, just, just, dealing with going to school and seeing everybody pretty much had what we didn't, you know. We barely had any video games, no cable, nothing to really, you know, it was rough. So he did what he could, but the street still called and I answered. I answered. Where do you think it went wrong for you? What was that transition to the streets? I'm not I can't really pinpoint an exact situation or time but I think it was pretty much in

I would say 2004 I was in the boxing you know the we ran into the bloods coming from um boxing class one day we were all me and my brother were wearing red and that was I'm not going to say that was our first um no experience running into the gangs, but it was significant because that's the incident we remember and that's pretty much set us off onto a different path, just pretty much the street path, because after that, you know, the next day in school, we started beating up everybody that was involved with that situation outside the boxing gym. It wasn't really much of a situation. It's just, oh, why are you wearing that red? Stop wearing the red, you know, that little press,

but it was enough to trigger something in us. We went to school the next day, and we just started putting hands on everybody. And it was over after that. No, at that point, you weren't getting affiliated at all. No, we weren't gang affiliated. But there was a couple of dudes that we knew from back in the days. From my grandma's apartments, he was going to the boxing gym.

He was a blood. So once we started showing like little interests or showing like potential, He started, you know, coming around more like trying to recruit us and eventually it worked. How old are you in 2004? 14. 14. Mm-hmm. Did your dad teach you anything about gangs?

No, we didn't know nothing about gangs at that time besides what we just knew from watching TV or stuff like that. Do you think if he did, you would have avoided it? I'm probably. Not really. Not really. We were just pretty much the products of our environments. It actually felt like protection at the time. Like I said, we didn't have any team.

We didn't have a project to actually call our own. We lived on a dead street. You feel me really, nobody is around. So the bloods actually became more or less our crew. It just became our crew. So I don't think we would have probably anything would have been different. We just needed a crew because we were pretty much outnumbered or just left alone. What do you think enticed you about other than that feeling of being in a crew and having that protection?

About being in the gang? Yeah. The reputation that came with it, you know, everybody just assumes that if you're in a gang, you're badass, you're making money, you're doing all of this, you know, and it carries. Oh, now, oh, James's blood now. He's gang banging. Oh, he's nothing to play with. Now, you know, people are looking at us differently. They're not really. picking problems, but now we're looking for problems. You know, we got the protection we need. Now we're looking for problems. And, you know, it was, we've just turned into something else, to be honest.

When was the first time you got into trouble with the bloods? What do you mean as far as with the law or just in the streets? Either one. Or whichever came first. The first time I got in trouble with the law, it wasn't actually with the blood. It was right before I actually turned blood. Because I'm going to be honest with you. I would have saved this for my story time.

I spoke about it. But before I was actually blood, I used to be a Crip. Yeah, I seen your face. I used to be a Crip. And my brother was blood at the time. So I chose to go Crip. That incident outside the boxing gym turned me off. So I was already, you know, had a bad taste in my mouth for the blood.

So I went to Crip. But my brother, everybody else was going blood. So it started creating a lot of conflict in the town. My first charge actually came when I was a crit at 14. Me and my friend Marquis, he needed some money for some re-up to re-up on some weed. We were short a couple dollars, so he didn't want to wait for his father to come. So we ended up pulling a robbery, and we ended up getting caught. One of my cousins, we went to my cousin's house, and the victim followed us over there.

And while he was up in my cousin's house, they came looking for us, and my cousin led him to him. So that's when I got charged. My first charge was a robbery, second degree, and I pled guilty to five years probation. Okay. So you didn't do any time for that? No, I just did WIO. I had a WIO for that. Yeah, I did.

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Time really for that. How hard was it to switch from Crips to blood? Out there, it was extremely hard. my brother, my brother Malcolm, my right-hand man, Jizz, they were the bloods at the time too. Jiz was blood at the time. So they were always fighting the other bloods trying to defend me because the other bloods out there, they wanted to get me, they wanted to put hands. Oh, you're the only Crip out here. I'm wearing the flag. Other Crips out there, they wasn't wearing flags.

They weren't, you know, they were just on the low with it. But I had the flag out. I'm representing. So it was always causing conflict, especially with black peatstones. So they was always fighting So it just became too much Even when to where my father was saying like Yo, y'all gotta do something like y'all y'all on opposites

Everything is going crazy so I just said fuck it I'm just excuse me I don't know if I'm able to curse But I'm like um fuck it I'm gonna just go over You know my brother kept telling me yo you gotta come over You gotta come over so I ended up making a switch And that was a problem in itself And now even when I was cripped

I thought it was a problem now everybody, oh, how's he going from Crypta Blah, yalla wildin, y'all are wilding, y'all are food, uh, ah, ah, but, you know, so it made me actually go harder to prove that I'm, I can represent the red flag. So, um, that's exactly what I did. And exactly why I got the name I got now with my town. And what is that name? A big homie, legend, they call me, you know, I don't take, you know, um, really, um, um, take it serious, but my son's mother, she used to tell me that all the time. She's like, you're a legend out here. The way they say your name, it's just, you know, we can get into it.

Now, is there a different initiation process when you come as a Crip, or is it the same, whether you know, you're previously a gang member or not a gang member? No, it's the same. I'm going to be honest. I didn't really have to do much to join the Crips. I don't believe. I don't I think I had to punch somebody in the face when I was out in Brooklyn, but that's about it. But for the bloods going over there, we actually had to put in work on rivals. We went down to an apartment complex Cadillac Manor, I believe it was Cadillac Manor, and we put in some work on Paroos. We had to put in some work on the Piru's.

What is that? Well, we just ran down there and beat him up. We told them we told them we was having a blood meeting. We told them like, yeah, come out. We're going to have a blood meeting. So when they came out, it was two of them. As soon as I seen them, I wasn't waiting. I just popped the bottle, and we just started shaking.

We just all started jumping them. Now, how old are you at this point in time? I'm 15. How does it feel at that age to be doing this? I'm not going to lie, I just felt, you know, I'm locked in now. I'm a badass. This is who I am. I'm Blitz.

My name is Blitz. I'm going to prove it. I'm going to be the best big homie I can be. I'm going to be the best blood, whatever. You know, I'm going to get there. I'm going to be that big dog. And I got there. Now, did the Crips have a target on your head because you left them?

No, no, no. They didn't care? I mean, I'm not going to, not now. They don't got a target. Back then, back then. It wasn't really much of a target, but we ended up getting into two wars with the Crips, like official wars where. you know, hospitalization, everything started happening.

You know, it wasn't really targeted me specifically. It was just that they always felt that I was always causing the problems. Every time I seen them, they try to call the truth. They felt every time I seen them, I'm starting a problem. So it caused the war, the first war with them, and then a second war after that. What's a gang war like? Shoot. I'm not sure how it is.

But where I'm from, we didn't really grow up with guns, using guns at the early age. It was always fists, bats pose, and knives and everything. We didn't start using guns until we got a little older. So it was just mainly back and forth. We're stabbing each other. Sometimes you'll pull out the gun, you'll still shoot it in the air or something. Nobody was really trying to, I'm not going to say we weren't trying to kill anybody because I went to, I got locked up for a 10.

to murder because I did try to kill him, you know, so. But that's pretty much what it was. A lot of back and forth for just jumping, stabbing, beating them up with bats, hitting them with cars, everything, just whatever we could do. Now, is the war just over a period of time? And if you see one of them, then you're attacking them? Mm-hmm. It's just, so I'm going to say this war started from 07 and ended in 08.

It was a year-long war with these crypts from my town. So it's not like war where we think of like every day you guys are going at it? No, it's like just over time. You'll see it on my head. We're just going to get it. We're going to get it. Wherever place we see it, see each other, we're just going to get it shaken. Now, during this time you're in school, right?

How are you doing in school? I mean, for the most part, I did well in school. I got good grades, semi-good grades when I, you know, was attending. I rarely attended. But I did good in school. It's just that I started having beef with every neighborhood around town, so I really couldn't go to school anymore. So school isn't like a safe ground for the rival gangs?

It wasn't for me. I'm not going to, I can't really speak for the other crews, but my particular crew, I don't really want to try to brag because it really seems like I'm bragging, but we're really not. Anybody that really knows me, they really know that this is facts. My crew, we had, we picked fights with everybody. We picked fights with everybody, Bloods, Crips, Latin Kings. I got into it with the Latin Kings in school.

This is why I went to Juvie. I got into it with the Latin Kings. We had a party. My sister was having a party with one of her Spanish friends. They came through the party. They were mad that the music being played was more reggae and black music than Spanish. So it caused the argument. It didn't cause a direct argument with me.

It caused the argument with one of the Haitian crews out there. But I was there, you know, I'm black. So I decided to get involved. And then that spilled over. I ended up seeing him, one of the Latin Kings on Thanksgiving, 2005. And I stomped him out. Me and my right-hand man, Jiz, and another guy, we stomped him out. I robbed him.

His phone dropped. I'm not going to say I robbed him, but that's the charge I got. Because his phone dropped, and I picked it up when he ran away. It was the next tail. And I ended up getting charged with robbery. We went to school together. So he seen me in school and he ended up pressing charges. And that's when I ended up going to the juvie because of that.

And how old are you at that point? I'm 15 going on 16. This is 06, beginning to 06 in January. And is this in Brooklyn? This is Spring Valley. Spring Valley. Okay. And they have a juvenile center in there?

No, I got arrested. They sent me to a juvie out in Westchester. I think it's Wakefield or Woodfield or something like that. And by how I believe it's called. And what was that experience like for you? First experience, it was, that was my first time being locked up, just in a facility, like prison setting. So I was a little nervous at first, you know, just not really used to it.

But once I got in there and, you know, I just, I do what I regularly do, just see what's going on, fill the place out. see any homies is in there. And it became a, you know, came a piece of cake to be honest. Was there gang rivalries in there? There was. There was. There was pretty much with the Spanish gang, not really, no bloods and crips, but a couple

with the Spanish gangs, we put hands and feats on a couple MS-13s over there. Just because he said he stabbed somebody in the town for wearing a different color flag. And I told him you wear blue, don't you? And he said, yeah, and then we beat him up. I mean, it's pretty much stupid, but it's what happened. You know, I'm young. So, you know, all I know is violence at the time. So that's pretty much what happened.

No, at that point in time that, you know, in a juvenile center, there's no, like, counselors, case managers trying to steer you away from gang life. There's no help. Not really for, no. I mean, there's the regular counselors that really talk to you. What are you trying to do? What's your goals? but there's not any actually set plan of how can you leave the gang and actually prosper.

They don't really talk about what can you do after that because you leave the gang and then what? I still got beef. All the beef out and calls, what you want me to do? Just be alone. Like, you know, so, you know, there's no real actual help to actually, you know, guide you out of the gang in there, nothing like that. What were your goals at that point in time? Be the best gang member ever.

There's nothing else? nothing else. Nothing else. I'm a 15-year-old. I'm reckless. I'm locked up. I'm about to go wherever they're about to place me, and I'm about to perform. And I'm about to perform. I'm from Spring Valley. Everybody I'm meeting. They're from the city. Oh, we're Spring Valley. There's no gangsters out there. I'm going to show you. I'm going to show you what I'm about. And that's what I kept doing. They sent me to Highland. I had to do a year in the Juvie. They sent me to Highland Residential Center. Yeah, and then I came out in January 12th, 2007 after a year.

And you're 16 at that point? I'm going on 17. Going on 17, okay. And do you go right back to the high school or are you kicked out? I'm kicked out. I was trying to go back, but all the incidents I was involved in, they wasn't trying to let me go. So they told me how to go do a GD program, but I wasn't thinking about that.

So I just was full-time in the streets at this time. Walk us through like a typical day when you're full-time in the streets at that age. Full-time at this age, just what I was regularly doing, we would just go meet up at our headquarters, which was the mini-mart at the time. Or we would go to the park and we just smoke, chill, talk shit, or, you know, and we feel it. We might do a walk-up or walk-by, which we, um, we would go. me and my two friends, Jiz, my brother KB, Jack O'Shabar, we were walking to enemy neighborhoods unsuspectedly and just start going crazy. Catch whoever out there will beat you up and didn't leave.

And where are you living at this point? What do you mean? Where do you live? Like at that point in time? Spring Valley, Rockland County. Like with who, your dad? My father. With my father for a point, but he got, you know, he was getting tired.

You know, he was sick, you know. I mean, he's working at the time, but he was still getting little tired of, you know, the back and forth, the street stuff. So we started living with my grandma. We went back to, um, living with my grandma. And what did she think about your gang activity? I mean, she didn't really, like, really care about the particulars, but she was always concerned when we started bringing the gun into the house.

So at this point, you've moved on to guns at around 17? Somewhat. Like, we had the gun, but. It was just stay in the house unless we really needed it, unless we really needed it. And we didn't really need it at that time until probably 2008 at the mini-mark when we got into the war with the Crips. So this is now the Second War with the Crips? No, this is still the first.

Oh, still the first. This is the first. So it goes on all those years. It goes on from 08. It ended when I got locked up. And when I came out in 2010, that's when the Second War with the Crips started, with a new group. Okay. So tell us about that. Which one the first one?

Yeah, the mini-mart incident. So I was with my brother, KB. We pulled up to the store, and they were actually inside the store. A bunch of them. It was about five crip. One of the leaders, Nashim. He was a demon at the time, you know. So once my brother's seen him, my brother went and grabbed the gun out the car. So we're all You know He walks in the store I guess their chat

I don't know what was being said But then they just started fighting So I'm rushing out the car And then now I got to fight The other two Individuals that stand in front of the store So I'm getting jumped Now my brother comes running out the store

And he just You know He starts letting it go He starts letting it go Nobody was hit thankfully That's why you know Nobody was hit But that was the first incident

Where like I Shots is fire Like, y'all, you know, it's getting serious now. It's getting serious. And, yeah, that was the first incident where the shots was fired. And after that, we ended up the same individual. We caught him again at the mini-mart. And this is when I caught the attempt to murder.

What happens there? Me and my best, another one of my best friends, two of my best friends at the time, Jacqueline Shamar, we was just leaving my son's mother's house. This was when she was just my girlfriend before she had him. She was pregnant at the time. So I was walking Shamar home because he was in the juvenile center. So he had to go back the next day. So we ended up stopping at the mini-mart.

And there's a bunch of the homies, the bloods out there. You know, this was a rival crew that we had that I officially told you about when I first came, turned blood, and I had to go to the apartments and fight them. Like, they're all hanging out inside the mini. But, you know, the problem our situation is over with. So we're just hanging out, smoking, having a good time. The Crips pull up. And the Crips, like these Crips, they had a lot of people scared.

Like, even the homies, even the tough homies, they had a lot of people scared. I'm not going to let me scared. They had my brother scared. They had my brother scared. They had, like, they were tough. So, you know, I was actually, I had a bottle. I was high. I took a pill right before that.

We all took pills. We were high on E. And we had knives on us. Next thing I know, my friend, Marr's getting beat with a bat. And we just got the dude on the ground. And we're stabbing him. We're stabbing them. We're stabbing them.

We get the report. We see the report on the news the next day. They said, man's in critical condition, had to be airlifted. And two weeks later, after that, they arrested me. for attempted murder. So when you guys are stabbing him, for some reason, you guys stopped or did you think he was dead?

I just got tired. I got tired. I guess we all got tired. We were, you know, we just, you know, we did what we had to do. So we just stopped and we're trying to get away. Just going to leave the scene. And, I mean, I'm glad we did at the time

because a couple minutes after we left, all the police came out there. One of the big homies, one of the big homies was driving. by, we ended up calling one of the big homies to give us a ride. He ended up driving by them anymore. He said, everybody's out there. They got the helicopter. They just pulled somebody out from the helicopter, et cetera, et cetera. So we thought he was, I'm not going to lie. We thought he was dead. We thought he was dead. Do you ever think about that moment now? Like, say you run it in your head, wow,

if, you know, maybe he got stabbed one more time than he would have passed away and your life would look even more different than what it became? I mean, I think about it. I thought about it. Then I thought about it now. I think about it. I'm grateful that it didn't. Because I'm going to be honest, I was trying to kill him. I was. I said if we get into an incident, you know, right before that, I said I'm going to stab

somebody in the neck. I was trying to stab him in the neck, but I was drunk. So, you know, I couldn't really get a good grip on a knife. So, you know, I'm grateful for that. Like, I'm really grateful because I would have killed him. I would have killed him. Where do you think that hate comes from that was in you at the time? Like just that anger.

It was hate towards him. He was violating. He was violating. He was in the hood. He had people scared. I don't like being scared. If I'm scared, I want to do something to you. Especially if another person makes me scared where like you're my enemy, you got me too scared to that point where like, nah, I got to look over my shoulder every day.

And I'm going to get rid of you. I'm going to get rid of you. I don't want to be looking. I don't want to do that. I don't want to do that. Would you have considered that person a bad person? him a bad person. Back then I was considered him bad.

I mean, now that I'm older, I'm able to process things a little differently. I'm just, he was just like us. He's trying to, you know, survive, do what he got to do, make it back to his family. We actually talked since I've been home, you know. It was a good, I posted it on my page. It was actually a good conversation, you know,

to actually be able to just talk to old enemies and things like that and be able to look past that, you know, a lot of people in this generation of youth, they're not able to do that. They would still hold on to old grudges, but we're able to move past that. So it was good. Do you think he looked at you the same way? After that? No, at that point in time.

Like, if the roles were reversed, he would have had that same energy or hate towards you as an enemy? To what, let it go or to just try to finish me? Yeah, if the roles were reversed right then and there. Yeah, I think he would try to finish me. He was definitely trying to finish all of us. He would come through alone. You know, he had, he was strat, you know.

He was known for stabbing individuals as well. So, you know, he was definitely a big threat. I don't really think he had any remorse. He didn't care at that time. He was older than us too. So I don't, I think he would have probably did us dirtier, to be honest. It's true. So you leave that night and you're on the run for like two weeks?

No, I'm not on the run. I'm chilling. I'm relaxing. Nothing happening. Nobody knows what's going. It's all over the news. Everybody knows that somebody's in critical condition. There's rumors around the streets. Oh, some bluds did. It was bluds and crips. It was bluds. Now, everybody's trying to figure out who it is. I got one of the big homies of the stones. He's asking me what happened because, you know, he knows my pedigree. So he's asking, he's like, yo, that was y'all? That was y'all? I'm like, nah, that wasn't, we had nothing to do with that. He said, they said it was some blood. I'm like, we really even there.

And as me and him are talking, one of the Piru's that was out there, he hops out the car. He drives by. He sees me. He hops out the car. He's like, oh, yeah, I finished him. We ended up, you know, he starts talking about it. So now everybody knows it's us now. Like, so now everybody, oh, that was Blitz.

That was Blitz. Then, you know, about like a week after that, I'm at the same apartment complex and police run down. So you got a warrant for you. arrest and it's attempted murder. It's attempted murder. How'd that make you feel when they were arresting you? I mean, I really didn't feel nothing. I was a little worried like, all right, what do they actually have?

That's always what my thought is. What do they actually have? Like, is he telling? I'm like, is this dude telling? Like, you're really going to give it up that way? But that's really running through my thoughts. And then I got to get word back to Jack O' and Shamar that, you know, I got picked up. So they can be on alert.

And, you know, that was my first instance. So the next day in court, my son's mother, she was there. So I told her, like, you know, let him know. They're grabbing us. This is what it is. Did they end up picking up the other guys that were a part of it? Yes. They picked up Jackal about two weeks after, a week later,

after they arrested me and locked me up, they picked up my friend Jackal. My old friend Jackal, they picked him up. I guess they were trying to make it look like we were snitching or something to try to get him to crack. But so they picked them up. Shamar was already in the juvenile center. So they didn't need to grab them. So we were just sitting in the county until they had to release us because there was no evidence at that point.

All there was was testimony. So it was just hearsay. It was hearsay. There was no, he didn't write a statement. The judge was, the judge was in the court. We were in the court. And as to get into that time, there's only a certain amount of time that you're able to hold us before, you know,

you have to release us if no charges going to be brought. and the DA's trying to get the judge to extend to stay unlawfully. It would be unlawfully, but the judge is telling, like, if you have to, if you want them to stay in jail, you have to do your job because there's no testimony. The victim might die. He lost the kidney. That's when we found out in the courtroom.

The judge said it. He said it was street surgery. The victim lost the kidney. So, you know, the whole courtroom was quiet. Like, you know, who does that? Like, how did that even happen? So, you know, there no charges were, were filed. so they released this after being held in two weeks.

But the only reason why I ended up doing time is because the individual, he got caught later down the line a couple months later with a trunk load of guns or something like that. The cop was telling us, one of the cricket cops was telling us. He told us, he said, yeah, your boy got caught up. He had a couple guns in the car. And the next thing you know, they're indicted us.

Wait, so the guy that got stabbed, Mm-hmm. He didn't snitch at first. No, he didn't snitch. But because he went back to crime after that. Yeah. He got caught with a couple of guns. Wow.

And I guess, you know, he decided to, you know, just give us up. They, you know, so we had to do, we got indicted. And I ended up pleading to, the whole thing about the case was that the judge, even the judge said it. We were going to take it a trial, but there's no self-defense law in New York. but the cameras and everything else were showing that it was actually self-defense that we were attacked. All these guys, the Crips were older than us. We're 16, 17.

They're there in the 20s. They came out. You can see them on camera pulling out bats and all of that. So the question was, where the jury actually find us guilty or not guilty with the self-defense? Because there is no self-defense, but you could clearly see we were defending ourselves.

So they ended up offering us one year and another year. for violating the probation. So me and my friend Jackal, we took the two years, the year and the year, and Shamar took the three and a half for the, he went down for the official stabbing. Like, all right, somebody got to go down

for the official stabbing. So Shamar took the three and a half, and me and Jackal took two. And they didn't have that camera footage when they arrested you the first time? We didn't know about it until, you know, we started having to dig in the crates, like, well, what the hell?

This is self-defense. So it just probably, they didn't have enough based off of that to charge you. officially then. And now when they first arrested you, they were probably getting you to, or trying to get you to flip. Yeah, they were trying to say who, who was there? Do you know such a search person that's showing me pictures of Jackal and Shamar? It's crazy because it's like a coincidence. I'm like, I don't know none of these dudes, but I actually have Shamar's ID in my pocket,

you know, so he left it at my house. So I was going to bring it back to him when I got arrested. So then, you know, they're trying to figure out, but I just shut it down, you know, throw me in the cell, Fifth Amendment right. I watched a lot of, um, the first 48 when I was growing at being in the street, you know, just trying to get an idea, like how to beat them at their own game. So, you know, I already knew Fifth Amendment right. It shut it all down. And then, you know, attempted murder.

Here we go. Right to the county. $500,000 bill. Bill and bond. I think they said, bail in bond. So just half a million ransom. Now, during that time where you're kind of in limbo where the Crips gunning for you? Where in the county?

Just anywhere between them picking you up the first time and then the second Because they let you go. Yeah. And then they indict you later on. Oh, yeah. It's still on. It was still on for a little bit. They probably want revenge, right? Yeah, they were trying to get revenge.

They were coming to my grandma's house. You know, with the guns, there was an incident where they actually pulled up my father. We see my father across the street. My grandma ended up finding the gun in the crib. So she gave it to my gun. father to hold and we see my father like y'all need my gun i need my gun like you got to pass the gun pops they're over there we he gave it to us though he gave it to us i love my old man or it was still on though it was it was never ending until we all got arrested and i came out in 2010 and that's when it was over

i seen everybody was living somewhat in harmony as far as the bluzz and crips in the um the gessner projects before i came out so So you went away for a year for that case? 16 months, to be exact. And where'd they send you for that? I was in the county jail, right in the county jail. Oh, you just did all county time? County time.

Miserable. Why didn't they send you to an actual prison? Because I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. That's a good question. I guess they didn't feel it was enough time because I didn't have stay time. I had a year.

I only had a year for the actual charge. I played guilty to assault. But then I got the extra year for the violation of my probation. So I don't know if that. You know, so I don't know. But I would have rather been upstate. I would have rather, I tell everybody now if I would have went upstate on my first bid, I probably would have never been back for the second one.

So, you know. Why do you think that is? What? After being up there in the mountains and experience what I experienced? Uh-uh. I don't got beat up, upstate, all type of stuff. So, you know, just, uh-uh. So that year and a half in county, what was that like?

Um, it was easy. As far as you know, there's no, you're just in a little closed environment. It's not like upstate prison where you got more freedom. So time was dragging a little bit, but I had a little more perks than a lot of the other individuals because of my name. So, you know, a lot of CEOs, you know, they looked out, I'm going to say. I'm just, you know, they gave me favors. You know, I did favors for them. I beat people up for them.

You know, it was just honest stuff. A lot of people want to admit that they did work for. the police, but yeah, I put it, they, oh, he needs to go. Da-da-da, he did something to my sister. I know one of the COs in there, I'm not going to say his name, but he said, yo, bro, got to go. He was a sex offender or something. So, you know, I say no more.

We're going to get him out of here. Put the whip together, get him out. Do-do. So, you know. These COs that are like that are, are they like the old school, you know, been on the job for, you know, 15, 20 years? It depends I mean

This dude He was relatively young I would say 30s 40s You know It just depends on how If they just Fuck what you or not You know how you carry yourself

I'd stay to myself I'm just you know On gang time You leave me alone I'm gonna leave you alone You bother me I'm gonna fuck you up And

I guess they just respected that Now were you thinking About your future at all For that time in county Nope Nope I was just one step closer to being big homie. That's all my future was pretty much about.

I'm being honest. I didn't think about what I was trying to do, what career I was trying to make. I was just trying to be the biggest homie out. And I came out in 2010. And that's what I did. This is when I made that move. I started, you know, the second, I launched the second Crip War. I started doing more stuff.

and, you know, I've reached that level, top level, to be honest. How did you launch the war? Because I came home, like I said, the Crips and Bloods, they were pretty much living in Harmony, was then in this Gessler projects. That's where a lot of my little homies, I'm not going to say little homies, but the homies that I dealt with, they were chilling in this projects, and it was half and half. So at first I was living peaceful, you know, hey, Crips, ah, yeah, it's.

cool, we smoke in, we chill in, because I used to be Crips. So the leaders know me, you know, especially one of the leaders, he definitely knows me. We used to go to school. We was good friends, me and the mouse. That's his name. One of the old leaders, his name was Mous. So we was all cool and stuff, but I don't know. I guess it got to one point where I just felt it was at time, you know, I ended up fighting one of the OG Crips. He had came home at around the same time I came out the county. and he was pissed off that I was wearing, I kept wearing my red flag in the neighborhood

in the projects. So me and him ended up fighting. They stopped. That was going to lead to a war right then, but, you know, it calmed down. It didn't lead to nothing big, but, you know, I guess that left us a bad taste of my mouth. So when the time was right, we just, you know,

it was an issue one night. We were outside of Gesner, me and my, one of the homies play play, from Albany and we just started, I guess it was over a girl. I'm going to say it was over a girl. I guess PlayPlay was trying to impress one of the chicks out there and the Crips, they used to do something

when they salute each other with their hands. It's like it's supposed to be dropping the five with the, you know, Bloods represented. It's supposed to be dropping the five so they'll close it. And PlayPlay, he got mad over it. He's seen them doing it. And, you know, he started talking shit. You know, it got heated.

I punched the nigga in the mouth. So it was just on after that. And then it just spilled again. Now we, it's just a war. And then I ended up removing all the crips out the projects. It just became blood territory at that point. Now, were the bloods mad at you for just getting out of jail and starting these problems? Nope, they were my crew.

So they were going along with what I was saying. they no i mean if they did have you know animosity or you know had a low feelings toward they didn't express it they was fully committed to you know what i was saying no was it normal to be your age and have your own crew no not not no because at 19 i came out at i was 19 i was um pretty much the had the highest level rank in the bloods now i was the high o 20 or double o g and it'll be called double OG on the West Coast, but over here is high O20. So, no, it's not really normal, but I just, you know, we're the exception. Now, how do you guys communicate with each other back then?

I mean, this is what, 2010? So they're cell phones, but it's not too advanced as it is now, right? No, yeah, but, yeah, we just call, write letters. I mean, you know, write letters to the prisons or just mainly call around and meet up with other bloods and stuff from different cities or states or something. Something like that. Did they send you money and hold you down when you were in county for that year? My crew?

Yeah. Some of them did. Not all of them. Not all of them. Not all of them. Because my main crew was still gone. My brother was locked up. Jizz was in the round Jack O'Shamar.

They were locked up. But some of the other crew, they were doing the right thing. No, I imagine you're on probation when you get out that second bid or the first bid. Nope. Oh, no probation? Nope. I'm free. I'm running.

I'm going crazy now. Why didn't they give you probation? I completed the probation. I violated probation. No, but that for the second case, for the stabbing, does it give you probation for that? No, I just took the whole year. The one year I was clean off papers.

I was good. Oh, wow. I was good. So you probably would have won a trial if you went to trial. I believe we would have. I believe we had. The judge was, she was, I think she was in favor of us going to trial. Like, you know, but I'm young.

I'm, you know, a little scared to, you know, put my life on a line like that because there's always that. You know, so, yeah, I think we were to beat at trial. So how long are you out on the streets for before you catch your third case? Two years, going on two years. And what happens with that? I got caught with a gun. It was, I got into it with my own crew, to be honest.

We ended up having what I would like to say, Civil War. We had a Civil War. Well, they were overthrowing me. That's pretty much what it was. What happened? I was, I did a lot of reading. You know, I'm like I said, I was more advanced than the rest of the individuals, my age, around me.

But I was reading at 16 years old. I'm reading 48 laws of power. I'm reading mafia books, five families, and all of this stuff. So, you know, my mind is different. I'm trying to, I see how much power we got. Now I'm trying to, you know, organize it. All right, we should take this to the next level, you know, try to get it more organized. I guess, you know, it was it.

I guess they wasn't with that, you know. So they rebel. I ended up losing, got thrown out. They all left and went to another hood. And I ended up going. I got into it with not them per se, but some individuals they was around and I had to start shooting.

You know, I came through the hood. They pretty much robbed me. They jumped me and pretty much robbed me. I came back. I started shooting shit up. and I ended up getting caught with the gun. I was riding, coming back from the city with one of my, um, my last homies that stuck around. And then, um, we got pulled over in the car and I, they got, they found the gun in the car.

And he told on me. Yeah, he told on me. How'd they make you feel that they threw you out? Um, it hurt. It hurt, you know, it's because, um, they went to the same individual. I mean, it's karma, though. You know, now I could look at his karma because they went to the same individual that I stopped dealing with because of them, you know? So it's like the individual, he was, if you know, you know, the gang dynamics, the individual I was rocking with.

He came out of prison and he was feeling some type of way about them and not want to give him the ranking. So I chose them over him, you know. I was with these guys putting in work. I took over our entire Crip neighborhood with these guys, and you're trying to deny them ranking for whatever reason. So I chose them and went somewhere else. And then they ended up, you know, leaving me and going right back with him. It's like, it hurt. It hurt, you know, especially since we all grew up together.

It's like, yo, what the hell? The relationship was never the same. Even now I came home, it's like, we still talk, but, you know, it's like, ah. So does he snitch on you that same night when you guys get arrested? Yeah, same night. Same night. I had the gun in the McDonald's bag. I don't know why.

I thought I was going to get away. I don't know. But they found the gun in the McDonald's bag. And they arrested all of us because, as you know, you got to own up to a gun. If it's found in the car, somebody has to own up to it. So he arrives at the station first, him and his girlfriend. And as soon as I come in the door, he starts saying,

yo, I'm sorry, bro. My bad. I'm like, yo, what the fuck? My nigga, what the fuck are you talking about? Shut up. Shut up. So we're in there, and the officer, the officer there, Ronnie Charles, he was telling, that's how I know. He was like, somebody got to admit to the gun blitz. He said, or y'all going to all go down. Somebody got to submit to the gun. I don't care who does it. So then I'm trying to see if he's going to take the charge.

You don't got no record. Da-da-da-da-a. You're talking about you. Sorry. All right, take the charge then. He's not taking the charge. He's like, she's going to leave me. That's all he keeps saying, no, my girl is going to leave me. My girl is going to leave me. So I ended up just owning up to the gun. You know, it's my gun. You can let them go. And he still writes a statement on me. He still writes a statement. He ends up still writing a statement.

I'm looking at the statement in court. Like, this is ridiculous. Oh, yeah, we came back from the city. The cops pulled us over. He stuffs the gun into the McDonald's bag and shoves the weed into a sneaker. His girl didn't even write a statement. She said, I don't know nothing was going on, you know. So that was crazy.

That was nasty. So did he get any time for that or no? No, he didn't get no time for that. Only I went down. How much time would he have gotten if he owned up for the gun? Probably it was been his first offense. And, you know, his mom was like, she was very political in the town. So I don't think he would have got anything.

I think he'd probably got a slap on a wrist the year the most if that, you know, but I ended up having plead out the 10 years. Is that because of your record? Because of my record, but they wanted me for, They wanted me for another charge that they wanted, there was another charge out, a robbery, kidnapping that my name was on. So they wanted me for that and they couldn't get me for that. So they gave me the 10. He pretty much said that in court.

Did you do it? Yeah, of course I did it. Of course I did it. They found out, though, you know, they came up there almost five years into my 10-year sentence. I was in a box, upstate box at the time in Malone near Canada. And detectives came up. They was saying, they show me pictures, saying that they were going to charge my sister or my cousin

because they couldn't tell. This is a woman scarf on my face. They couldn't tell if it was a woman. I told them they drove up here for no reason. My man, my friend was already locked up. Jizz, my right-hand man, he was already locked up for it. He wasn't telling. So, yeah, five years into it, they pulled me back.

They took my toothbrush and they said there was a connection with the DNA to one of the gloves or something that was found on the scene. Did anyone get hurt at this robbery or this was just a... It was a store robbery. I'm not going to say he wasn't hurt, but I'm not going to... You know, he said he suffered some injuries. I did believe I hit him probably a couple times with the gun or something. Not shot, just hit.

Just magnanim across the head or something. And he stole money from the... Mm-hmm. Okay. And this was several years prior to that? This was 2012. Okay. Mm-hmm.

So what year do you go down for this gun? This 2012. Oh, so what happened that? that same year. This, the robbery happened probably March and I got arrested probably for the gun in April, two days before my daughter was born. Now,

do they tie that gun to anything else? Like you said you shot up, uh, the old, uh, hangout spot or whatever. No, no,

no, no, this was fresh. This is new gun. Okay. Yeah. So they can't put anything else on you. Okay.

So you go down for the gun. Do you ever get bail at all once you get arrested at night? No. I mean, I, when I went to there, I think my bill was $200,000 when they placed bill. You know, I'm not making bill. You could barely even make $50,000 bill in the hood, you know?

So it was like, I'm just sitting there. I just got to sit and do my time. How long does it play out until you take that 10-year plea deal? I was in there for about a year, about in the county, fighting it for a year. I was trying to get it lower to as much as I can. I'm trying to get to at least seven. Like, this is a gun charge at the end of day.

but they kept telling me no, we want you for this robbery kidnapping. So, you know, 10 years is what it is. Take this or go to trial. Now, would you have been better off fessing up to the robbery at that point to get lower time? I don't, I mean, that's what they say, but I don't believe that. I'd rather take my chances of me not knowing nothing. I don't know nothing. I ain't do nothing, you know, so.

And it took them another five years to figure it out anyway. Yeah. So you probably thought you were in the clear. I thought I was good. I didn't think nothing was going to come about. So, you know, it was a very big shock. I was, you know, if they were to brung it in the beginning, it wouldn't have hurt as much as it did at that time, you know,

because this is 2017. I'm still, you know, I'm in prison. I'm in state prison, maximum prison. So I'm still, you know, you know, locked into the prison, but I'm still, I'm moving out. Like, my mind is starting to move out. I'm starting to think differently. Starting like, yo, I need to start doing, really preparing.

This is where I'm really starting to prepare. So now you're giving me extra time. Like, yo, what the hell? What was your mind check going into that 10-year sentence? To be honest, I'm going to say I was thinking, like, this is my first time up north in state prison. I already know the dynamics. I'm from Spring Valley. I did been through the same dynamic in Juvee where I'm going to be outnumbered.

I'm not going to really know nobody. So I'm going to have to perform. I'm going to do what I got to do for these 10 years, you know. make sure I'm safe and protected, but I'm going to make sure I come out a much better man because of it. You know, while I'm still there, I'm going to learn as much as I could, and that's what I stuck to.

Were you on gang time going into it? Uh-huh. But you were still technically a blood or not a blood? Could you call yourself a blood going in? What, into prison? Yeah. Yeah, I was blood. Okay.

I was definitely blood. But even though you were kicked off of that specific set? Yeah, yeah. The streets in the prison are too, it's funny. Like, if you know, you know, but the streets in the prison are two different dynamics. Like, they don't, they interact, but it's, you know, it's still separate at the same time. Where did they send you for your first real prison?

My first prison, I went to Clinton Annex. That's not the real Clinton, Maine, which you probably heard about Clinton, New York, but it was a Clinton annex. It was like a little less, a max B, not a max A. It was like a little step down where you get a little more freedom. But I was there for about nine months, and I ended up going to the box because I broke a rapel's jaw in the bathroom. How does this happen tell us this story?

One of my friends ended up pulling from the town, one of the guys I know, like, he was the first guy seen like from my town in the prison. So we're in the bathroom hanging out, we're smoking. And this guy, he walks in and he's farting while he's walking past us. I told this story before. He's farting why he's walking past us. But, you know, I'm still, this is 2000.

2012, so I'm only like 22 and, you know, 23. It was 2013. So I'm 23. I'm still a little young in the mind, you know, I'm still, like, you know, you're not apologizing, you're gonna start laughing, you know, so that pissed me off. You know, you wanna laugh, you're a rapo at the end of the day. So, you know, you was in there for, they said,

for violating his grandkids or whatever, so he ended up laughing, and then I, you know, words were exchanged. We got into each other's faces. is I flinched at him, you know, like I was going to hit him. I wasn't playing on hitting him. I really wasn't going to hit him, but I flinched at him. And then he ended up pushing me into the, and I landed into the garbage can, so I was mad. So I got up and I hit him two times and I broke his jaw.

So they sent me to the box for a year or six months like that. I think I did six months for that, yeah. And he just happened to be a pedophile. So you didn't know about that at first? I knew he was a pedophile. That jail was full, like, um, it was, I'm not gonna say it was full of, um, sex offenders, but you knew, like, there was like an entire dorm for them. Like, you know, you know who every, the sex offenders were. So, you know,

it was an old secret that he was in there for, for, for all of that. But they were, like, protected. You couldn't hurt them. I mean, now, like, you know, as I started getting into years later down the line, I realized that they're actually are protected. Like, it can be a hate crime if you really, you know, start really beating on them, like, you know, but back then, I didn't really care. How do you feel about that? What, being a hate crime? Yeah. You know, I don't really agree with it, you know, but I don't agree with what they do either.

So, you know, that's a, that's nasty work, to be honest. And there, pretty much, I had to really stop the bros from really, you know, always killing them, you know? Like, they were really, like, try to beat up every pedophile that was coming into the dorm. Like, that was, you know, you really can't do that. You really can't do that, though. You know, it's going to make us hot, you know, sergeants and them start cracking down on the COs,

and then, you know, we start taking the full weight of everything. Like, nah, you can't do that, man. Why do you think the prison puts them in there with some of these violent guys to begin with, though? I think they want them to get beat up because there's sometimes, like I said, CEOs will push the button on them. Yo, he's a pedophile, get him.

I'm about to go to the bathroom. You know, too-da-do, we just take care of them real quick. Beat them up, send them on their way. send them lay back in bed or something, you know, then we'll have them. Like I said, the bros was mainly beating them up. So I started trying to like, we ain't got to beat them up all the time. Like, you know, make them clean around the dorm or something, you know, take care of the dorm instead of, you know, just putting hands and feats.

Because you can't have dudes leaving the dorm with black eyes all day and stuff. Like, that's not going to work. That's not going to work. Was it hard to adapt a prison lifestyle? Because it's different than county. It's different from county. Yeah. It's way different rules.

You know, counties like a little more less strict, you know, like not too much structure, you know, or discipline. You don't really, you could stay locked in your cell and stay prison. You got to be out. You got to mingle. You got to use the phones. You got to really network if you want to survive in there. Now, after you got out of the box, do they ship you to a new place? Mm-hmm.

I landed up in Comstock. Comstock was my second jail that I was in. I was there for nine months. You're a short time we're in these places. I was there for nine months. And this is another Macs security? Yes, this is one of the Max. Great Metal is actually called Great Meadows.

We call it Comstock. But I was there for nine months. This is when I'm actually, like, I got to put in work for the Bloods. So I was on the wall, I'm going to say. Because I left the, I missed this part. When I was in Clinton Annex, there was a deal. There was a deal in Clinton annex. Somebody had to go.

He was claiming blood and he was a rapist. He had a sex offender charge. So this individual, he was there before me. But they asked me that I want to take it. I say, yeah, sure, I'll take it. You know, so I was supposed to cut the individual. But at the last second, I guess one of the guys in the same set as him wanted to take care of it. So he ended up cutting him.

but now I'm taking, I was taking the fall because they said I didn't help help him get away. It's called back in the safety. That's what's called. They said I didn't back his safety after he cut the next individual. He cut the victim.

So now, if you don't back the safety, you're on the wall, your food. You know, it's, you, you, you feel, you know? So I'm actually on a wall at this time. So I left Clinton annex. I broke the sex offenders draw, and I'm in Comstock, and I'm on the wall.

I'm food to order blood. I'm fool to the set. So I actually had to get back into it. I talked to a couple of the big bros. They told me you got to take a certain amount of deals. And the first deal I was on, I left the spot. Or I ended up getting cut on the side of my face a little more. It's not really visible.

But yeah, that's how it went. Yeah. So why do they call it taking a deal? I have no why. I guess a contract. I don't really know why it's called taking a deal, but that's just the terminology. It means just take a deal means just that person got to go.

You got to make sure it happens. And the only benefit for you is just being able to stay with the bloods? Being able to stay with the bloods and live in peace, pretty much. So you don't get paid or anything? I got paid. Oh, they do pay you for it. I got paid. No, not necessarily, but I got paid for this.

This was a hit. I didn't have to do this particular one. they were going to wait until, you know, something really came about, but I wanted to get it over with. And this is why I ended up being food because this is, you know, I told you I was food from my last spot. I got food from off of this deal as well. It's fucked up.

I got thrown under the bus because the individual that we hit, he was a leader. They, the word was around that he was food and he had to go. But after we ended up making that happen, the top dog said that was never sanctioned, you know. If you know, you know. So everybody watching this, they don't know what I'm talking about. The top dog said it was never sanctioned.

And so now instead of the other leaders taking the fall, it fell on me. Like, oh, you went against the grain. You made, you jumped out the window and took a deal on a leader. So now I get kicked out of this particular set, the Brims. So now I'm officially a dub from Brims, from the Brims. And how does that affect your prison? experience. I'm scared to death. I'm scared to death. I'm like, okay, now I'm going to be a deal for the brims. I'm going to be a deal for the brims. Everybody know, if you're up north, you don't want to

be a deal for the brims, the stones, you know, you don't want to be a deal for nothing. But, you know, it's like, yo, what am I about to do? I'm about to go back in a population, you know, with no protection. Everybody could get me right now. Everybody could get me. Anybody I just beat up, anybody I made enemies, anything could happen. So my first thing was just like, I got. I got. got to find another home to get to, you know, find somebody to take me in before I go back to population. So what do you do? Where do you end up going?

I ended up going to another hood called the hunters. And this is all under the bloods. Mm-hmm. This is all bloods. So the blood's beef with each other. And the prison systems, mainly in the streets, too. And mainly in the prison system is blood on blood. It's so numerous.

The bloods are so numerous. That's all you couldn't beef with, pretty much. How does that even make sense? It doesn't. It doesn't. but it's under the bloods is, you know, different situations. So, you know, everybody's not apart. Blood is just the name.

But there's different stuff under it. So, you know, it's just everybody just wars against each other. So what happens when you get out of the box from that hit? Um, I mean, I was sent to El Mira. El Mair was a relatively all right spot. I was able to transfer from Elmira. I got into a couple incidents, you know, fist fights over one over, incident over the phone.

But for the most part, Elmira, I was able to transfer out and drop down to a medium. So you stayed out of trouble at Amar. For the most part, yeah. I mean, I punched a couple of dudes in the face, but I got away. So, you know, yeah, for the most part, I stayed out of trouble. Now, how many years now into your sentence is that? This is five years. This is 2000.

Yeah, five years, 2017 when I'm in Elmira. This is when I get pulled back down to court. Now, before you got pulled down to court, are you thinking about changing your life at this point in time? I'm starting to, you know, I'm starting to start thinking outside the box, starting to, you know, try to educate myself, trying to figure out ways I could take correspondence courses. And, you know, that's when I started. I didn't start in 17, but I was able, in 18, I started paralegal correspondence through Blackstone

and started doing stuff like that. What were you thinking about your future? Yeah, I was just, I mean, I didn't really have anything set for what I wanted to do for the future. I just know that I wanted to do. be on a business, you know, on my own business. I just knew that I couldn't keep thinking the way I'm thinking now if I'm going to get there. So I had to make some adjustments, you know, educate myself a little more and everything like that.

So do you think prison forces someone to start thinking about that? I mean, it can. It can. If you, like, one of those conscious individuals, you know, self-aware, like, you want to know where you're going to go. I think prison definitely wakes you up. You know, you start seeing things differently. You see things in hindsight. You look at the past. You're able to take lessons from it, you know, and able to make better choices. Some people just ignore it, though. So do you think you personally needed prison? Yes, not that much time. I did, you know, 12 years, but I don't think

I needed that much time, but I needed to slow down because before I got locked up, I was, I was, out here running crazy. You know, I needed to slow down before something really, you know, my life would have ended it different. So you get that extra time and then you go back to Elmira or did they send you somewhere different? No, I got, I went down to a medium. From Elmira, I went to my first medium, which was Mohawk correctional facility. I was there for three months and I went to the box.

You know, this is a younger crowd. It's a younger crowd. You know, and Mohawk was a spot where it's going down. Like cuttings every day. The young boys are making me look bad. I'm feeling like, you know, they're making moves. I got to show something. So I ended up, you know, cutting two dudes over there.

And they kicked me, they sent me to the box for the last one. And I went back behind to the max to five points. Do you think it's hard in the state system working your way down from a max to a medium just based on the politics, the environment, all of that? Because in the federal system, it's quite different too. It's hard to adjust to. Yeah, I believe so. Usually they make you, as long as you can stay out of trouble from what I've seen, like a year and a half, 16 months to two years, they'll drop you down. You know, now they started doing the preference transfer where they'll try to send you closer to your home so make it easier for the visitation.

But, yeah, I mean, as far as, like, adjustment-wise, being from a cell to a dorm, like, environment, it was hard. Like, you know, I'm trying to have people around you, everybody moving around. You're not knowing what's going on. Nah, I rather have been in a cell. Like, the max was better suited for me at that time. So you're back at the max, but you're trying to change your life, too. Is that complicated? It is.

It really was because, you know, I got the homies. oh, you know, they still want me to put in work. They see what I'm trying to do. They see me going to college, doing this, working at the library and stuff. And then situations come up, oh, B, you got to be involved in it. You know, it's like, damn. And now I got to put myself on the line again, you know, to prove that I'm here, you know. I'm just not out the way.

So it was definitely hard to adjust, you know, but I made sure I was getting my schoolwork done. I made sure I got my schoolwork done. doing all of this. How are you as a father in prison? As a father, I mean, I would talk to my son as much as I could on the phone. He was still growing up. And this is when he started getting to the, like, when I got into like five points, this was starting, like he started getting to that age. I can't really say how old he was. But he started getting to like where he's hearing about me more, like my actual name in the street. So, you know, I got to really make a difference. Like, I got to show you that.

this happened to me so it wouldn't happen to you. You know what I'm saying? I did this for you, you know? So that's why I really started making the little, the changes, started reading more, just started staying focused, just trying to knock out all the programs I can. How did you ensure that he didn't follow your same path? I mean, to be honest, I don't try to, I don't lie to him.

You know, even when he was, he was growing up, they were, oh, daddy's away. He's in military. You know, he asked me, yeah, daddy's in prison. Daddy's in prison, you know, I did something bad. I'm in prison. I try to be real, you know, given my personal experience, like, you know, and give him the real truth, like, not what, you know, fatherly advice. I try to get, this is what's real, justice, you know. And, you know, I just stay with that, you know, he's been doing good so

far, you know, he got his LTL, Lifetime Loaners. He got just dropped his rap album. So, you know, I'm very proud. Do you think it hurts a child when a parent tries to hide the incarceration? Yeah, because it doesn't expose him to it. You know, my father, I didn't learn my father was incarcerated until 2007 when I'm online, just found the New York State lookup and I just started, we just started typing the names and his name pops up. Like, why didn't you tell us? I'm already knee deep into the game now, but you should have at least let us know, like, what the streets was hitting for, you know, what was going on. So we can at least really fully make a decision, you know, before, like, at least tell us your

experience, you know, but I believe that you should tell your kids what's going on. you know, they got to learn from somewhere. And the best teacher is the parent. Now, what was going on with your father while you're serving this time? My father, he was deteriorating. He had gotten prostate cancer, you know, kidneys is feeling. It was just, yeah, he was just going through it. He was trying to hold on.

He was trying to hold on. Yeah, he passed a year before I actually got out. How did that make you feel serving time? and not having those last years with him. Oh, it was terrible. I felt like crashing out. I felt like crashing out. But I'm like, all right, you know what?

I'm here. I'm about to go home and still stick to the plan. You know, I'm going to make you proud. I know you was waiting. But, you know, we got this. We got this. What kept you on track? Just, you know, just the fact that there was a lot of people out there believing in me.

My son was, you know, waiting. My sister, everybody, you know, they believed in me. They kept believing in me. yeah, you're going to be good. You know, you're going to be good. So they kept me going. They keep me going. They still keep me going.

Now, during this time of you trying to change your life in prison towards the last years of your sentence, are you still rolling with the bloods? Mm-hmm. Why? It's, it's, I don't really want to say. There's not really like an answer. It's just, it's culture.

I've been blood. since I was 15, you know, I don't believe, I don't believe that the gangs actually get you in trouble. In prison is different. Yeah, gangs ain't you in trouble in prison all day. But, you know, in general, just generally speaking, I don't believe that gangs are actually what get you in trouble. I believe that you get yourself in trouble

because everybody gangbang. Whether you got a crew, it's just the bloods are so highly recognized that, you know, it's just, get classified. Any crew is a gang, you know, so, but I don't know. It's just I'm big homie at the time. I reached, you know, a good level up there, got people, you know, relying on me. So, you know, I'm trying to send as many people, I was judging my success on how many people I could send out the door on time, you know, they get you home on your conditional release. So it's really not really, I just, I love it. I think we can be better than what.

But, you know, society and the media and everything paints of us, to be honest, you know, we get, you know, there's a lot of bad with this. There's a lot of bad. I can't even, I'm not going to say there isn't. There's a lot of bad that comes with this. We look bad, but there's some of us out here that actually are, you know, living regular lives. I live a regular life. I do American felon, work nine to five. Hocus, you know, you've seen Hocus.

He did to drop my flag. There's a lot of brothers out here that, you know, are still representing. that are still making positive moves. So, you know, I think that's what we need. You're not going to end gangs. You're not going to end gangs. As long as there's poverty out there, you're not going to end gangs. So what we need to do is have the street leaders step up, you know, and teach the youth

the better way. So are you saying that the youth shouldn't join the gang, son? I don't believe they should join the gang. If you're not in a gang, don't join it. There's nothing, you know, there's, especially not now. Like, there's no guidance. There's no organization. There's really no type of structure.

There's no game plan. I made a rail about this. There's no game plan. Everybody wants to talk about, you know, we can eat. You can join us. We'll get you out your situation. But nobody ever has a plan. The gang doesn't have a plan.

None of the gangs have a plan. None of the sets have a plan on helping anybody get out the hood. So I advise anybody watching. You do not join a gang. If you, you know, if you're in a gang, If you feel like, you know, you need to drop out, you should drop out. If you feel that there's a better way to, you know, help our youth, then I think that's the way to go.

This is exactly why I did the United Sets of America for the individuals that aren't comfortable with the drop my flag, you know, for the individuals that feel like they want to keep their flag, but want to help with the community, the United States of America is trying to bring that together. No, you weren't worried about, you know, guilty by association coming out of prison, still claiming to be a blood? From who?

Just anything. You know, if the bloods are committing crimes, not you physically being guilty of a crime, but just being labeled, you go to get a job, you know, they find out you're a blood. Yeah, that's always, you know, always concern, especially even just doing American felon TV. It's always concern, you know, my face is out there. I'm a felon, I'm this, I'm that, you know. I always think about how the jobs will look. I got turned down from one job because of American felony.

He was like, I didn't know you was all out here. It was a construction job. He said, I've seen a lot of your rails. He looked me up. You see a couple of the rails. He's like, I lost the job because of that. I didn't get the job. I was interviewing for the job, but I didn't get it because of that.

And you probably would have been one of his best employees. Yeah. The ironic part about it. Yeah. How old are you when you got out of prison? I got out in 24. I was 34, going on 34. So a couple of years ago.

Mm-hmm. Two years ago. Tell us about that transition into, I guess you would say, a normal life coming out of prison at that age. Um, I mean, it was the most things I found challenging as far as reentry was I came home stable. So, you know, I had a roof over my head, had a place to live. It was just pretty much just the technology, you know, and getting used to being around, you know, people without, trying to, you know, always head on a swivel and everything. I mean, I still keep my head on a swivel, you know,

but it's just being around everybody without, you know, being so hypervigilant, you know what I'm saying? But mainly the technology is just getting used to the technology, you know, was really much the part I needed help with, you know, and I think everybody needs help with that coming home. We don't really got that. You got the tablets up north, but there's not real, you know, there's not really preparing you for what's really out here.

all these apps and all these features and things that you have to familiarize yourself with. No, but that was pretty much the hardest part was just, and, you know, reconnecting with the kid, with my little man, because, you know, he was gone. I left him when he was going on three. So, you know, it's always like, how do you really be a parent? You know, he already, the streets pretty much raised him.

Other people raised him. So I was like, you can't be too forceful. You know, it can't be too demanding. can't be too lenient. I'm still a parent. You know, so that was pretty much a challenge, too. You know, we still be, ah, you know, but we're here. That's my little man. Did you have to disassociate yourself from certain people when you got out? I barely even talk to anybody that I used to from my past. You know, this is only one of my pretty much one friend that my friend, Jiz, General, he does American Felon TV South.

You know, he's the only one that I pretty much talked to from my past. You know, I feel fell out with everybody. What I mainly realized is not, you know, it's not really falling out. We just different alignment, you know. I'm thinking of a business, trying to grow the business, you know, and certain dudes are comfortable where they're at. I can't, you know, I don't owe my past loyalty. I owe my future.

What is American felon? Well, American Felon TV. American Felon TV is the biggest, pretty much I'm going to say, for media company for felons, the home for felons, opportunities. We mainly feature other individuals right now. This is the second year that I'm doing it. So the first year, I was just trying to, you know, get the name out there,

build brand awareness. Now I'm trying to transform into a full media company. You know, we don't really have nothing. that paints our narrative the way we need to. Every other kind of group of people have their own media network, BET, Telemundo, and pretty much American Felon TV

is going to be that avenue for the felons. You know, we create different type of shows. If you want to check it out, we got the on-the-record interviews. We do deep dives. We do a business show called Sell Made, where we acknowledge a felon business owners. It's just all felon empowerment

and trying to help felons find opportunities as well as that. And what about your book? You have a book with us. Yeah, the prison zoology. Yeah, prison zoology. This was pretty much my answer for 48 laws of power. That's pretty much what it was. Yeah, prison zoology.

I know the name might make you think it's all about prison, but it's about survival systems. It doesn't matter if it's prison, coming back from combat, you know, being in the streets. It's about survival, how to navigate and see individual traits. Because if you've been in prison, so you know that everybody always likes to equate themselves, I'm this type of animal. I'm a shark. I'm a lion.

So I figured the best way instead of is to put these archetypes into real words and have you see their characteristics, why people act the way they do in this type of environment. And prison is the most extreme environment that we, you know, on this planet, one of the most extreme environments. So prison zoology breaks down different archaeotypes that you, you know, we find not in the yard but everywhere from the shark, people who prey on the others, the line, the people, you know, who influence, you know, it just teaches you how to navigate,

find the strengths and weakness and just, you know, survive. What do you know now that you wish you knew before you got into a gang? Wish I knew now. That is a facade. I'm going to be honest that there's no exit. They don't offer exit. Like I said, the gangs offer no exit at all. The streets offer no exit at all.

There's, you know, everybody thinks that you can jump in, get fast cash and actually make a living. But it's not true. It's not true. Have you noticed the most kingpins. when the last time you heard of a kingpin are actually coming out the streets. You know, the streets is a myth. There's no real retirement plan.

We get into the streets thinking we're going to help our families and we ended up putting our family in a bigger hole when we get locked up or jammed up and now they got to come out of their pockets to pay for our fees and et cetera, et cetera. So I just wish I knew that, you know, there was no escape. That, you know, only escape is hard work, you know, living straight, trying to do things the right way.

you know, that's the only escape for real. How do you want to be remembered? Damn, good question. How do I want to be remembered? I want to be remembered as a good father, but also a good businessman. You know, someone that had an idea to, you know, get people an opportunity, you know, to show the world that we're not always always our. worst mistakes. You know, we're bigger than our worst mistakes because, you know, we get shit in

all so much. We're legally able to be discriminated against, you know, felons can't do this, felons can't do that. So, you know, overall, just other than just being a good man, good father, I just want to be, you know, somebody that helped somebody, that helped a lot of people, to be honest. Well, James, I appreciate you taking the time to come out here today and come on the show. I appreciate you for having me. Thank you, man. Yeah, thank you, brother, and keep up the good work and we'll have the links to all you got going on in the description of this episode. All right. Bad.

Thank you, man. Awesome.