I Started Selling Crack At 12

It was my aunt, her boyfriend Donnie who was also a heroin addict and her three boys, Rickey, Zipp and Jo-Jo .

When I asked her about what school I would go to she told me "That shit ain't nothin but a waste of time, you can get as smart as you want but at the end of the day you still just a dumb nigga from the ghetto to the man." she used to tell us that "to them, we animals and that's why they put us in these concrete jungles and let us kill each other."

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How They Got Their Start.

My cousins said they all used to stand on the corner and sling dope when they were my age but one time my aunt and her boyfriend stole their package and disappeared for two weeks, the only option they had was to stickup a stash house of a different crew over in east Baltimore to get the money. They said it was so easy it changed everything, they never went back to the corner and when their supplier came to pick up the money they owed him, they sent him a message by tying him to a chair, covering him in gas and almost lighting him on fire. He let them keep the money and they let him go. From that day on they started to build their reputation as stickup boys.

From Robin Hood to Robbing The Hood.

In the early 80's the drug game was different it was run by O.G.'s and young guys from the neighborhood, it might sound odd but even though they destroyed the community with drugs, they took care of that same community, they paid peoples rent, gave the kids money and told them to stay in school,they lived in the neighborhood, they sponsored and created youth sports leagues, invested in community businesses, they made sure people had food to eat and kids had toys on Christmas. They wanted to be like SuperFly, The Mack, Black Ceaser, these were the Superheros that came from the Blaxplotation films of the 70's, the bad guy was "The Man" and that's who they fought, they were avengers of the ghetto.

In the late 80's the young guys figured out how to cut out the middle man and that's when the money started flowing like water. When the greed set in, the lessons of respect learned from the O.G.'s was forgotten, they started battling for territory, kids were getting caught in the crossfire of bullets and drug addiction.

In the early 90's The new school of drug dealers all wanted to be Nino Brown and Scarface, it wasn't about a better life outside of the governments chains anymore, it was all about ego and status. They didn't live in or take care of the neighborhoods anymore, they moved into the suburbs away from the Jungle and the war zone. Who owned the most corners and who had the most soldiers was the new game.

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I Gave You Power

The new school of thought was that the gun gives you power, that's where we came in, if we felt like a weak dude was getting it and he shouldn't we would show up and take it from him. If the guys on the corner were getting flashy, if the corners were making too much money, or people started feeling like they couldn't be touched we would be there to bring them back to earth. In reality we were driven by our own egos as well, our egos and our reputation but in our line of work your reputation was the difference between a shootout and a smooth in and out.