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Speaker 4: You are now listening to True Murder, The most Shocking
Speaker 4: Killers in True Crime History and the authors that have
Speaker 4: written about them Gasey, Bundy, Dahmer, The Nightstalker BTK. Every
Speaker 4: week another fascinating author talking about the most shocking and
Speaker 4: infamous killers in true crime history. True Murder with your host,
Speaker 4: journalist and author Dan Zupansky.
Speaker 5: Good Evening. This is your host Dan Zupanski for the
Speaker 5: program True Murder, The most Shocking Killers in True crime
Speaker 5: History and the authors that have written about them. An
Speaker 5: African American soldier returns home to New York City from
Speaker 5: the Vietnam War in the late nineteen sixties is a
Speaker 5: time of turbulence and change. Racism is very much alive
Speaker 5: in America. Times are tough for a young black man
Speaker 5: in America, especially one who has fought for his country
Speaker 5: in an unpopular war. Rick Tally takes what he believes
Speaker 5: the only economic road open to him, drug dealing. Prisoner
Speaker 5: of Dreams presents a large cast of characters from small
Speaker 5: times street hustlers and pimps to the Hollywood and Las
Speaker 5: Vegas celebrities to organize crime figures in a point and
Speaker 5: eye opening memoir. The author describes his life and times,
Speaker 5: the good and the bad, in New York City and
Speaker 5: Harlem during one of the most seminal periods in American history.
Speaker 5: The book that we're featuring this sevening is Prisoner of Dreams,
Speaker 5: Confessions of a Harlem Drug Dealer with my special guest,
Speaker 5: author Rick Tally. Welcome to the program, and thank you
Speaker 5: for agreeing to this interview. Rick Tally, How you doing.
Speaker 6: I'm glad to beah.
Speaker 5: Thank you very much for this opportunity to interview you.
Speaker 5: It's congratulations on the book. Like I had mentioned earlier,
Speaker 5: first off, this is a memoir, so it's a little
Speaker 5: bit different for our audience. But again, you've just led
Speaker 5: this incredible and fascinating life and you've certainly captured all
Speaker 5: that fascinating aspects in this book. So let's start off, Rick,
Speaker 5: why don't you tell us a little bit where you
Speaker 5: grew up and tell us a little bit about your
Speaker 5: early life and what really sort of molded you, and
Speaker 5: then we'll talk about other things like the military and
Speaker 5: basketball and prison and drug dealing. So first time, tell
Speaker 5: us how you grew up and tell us a little
Speaker 5: bit about that.
Speaker 6: I grew up on the Upper the West side of Manhattan,
Speaker 6: and I guess what they call it ghetto, but we
Speaker 6: just called it our community.
Speaker 5: I have a.
Speaker 6: Normal upbringing with my three brothers and my one sister.
Speaker 6: My father was absent, even though I saw him, you know,
Speaker 6: he was doing what he did and he was into
Speaker 6: the number game. And you know, I had a a
Speaker 6: pretty basically a normal childhood. I didn't I wasn't a delinquen.
Speaker 6: I wasn't playing hooky from school, you know, even though
Speaker 6: I did play hooky every now and then. But basically
Speaker 6: I went to school, worked after school, and like I said,
Speaker 6: I had basically a normal upbringing, no different from any
Speaker 6: of my other friends.
Speaker 5: And uh, course this we're talking about, Uh, you were
Speaker 5: in the Vietnam War. So tell us what happens. Uh
Speaker 5: where were you in terms of age? And uh in
Speaker 5: terms of finishing high school? Where were you when this
Speaker 5: eve enlisted in the Vietnam War? How? How did this
Speaker 5: tell us about that? Well?
Speaker 6: I was that was the era where they still had
Speaker 6: the draft. My draft was coming up the year that
Speaker 6: I was supposed to finish high school. Right out of
Speaker 6: high school, I was going into the service, which would
Speaker 6: have been in the winter becoming winter. I didn't I
Speaker 6: don't like cold weather. So I decided M of F
Speaker 6: me and a friend of mine we pushed our draft
Speaker 6: and we went in that May, and I actually finished
Speaker 6: high school. In the service, I went to Vietnam. I
Speaker 6: was in Vietnam nineteen sixty eight sixty nine, after year
Speaker 6: the Tet Offensive. In fact, I was over there the
Speaker 6: worst war year that the United States had in Vietnam.
Speaker 6: And I was in the eleventh Armor Cave and Colonel Patten,
Speaker 6: the son of the late General Patent, commanded the eleventh
Speaker 6: Army Cave, which his father commanded in World War Two.
Speaker 6: He wanted to make general, so he devised a new
Speaker 6: war strategy for the Leventhoma calf And we went everywhere
Speaker 6: there was a problem, the DMZ whole, Taming Trails or
Speaker 6: Iron Triangle or may Con Delta, everywhere, and we stayed.
Speaker 6: You go to the physic in the infantry, you go
Speaker 6: out and you stay out, maybe anywhere from seven to
Speaker 6: fourteen fifteen days. And the unit that I was in,
Speaker 6: and then you get stay out seven fourteen fifteen days.
Speaker 6: You come in, you stay in, three days, four days,
Speaker 6: five days, you recoup, get amnence and everything. But the
Speaker 6: way the Eleventhoma Calf operated, you go out, you stay
Speaker 6: out ninety days, one hundred days, and then you come
Speaker 6: in to clean up the vehicles and restock ammunition and
Speaker 6: get a shower and relaxed for two days, and then
Speaker 6: right back out into the jungle on search and destroy missions.
Speaker 6: You know, In fact, we used to hunt them so
Speaker 6: hard that we used to say, I wish we could
Speaker 6: hurry up and find them so we could have a
Speaker 6: firefight and take a break.
Speaker 5: Yeah. Well, now, what did you feel? What was your
Speaker 5: emotion about Vietnam itself before enlisting? And then maybe we
Speaker 5: would talk about.
Speaker 6: I think I have an opinion about Vietnam before I
Speaker 6: went into the service. You know, I'd see the news
Speaker 6: footage at six o'clock like everybody else did, but I
Speaker 6: never formulated an opinion about it, and I never imagined
Speaker 6: in a million years that I would actually be there.
Speaker 5: Now, when you went there, of course, you're you're in
Speaker 5: the infantry, like you say, you're in a battalion that's
Speaker 5: a ninety yah hundred days, so you're seeing the worst
Speaker 5: of the worst. What are we talking about? What kind
Speaker 5: of horrors did you see? In Vietnam.
Speaker 6: Well, you know, it's nothing like you've ever seen in
Speaker 6: the movies. I I'll tell you that, and I'll give
Speaker 6: you uh an example that I basically give to everyone.
Speaker 6: Just imagine that you were standing up against the wall
Speaker 6: and there were maybe a hundred men lined up and
Speaker 6: all of them shooting at you with machine guns while
Speaker 6: you're up against the wall. That's the barrage of bullets
Speaker 6: that comes at you in a firefight, not to mention
Speaker 6: the bombs, the rockets and whatever else they shoot at you.
Speaker 6: And you get into a firefight, maybe you break camp
Speaker 6: and you go out and search and destroy, maybe at
Speaker 6: seven thirty in the morning. If you get ambushed or
Speaker 6: you run into enemy forces within the hour or so
Speaker 6: after you going out, depends upon how big the force is.
Speaker 6: You eight nine, ten, twelve hours of go buy and
Speaker 6: it seemed like it was only five or ten minutes. Well,
Speaker 6: you know, and then you calling for air strikes. First
Speaker 6: you get am buysch. The first thing you call force
Speaker 6: artillery support. The next thing, the artillery stops because you
Speaker 6: calling in the cobra gunships. Then after the cobra gunships,
Speaker 6: you calling and the the phantom And depends upon where
Speaker 6: you are, you might call in the battleship. It's if
Speaker 6: you operating anywhere within the coastline where the battleship New
Speaker 6: Jersey and the other fleet can support your firefight, you
Speaker 6: calling in them so it you know, and after the
Speaker 6: firefighters over, you get down on the ground and you
Speaker 6: go in the bunkers and pull the bodies out and
Speaker 6: search 'em looking for intelligence. And you know, sometimes you
Speaker 6: a actually doing that. You might stack up a hundred,
Speaker 6: two hundred, maybe three hundred bodies. Other times you maybe
Speaker 6: only twenty or thirty bodies, because what they would do
Speaker 6: is as they flee to the jungle, they take they
Speaker 6: dead and they or they try to take their dead
Speaker 6: and they wounded with 'em, so that you don't kill
Speaker 6: a ac good body count. But if you look at
Speaker 6: the size of the complex that you actually came upon
Speaker 6: in the jungle, you can see that it's wasn't enough
Speaker 6: to hold maybe three men. But and you see blood
Speaker 6: trails and destroy bunkers all the way. You find a
Speaker 6: arm head leg there. So you don't get a actual count.
Speaker 6: You estimated by the size of the complex that you
Speaker 6: ran into how many you actually killed. By the blood
Speaker 6: trails or the body parts. And then there's other times
Speaker 6: that you actually fin you know, finish the fire fight.
Speaker 6: You might it might last. Let me let me give
Speaker 6: you a little better example. You as I said, you
Speaker 6: pull out, you get in the fight. It's maybe eight hours,
Speaker 6: it feels like ten or fifteen minutes. But sometime the sports,
Speaker 6: the size of the forces of the enemy that you
Speaker 6: run into is so big and so well equipped that
Speaker 6: that eight hours will be twenty four hours. So when
Speaker 6: nightfall you back off and form a circle and continue
Speaker 6: to fight throughout the night, calling the helicopters. I'll tell it,
Speaker 6: we' the same thing that you do in the daytime.
Speaker 6: And then when daybreak comes, you pull back on line
Speaker 6: and you push forward, trying to destroy they base camp.
Speaker 6: Then if it's if it's the forces like I said,
Speaker 6: well equipped, which would be the north Viard means army,
Speaker 6: not the vig come, then you you fight. The hours
Speaker 6: pass and if it night falls again, you form the
Speaker 6: same circle and then you and then daybreak comes again,
Speaker 6: you pull back on line and you push forward, and
Speaker 6: you do that until you destroy it. And it's like
Speaker 6: sometime the force is so big. I was in the
Speaker 6: left of Army, Cap. I can remember running into the
Speaker 6: North Vietnamese Army where the fight lasted seven or eight days,
Speaker 6: and we would bring in on our flanks, the big
Speaker 6: red one on one side and call the first caf
Speaker 6: in on the other side, and then the artillery would
Speaker 6: drop behind the base camp and so that they couldn't
Speaker 6: run off. So it's it's a it's it's it's mind boss,
Speaker 6: you know what war actually is. It's not it's just
Speaker 6: beyond belief, you know. And like I said, I have
Speaker 6: never seen a movie that has portrayed what a firefight
Speaker 6: is really like in no shape, form or fashion, right,
Speaker 6: you know. And I for my service, I rely, I have.
Speaker 6: I got wounded twice. I have a bronze Star, have
Speaker 6: silver star, have campaign ribbons, you know. So and it's
Speaker 6: not that I was trying to be a hero. We
Speaker 6: were just trying to stay alive. And you did what
Speaker 6: you have to do to stay alive.
Speaker 5: And sometimes how many years were you in the service and.
Speaker 6: Three and a half years?
Speaker 5: And psychologically, how did how did you fare out of that?
Speaker 5: Do you see, like I said, you saw this carnage,
Speaker 5: but you seem to be you know, psychologically, how did
Speaker 5: you handle this three and a half years. What was.
Speaker 6: One year? And let me show you the mindset of
Speaker 6: the military at the time. I had maybe a year
Speaker 6: in because I was on the All Army basketball team,
Speaker 6: and when the season was over, that's when I went
Speaker 6: to Vietnam. Stayed in Vietnam a year. When I came
Speaker 6: back from Vietnam, I had I still had something. I
Speaker 6: had maybe fourteen months for us to do. And when
Speaker 6: I came back, they sent me to Ford Hlle, Texas
Speaker 6: to train. Then they sent me through Fort Knox, Kentucky,
Speaker 6: put me in another compact unit, and then charge and
Speaker 6: informed us when we got there that we're there to
Speaker 6: train other people to get him ready for Vietnam and
Speaker 6: to stay ready for combat in case the country needs
Speaker 6: us again. So when I came back, they didn't train
Speaker 6: me and the others like myself to go out and
Speaker 6: become productive citizens. They trained us how to continue killing.
Speaker 6: And then this charged us from the service.
Speaker 5: Right, And so what did you do immediately after getting
Speaker 5: out of the service. You have this basketball career. Let's
Speaker 5: talk about a little bit about that. You were, uh,
Speaker 5: you played pro ball, But what was the at the time,
Speaker 5: like seventeen eighteen years old.
Speaker 6: What was your well, when I played, like I said,
Speaker 6: I played, I played. I played on an all army team.
Speaker 6: When I came back, you know, I didn't play basketball
Speaker 6: for a while because I didn't I just didn't see it,
Speaker 6: you know, I didn't even play recreational really, you know,
Speaker 6: and it took it took a little while for me
Speaker 6: to start playing ball again. And then once I started
Speaker 6: playing again, you know, it just all it all came
Speaker 6: back college basketball, playing the pros here to me pros here,
Speaker 6: and so forth, and so on, going into different NBA camps,
Speaker 6: you know, with playing with them. So basketball was basketball
Speaker 6: was just something. Once I became good at I was
Speaker 6: great at it, So I wasn't you know, I didn't
Speaker 6: have to practice all the time to improve or I
Speaker 6: didn't have to do this. Well, you know, I'd get
Speaker 6: to be out of shape because I wouldn't play for
Speaker 6: six or seven months, and then I'd get a call, Yo,
Speaker 6: we wanted to play here. I worked out for two
Speaker 6: weeks and then I'd go play wherever they wanted me
Speaker 6: to play, and I'd be at the top of my
Speaker 6: game with whoever I played with. And I played with everybody,
Speaker 6: everybody who was at my age. Then who you know,
Speaker 6: guys in the NBA Archie ball everybody you know? I
Speaker 6: played with them all.
Speaker 5: So y did you haven't what were your prospects for
Speaker 5: being NBA and and where and when did this idea
Speaker 5: of drug dealing come into to play? I mean, it's
Speaker 5: it seems out of sort out of character. Uh, you
Speaker 5: really have a drug problem when you're a teenager. I
Speaker 5: know from the book that you weren't doing drugs to
Speaker 5: psychologically handle being in the in the in the milingy.
Speaker 6: No, you know that was that was never a prop
Speaker 6: I you know, it was a job opportunity and nothing
Speaker 6: more than the job opportunity. It was a way for
Speaker 6: me to take care of myself. It was a way
Speaker 6: for me to earn a living. So my adventure into
Speaker 6: the drug games came because a friend of mine kept
Speaker 6: saying we could make a lot of money, We could
Speaker 6: make a lot of money. And I had just about
Speaker 6: ran out of the money that I had saved up
Speaker 6: from the service, and I didn't have any employment prospects
Speaker 6: in the so called legitimate world because the jobs that
Speaker 6: I was being offered as a returning Vietnam War veteran
Speaker 6: were dishwashing parking cars. Take this ninety dollars a week.
Speaker 6: And that's how you know this is you know, you
Speaker 6: don't know how they do anything. The service didn't teach
Speaker 6: you anything but how to be a killer. So the
Speaker 6: best we can do for you at the New York
Speaker 6: State Employment Agency is offer you a job as a
Speaker 6: dishwasher or a parking attendant in some garage at one
Speaker 6: hundred and ten dollars a week. So I took the
Speaker 6: last of the money that I had and I partnered
Speaker 6: off with a friend of mine, and that's how I
Speaker 6: ventured into the drug game. And the amount of money
Speaker 6: that I invested to become a drug dealer quote unquote,
Speaker 6: nobody you know, believed that I took that meet not me,
Speaker 6: but me and my partner took that small amount of
Speaker 6: money and did what we did with it, you know,
Speaker 6: because we started out with ninety dollars, which brought us
Speaker 6: sixty five dollars worth of drugs, the bags we needed,
Speaker 6: the tape and rubber bands that we needed to bag
Speaker 6: that sixty five dollars with of drugs up. And that
Speaker 6: was in July, and by August we were making ten
Speaker 6: thousand dollars every other day.
Speaker 5: And it now s sorry, go ahead and we and
Speaker 5: it just mushroom from there. You know.
Speaker 6: I got with a good crew, you know, and it
Speaker 6: took off.
Speaker 5: Get you know. The main reason for your success, you
Speaker 5: and your partner, though, is that you weren't like a
Speaker 5: typical guy that would take a little bit of uh
Speaker 5: of heroin like that. And there's no way that uh
Speaker 5: the amount that they used could ever defray the cost
Speaker 5: of uh of dealing so y at that small amount.
Speaker 5: So that's the big advantage you had. You made the
Speaker 5: clear decision you weren't gonna be doing any heroin. You
Speaker 5: weren't interested in doing any of that product. You were
Speaker 5: interested in selling it, right, No.
Speaker 6: It was this business y it it brought him money.
Speaker 6: And the guy that I partnered with, he used but
Speaker 6: once he saw that, hey, you know, this is what
Speaker 6: we wanna do good money, he stopped.
Speaker 5: Views. Now, you didn't initially say yeah, I want a
Speaker 5: drug deal. I want to, I want to I want
Speaker 5: to sell some heroin. I want to I want to
Speaker 5: sell some drugs. Especially when you got out of the service.
Speaker 5: What was it like getting out of the service in
Speaker 5: nineteen sixty nine and coming to New York City, How
Speaker 5: it things changed. I mean, I know you were only
Speaker 5: in Vietnam for a year, but after you were discharged
Speaker 5: from the military, we are resentful thinking geez man, I
Speaker 5: wasn't prepared for anything, and now look what I've done
Speaker 5: the service. I've been a brave guy. I've been in
Speaker 5: the military. Is that why you had maybe you had
Speaker 5: qualms about doing something like this like selling heroin? Did
Speaker 5: you have any qualms at all?
Speaker 6: Or it was I didn't. I have no qualms whatsoever
Speaker 6: about doing what I did. It was an opportunity for
Speaker 6: me to earn a living. It's a business. It's not
Speaker 6: about saying this is what I do. World, look at me.
Speaker 6: I'm a drug dealer. It was never about that. It
Speaker 6: was always a business decision. Enter into this to earn
Speaker 6: a living, a good living.
Speaker 5: Bottom line is there, but there is there no qualms
Speaker 5: like I mean, not qualms, but considerations like not everybody
Speaker 5: you know and not everybody in your entire family. Can
Speaker 5: you go to and say, listen, I made a decision
Speaker 5: to sell some heroin and everybody's gonna hug you.
Speaker 6: I mean, well, first of all, you know, it's a
Speaker 6: secret society. See that's that's the misunderstanding. That you don't
Speaker 6: broadcast this is what I decided to do. You do
Speaker 6: it in total secretsy See, that's the misconception that you know,
Speaker 6: and I can understand because you see get into movies
Speaker 6: and you see it on television. There's people in my
Speaker 6: family who never knew what I did, to include my mother,
Speaker 6: never ever told 'em anything mm about me doing this
Speaker 6: one to protect them to they could never be put
Speaker 6: in a position to do me no harm by saying
Speaker 6: something that they shouldn't. So it wasn't me telling this
Speaker 6: person this is what I'm gonna do. Telling this person
Speaker 6: it was on a need to know basis. If you
Speaker 6: needed to know what I was doing, then you were
Speaker 6: a part of what I was doing and not privy
Speaker 6: to everything I was doing, but only what your involvement
Speaker 6: with what I was doing. Bottom line, it's I you know,
Speaker 6: like it's a it's a very very very big misconception.
Speaker 6: And what we did could never happen again. It'll never
Speaker 6: be the way it was at the time that we
Speaker 6: were doing what we did.
Speaker 5: Why is that? What's what's what's different about? I Mean,
Speaker 5: there's obviously huge differences, but what was the main difference
Speaker 5: that you say that it would never ever happen like that.
Speaker 6: Again, Well, first of all, the biggest drug dealers in
Speaker 6: the world are firesing right now. You know, those are
Speaker 6: the those are the drug kingpins right now. And the
Speaker 6: way it breaks down to the streets at this day
Speaker 6: and age, the money's not the same. It's not it's
Speaker 6: n it's not cruel, uh, it's it's it's just scattered.
Speaker 6: Everything is just scattered. Then while we were doing it,
Speaker 6: it was all very much organized crews and everybody knew
Speaker 6: everybody and not just in New York and California, detroited
Speaker 6: to call. You know, New York was drug capital of
Speaker 6: the world. If you wanted to sell drugs anywhere, you
Speaker 6: had to come to New York and the f And
Speaker 6: if you won't equate it to the mafia. That's how
Speaker 6: it was. Not families cause like they say, families, Gambino
Speaker 6: and Genevisa, so forth and so forth. And it was
Speaker 6: only five of them. It's this crew here, this crew here,
Speaker 6: this crew here, and you know the name Pee Wee Kirker,
Speaker 6: New York, Freddie Myers, Frank Matthews, Nicky Bond, Jesse Gray
Speaker 6: and you know, I don't even want to mention Nicky
Speaker 6: Bonds and Frank Lucas's name in the same breath that
Speaker 6: I'm mentioning these other gentlemen. But that's how it was,
Speaker 6: and the tentacles reached from New York across the United
Speaker 6: States into England.
Speaker 5: Now, how long was it before, like you you say,
Speaker 5: you took a real meager investment, you and your partner,
Speaker 5: and the next thing you know, you're making ten thousand
Speaker 5: dollars every other day. How long is it before you're
Speaker 5: a real major player, like you say, coast to coast,
Speaker 5: all over all kinds of major centers, Vegas, Los Angeles.
Speaker 6: So it took me and Vonnie about ten months.
Speaker 5: Wow.
Speaker 6: See, but I had an advantage because I had been
Speaker 6: in the service, so I knew people all across the
Speaker 6: United States, and I knew their character and I knew
Speaker 6: their makeup. I knew I knew what they were about
Speaker 6: based on being in the service with them, being in
Speaker 6: Vietnam with them, I knew what type of men they were, right, right,
Speaker 6: And so when I would get on the plane and
Speaker 6: fly somewhere to hang out and party, I would stop
Speaker 6: and check out, you know, maybe sit you know what
Speaker 6: you be interested in? This? You know this is and
Speaker 6: you know, I say, if you think you can handle this,
Speaker 6: we'll sit down and talk. Some say yeah, and some
Speaker 6: said no, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 5: But you can trust all of them, right huh. And
Speaker 5: you could trust all of them regardless.
Speaker 6: Right, Yeah?
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 6: I knew I could trust. I knew, like I said,
Speaker 6: I knew their makeup from what I went through with them. Yeah,
Speaker 6: And I knew they had level heads and I knew
Speaker 6: that they were men that were respected. You know, I
Speaker 6: respected them and they respected me, and we had I
Speaker 6: had every confidence in them when I sat down to
Speaker 6: talk with them and explain what was going on and
Speaker 6: what could go on, that it would go no further
Speaker 6: than them and I. And that's how it happened. And
Speaker 6: that's how it worked.
Speaker 5: Now. The thing is, you're you're dealing heroin. We're talking
Speaker 5: about ten months they were in pretty short order. Your
Speaker 5: your big players, and you're making a lot of money
Speaker 5: and of course you're not doing any of the drugs,
Speaker 5: so you're pretty thrifty with your money. Are you? Also?
Speaker 5: Are you more cautious or more confident? And what do
Speaker 5: you do sort of protect is.
Speaker 6: Always more confident? Always, you know, it's a euphoria you know.
Speaker 6: It's like, I'll give you an example. The people who
Speaker 6: use the drugs reach a certain euphoria from using the drugs.
Speaker 6: And in the beginning of my book I talk about this.
Speaker 6: You know, the dealer is trapped just like the person
Speaker 6: who's using. And the person who's using sees the glamor
Speaker 6: in life by the high that the drugs bring on.
Speaker 6: The dealer is trapped by the power and the luxury
Speaker 6: of life that that money brings. You know. And wherever
Speaker 6: you gone go, people in that circle greet you with
Speaker 6: open arms and they set everything out for you. Oh yo,
Speaker 6: this is so and so this is you know, so
Speaker 6: you y. You know, you have a a a a
Speaker 6: power in a secret society, and the things that you
Speaker 6: can do, the lifestyle that you are able to live
Speaker 6: is is remarkable. It's just remarkable, you know. And then
Speaker 6: the other part of it is if you're true to
Speaker 6: yourself when the time comes to pay your tab because
Speaker 6: you get caught, you don't sell your soul or your
Speaker 6: family and your friends down the river. You stand up
Speaker 6: and take what you got coming to you, and you
Speaker 6: go through your time and you keep your mouth shut,
Speaker 6: unlike some others who claim to be this, this, and this,
Speaker 6: But when they had the foot on their neck, they
Speaker 6: told on everybody they could possibly could, and then set
Speaker 6: up even more people to be go where they didn't
Speaker 6: want to be so that they could be free.
Speaker 5: Well, you know, the thing is, like, I know that
Speaker 5: you were you were not married, So I think a
Speaker 5: lot of these people married with a few kids. Not
Speaker 5: to say not to excuse people for ratting out, but
Speaker 5: I mean I think that there's a different kind of
Speaker 5: pressure sometimes that that some you know, that federal federal
Speaker 5: agents can apply. Let's put it that way. A lot
Speaker 5: of guys going.
Speaker 6: Over it all. If you chose to walk on this
Speaker 6: side of the street, sure, then you have to have
Speaker 6: loyalty to something. And if you're not loyal to what
Speaker 6: you believe yourself to be, then what kind of person
Speaker 6: are you?
Speaker 5: Now you're talking, you're talking about attributes, and I mean
Speaker 5: you're very, very confident, and you can defend any kind
Speaker 5: of criticism that I might or you know, via my audience,
Speaker 5: some people are are saying, well, you know, you sold heroin,
Speaker 5: you sold death. You must have known the lives you
Speaker 5: were destroying. How come you didn't have any qualms? How
Speaker 5: come you didn't have any reservations? You know, this is
Speaker 5: the argument if I'm me a devil's advocate, So you know,
Speaker 5: do you not have any hesitation at all? Didn't you
Speaker 5: see any of this this? Or didn't you see it
Speaker 5: that way?
Speaker 6: Listen?
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 6: That's the s You know, the same argument can be
Speaker 6: made for these big companies that dump pollutants into the river.
Speaker 6: What qualms do they have? You know, you do what
Speaker 6: you do based on the circumstances that you're faced with.
Speaker 6: Did I have any qualms? Listen? I come out of
Speaker 6: the same circumstances that the people who use drugs came
Speaker 6: out of 'em. I chose to do one thing with
Speaker 6: my life. They chose to do another thing with this.
Speaker 6: I'm not responsible for them making that choice. Can't hold
Speaker 6: me responsible for them making that choice because I took
Speaker 6: the opportunity to supply them with what they wanted so
Speaker 6: that I could live a better life. It's just it's
Speaker 6: you know, and morally, morals change all the time, you know,
Speaker 6: And you look at society and you see district attorneys
Speaker 6: and lawyers and priests and rabbis preaching morality. This is
Speaker 6: how you are supposed to live. And if you don't
Speaker 6: live this way, then you're not a good person and
Speaker 6: you're destroying the moral fiber of the nation. Then you
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Speaker 5: No pur necessary detail. I lost thee terms and conditions eighteen plus.
Speaker 6: Three molesting children all in the name of lived in.
Speaker 6: So how can outstanding judgment of me? Because the path
Speaker 6: I chose to live because I'm not going out and
Speaker 6: taking anybody and pulling them into a whole way a
Speaker 6: dog room and pulling the drugs down through. They made
Speaker 6: a conscious effort that they wanted to get high. I
Speaker 6: made a conscious effort that I didn't want to get
Speaker 6: high and I wanted to make money. Now, most people
Speaker 6: can't accept that, but that's the reality of life.
Speaker 2: Well.
Speaker 5: I also found interesting too, is that when you said
Speaker 5: you really didn't think one way or another morally for
Speaker 5: the war, and you went to war and as writing
Speaker 5: the book, there was people that based on your job,
Speaker 5: they're due too. You did your job well as also
Speaker 5: and people were killed and again, well, so exactly exactly.
Speaker 5: Now again, you you're making a lot of money and
Speaker 5: you're flying under the radar, at least you think you're
Speaker 5: flying under the radar, and probably under the kind of
Speaker 5: thing that people would call radar. You're not a flashy
Speaker 5: guy like you say you're you know, you don't have
Speaker 5: to kill anybody. You're not really getting your hands dirty.
Speaker 5: You're not that kind of guy. You're There was enough
Speaker 5: to go around for everybody. So despite what the movies
Speaker 5: have to say, you really didn't have that constant threat.
Speaker 5: You weren't at that level. You were very secretive. You
Speaker 5: had legitimate businesses, you concert promotion, record labels. So you
Speaker 5: put your money where where was needed in the community anyway.
Speaker 5: And you had those passions and those people connections and
Speaker 5: friends and so, like you say, you don't you don't
Speaker 5: have to wash money. You could just use money basically,
Speaker 5: and and so, but what happens in terms of were
Speaker 5: you cautious enough in terms of protecting yourself from you know,
Speaker 5: going to prison.
Speaker 6: No, evidently not. I've spent twenty two years in prison.
Speaker 6: So now that you know, you know, evidently I wasn't
Speaker 6: cautious enough. But I didn't think of you know, we
Speaker 6: didn't move and thinking of terms of doing this. We
Speaker 6: set up our systems and that's what we did. We
Speaker 6: worked our systems. The police worked they systems. How you know,
Speaker 6: I'm the police did what they did and I did
Speaker 6: what I did. I didn't I wasn't trying to disrespect
Speaker 6: the police by flowing anything in their face. And like
Speaker 6: I said, once again, the reality of the situation is,
Speaker 6: that's a secret society. So you not all I'm a
Speaker 6: drug dealer. I'm a drug dealer. I'm a drug dealer.
Speaker 6: I'm a respected community member of the community. I'm a businessman.
Speaker 6: Even though one of my businesses is under the radar.
Speaker 6: Even though one of my businesses is under the radar,
Speaker 6: my other businesses employ people in the community. I'm not
Speaker 6: driving up and down the street shooting people on the street.
Speaker 6: I'm not shooting at this guy and killing an innocent child.
Speaker 6: I'm not doing any of that. I'm s c I
Speaker 6: come out, I I play with the kids in the neighborhood.
Speaker 6: I buy 'em things. I we gonna picnics. You know,
Speaker 6: we did all com bus rides everything. So it's it's
Speaker 6: not all about green greed, grease. Take money in my pocket,
Speaker 6: mind and damn everybody else. If you wanted to do
Speaker 6: something and I could help you, I'd help you. It
Speaker 6: just that's it's just that's simple, you know. You you
Speaker 6: know there were times that women that I know who
Speaker 6: worked the whole throw There were men that I knew burglars,
Speaker 6: robber robbers and muggers whatever, so that they could take
Speaker 6: care of their habits. But they were also times that
Speaker 6: they didn't have money. And if they approached me saying, yo, reck,
Speaker 6: I'm sick. Yo, what you need and I'd give it
Speaker 6: to 'em. It wasn't get out of my face. Get
Speaker 6: the money to do this, yo, hear man boom, Pay
Speaker 6: me whenever you can. If you don't pay me, I'm
Speaker 6: not gonna say nothing about it, you know, but I know,
Speaker 6: you know you gonna need help again. So you know,
Speaker 6: they always paid because they always knew that if push
Speaker 6: came to shove, they didn't have to go do whatever
Speaker 6: it is that they did sick from not being able
Speaker 6: to get hired. So you know, it's not like I say.
Speaker 6: You know, I wasn't about stepping on somebody's neck to
Speaker 6: rise above the crowd. You know, that's what they w
Speaker 6: p people chose to do. I have nothing to say
Speaker 6: about that. I wouldn't disrespect them because in all acteology.
Speaker 6: They afforded me the opportunity to live the way I
Speaker 6: wanted to live. So how you know, hey, it's it's
Speaker 6: nothing else I could say about it. It's just that simple.
Speaker 6: They wanna do that, and I wanted to do this.
Speaker 6: By me doing this, I gave them a better quality
Speaker 6: of what they was getting anywhere else, you know. And
Speaker 6: there were several times that the New York Times and
Speaker 6: other newspapers wrote about that dynamite red tape you know,
Speaker 6: which that happened to be associated with that crew, you know,
Speaker 6: and talking about the how can we give it away
Speaker 6: the way we was giving it away. The people who
Speaker 6: were using were very happy getting two for the price
Speaker 6: of one, a better grade than anybody else had anywhere
Speaker 6: else across the country. So, you know, it was simply business.
Speaker 5: Now, Rick, I wanted to ask you because not everybody
Speaker 5: historically knows drugs, the drug business and drug dealing and
Speaker 5: drugs in general are much different intoy and thirteen. They
Speaker 5: were different. In the eighties. Heroin in New York City
Speaker 5: was abundant. Again, you were selling small amounts of heroin.
Speaker 5: So people and certainly in the Inner city were or
Speaker 5: everywhere were we able to buy small amounts of heroin,
Speaker 5: and then cocaine wasn't around or not very popular till
Speaker 5: much later. So tell us how long this run was
Speaker 5: before we get around to talking about how they finally
Speaker 5: got around to arresting you and giving you the big time.
Speaker 5: And I know that the twenty two years you got
Speaker 5: seventeen of that last bit, so there must have been
Speaker 5: There are a couple other shorter bits in there. But
Speaker 5: ye tell us a little bit about actually heroin itself,
Speaker 5: because I think that's it's a slice of history that
Speaker 5: people don't really know about how popular heroin was. And
Speaker 5: this is before cocaine, and so tell us how long.
Speaker 6: You know that's also a misconception because cocaine was very
Speaker 6: popular at the same time heroin was popular. It just
Speaker 6: costs at that time so much more, right, right, But
Speaker 6: it was there because I also slow cocaine, because I caught.
Speaker 6: One of my cases was for I sold ten pounds
Speaker 6: of cocaine to federal agents in another state.
Speaker 5: And how much time did you get for that?
Speaker 6: I didn't get anything, you know. I was fortunate enough
Speaker 6: with a good lawyer as to where I myself and
Speaker 6: several others involved in that case beat the case, and
Speaker 6: the only person who actually ended up getting the time
Speaker 6: was the informant that brought the vEDS in as the friend.
Speaker 5: Well that's a that's a good one. That's an interesting development.
Speaker 5: Usually doesn't happen.
Speaker 6: Right, it doesn't. It took me two years to beat
Speaker 6: that case.
Speaker 5: Right right, And and a bushel full of money probably too.
Speaker 6: Right, Oh yeah, yeah, a lot of money, a lot
Speaker 6: of money. I think close to a million. Wow.
Speaker 5: Wow, Now did you use uh? Do you always use
Speaker 5: the same attorney? I mean, this guy's done you real well?
Speaker 6: So yeah, I use the same attorney. I use him
Speaker 6: today to handle my all my legal businesses.
Speaker 5: Right right. And he's how many.
Speaker 6: In his own rights?
Speaker 5: And what's his name?
Speaker 6: Laurence Sown? But he handled the pieces that followed drug case.
Speaker 6: He was the only lawyer to get a defended off
Speaker 6: in that case. He handled the West East one of
Speaker 6: the West East child he had. He was down with
Speaker 6: the lawyers in Chicago for the Chicago six.
Speaker 5: Oh really yeah, yeah, so you know there.
Speaker 6: Are several books out on him. M Yeah, he was
Speaker 6: friends with Nicky Bond's attorney. But Larry is a lawyer.
Speaker 6: He won't handle anybody who is turning informant m right.
Speaker 6: You know, he handled the air rich the case. After
Speaker 6: he had lost all his property and was sent to
Speaker 6: the penitentiary for the rest of his life, Larry got
Speaker 6: him out and got his m his mother's house back,
Speaker 6: some of his airplanes, and a couple of his mentions
Speaker 6: back for him because they were seezed illegally.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 6: So Larry is a very very good lawyer with offices
Speaker 6: in Paris, California, across the country.
Speaker 5: In a nutshell, did he get you? What was the
Speaker 5: basis of your not being convicted?
Speaker 6: The agent's line, trying to implicate myself into other people,
Speaker 6: and they put us in a place that we couldn't
Speaker 6: possibly have been for the scenario that they said took place.
Speaker 5: Yeah great, Yeah, it's a good defense. Now you end
Speaker 5: up you end up doing you do twenty two years
Speaker 5: in total, but your last bit you did seventeen of that.
Speaker 5: So tell us about these tell about these these bits
Speaker 5: and and what goes on there? You're you're not scared
Speaker 5: straight from doing some time?
Speaker 6: No, why why would I be? I had already been
Speaker 6: in there. What could possibly spin me about prison?
Speaker 5: Yeah? And it was nothing, nothing intimidating about prison When
Speaker 5: you went in. I mean, I know.
Speaker 6: You're celebrity life period. But me, there's nothing in life
Speaker 6: that's intimidating, right, you know.
Speaker 5: So so after the military, I guess nothing is going
Speaker 5: to stack up against it anyway, right and not really?
Speaker 5: And you know.
Speaker 6: I did things in prison where the correction staff tried
Speaker 6: to kill me a couple of times. Why is that
Speaker 6: because they didn't like the way I carried myself. You know,
Speaker 6: they couldn't make me act out a character. You know,
Speaker 6: they couldn't get me into an argument. And if they
Speaker 6: came to me, would rules and regulations. I knew the
Speaker 6: rules and regulations betther than they did, you know, and
Speaker 6: that kind of infuriated them. It was like all this
Speaker 6: uppity nigga. And the last time they were gonna make
Speaker 6: an attempt on my life, another correction officer warned me
Speaker 6: and told me what was gonna take place, and pointed
Speaker 6: the officers out so that like they moved me out
Speaker 6: of their reach so that they couldn't actually do what
Speaker 6: they had planned.
Speaker 5: Where were you doing time? Uh? Those couple beds.
Speaker 6: All over in the state of New York, all over
Speaker 6: wherever they had a bed they sent you, you know,
Speaker 6: green haven, I sing, sing Auburn Clinton, uh Attica.
Speaker 5: So just different place. Said they process your, assess you,
Speaker 5: and then.
Speaker 6: Yeah, you know how you like real keep you? They
Speaker 6: move you around, you know, yeah, they move you around.
Speaker 6: And actually I was. I was in comstock, and I
Speaker 6: hated comstock because comstock was so so dirty, I mean silky.
Speaker 6: When you pull up on comstock, you look like you
Speaker 6: going back in time to many easier days. And I
Speaker 6: got in there all of those rats and mice rooming around,
Speaker 6: and I'm like, you sit down and eat, and you
Speaker 6: got roaches in your food, and you in your locker
Speaker 6: and your cell. You got mice that don't run from you,
Speaker 6: hide in your boots and you go to put your
Speaker 6: boot on and your stepping on one. So you know,
Speaker 6: I got tired of that. So one morning I didn't
Speaker 6: even go to breakfast. I just got up and went
Speaker 6: and stood in the councilor line. First one in the line,
Speaker 6: went in there and told my counselor I wanna get
Speaker 6: out of here. He said, who, who's bothering you? Tell
Speaker 6: me what's going on out We can protect you. I
Speaker 6: excuse me, I said, bothering me? I said, ain't nobody
Speaker 6: bothering me. Are you crazy? I said, this place is silty.
Speaker 6: I wanna get out of here. I said, I don't
Speaker 6: care where you send me, just get me out of here.
Speaker 6: He said, you told me no, I couldn't leave. Two
Speaker 6: weeks later they ship me out. I w I was
Speaker 6: happy to get out of there. And then another time
Speaker 6: I had to ask my counselor could I go to Attaka?
Speaker 6: He said, nobody asked to go to Attaka. What's going on?
Speaker 6: Why you wanna go to Anaka? And listen? Man ask
Speaker 6: to jail. Send me to Attica. You know I have
Speaker 6: some friends up there and go up there and hang
Speaker 6: out with them for a couple of years. I I
Speaker 6: you know, I'm not trying. I wasn't trying to avoid
Speaker 6: some places because they were saying this place is hard
Speaker 6: or this places. I didn't care where I'm in prison.
Speaker 6: It's a beg. You gonna lock me in that cell
Speaker 6: at nine o'clock at night and at seven o'clock in
Speaker 6: the morning, you gonna crack it and send me to breakfast.
Speaker 6: So Attaca, Clinton, green Haven, Comstock cause the only place
Speaker 6: I didn't wanna be, and that's because it was filthy.
Speaker 6: But any other prison where you talking about it was
Speaker 6: tough and it's this, and it's that I didn't care
Speaker 6: where you sent me. It didn't make no difference. I
Speaker 6: couldn't go home, I couldn't go see my girl, I
Speaker 6: couldn't go see my son, I couldn't go hang out
Speaker 6: with my brothers. I couldn't see my mother. You know, so, uh,
Speaker 6: prison is prison n N one is not tougher than
Speaker 6: the other.
Speaker 5: Now, let's get around to talking about how you finally
Speaker 5: they finally ensnare you and send you to prison for
Speaker 5: a long bit. And tell us a little bit about that,
Speaker 5: because I was a surprise, I'm sure. Tell us how
Speaker 5: they finally do get you, and are they their federal charges?
Speaker 5: And tell us about why this is such a big trial.
Speaker 5: You've done a little bit of time before you've gotten
Speaker 5: out charges. How comes so big now? And was well.
Speaker 6: They caught me it was a big for a lot
Speaker 6: of time.
Speaker 5: M hmm.
Speaker 6: But the lawyer, Larry always chop the charges, the indictment
Speaker 6: charges down, and one thing they always do is they
Speaker 6: over indict. Like if you get caught with coming out
Speaker 6: of a building or going into a building and you
Speaker 6: have drugs, one of the charges you're gonna get truspassing
Speaker 6: burgulary criminal trust pass so you have m the drug
Speaker 6: charge will be you will be indicted maybe ten different
Speaker 6: ways on the drug charge. Then for being where you
Speaker 6: are in a known drug spot or whatever, you'll get
Speaker 6: ten different indictments counsel on indictment for that. So in
Speaker 6: all actuality, you walking into a building with a kilo
Speaker 6: two kilo fi whatever it is that they catch you with,
Speaker 6: you have a ah. The ordinary person will look at
Speaker 6: that and go, well, he had X amount of drugs.
Speaker 6: But when the indictment comes out, you'll have seventy five
Speaker 6: counts on indictments. Yeah, because they stacked the indictment and
Speaker 6: that makes it almost virtually impossible for you to be
Speaker 6: every charge. But when you have a good lawyer, they
Speaker 6: work to knock the top counts off the indictment, and
Speaker 6: then when you get down to the lesser accounts on
Speaker 6: an indictment, they try to make sure they can keep
Speaker 6: enough so they can add up enough years so that
Speaker 6: you can stay gone for a good period of time.
Speaker 6: But then again it's in the hands of the lawyer.
Speaker 6: If you have a proper attorney, then those counts can
Speaker 6: be willled down too. Where as opposed as you doing
Speaker 6: twenty five years, you might do six or four. So
Speaker 6: you know, it's all how they stack the indictment is
Speaker 6: how long you're gonna go away for and what you
Speaker 6: gonna actually be convicted of. And you know a lawyer
Speaker 6: who is court worthy will always get you, if not
Speaker 6: completely off the least amount of time.
Speaker 5: So what actually happened that, uh, you were looking at
Speaker 5: a huge sentence for once? What how did they get
Speaker 5: enough evidence against you? What were the circumstance? Uh?
Speaker 6: The amount of money that they could not find that disappeared,
Speaker 6: that came from an undercovered by that got me the time?
Speaker 5: How much money we talking uh about?
Speaker 6: It was a four hundred and twenty two thousand dollars
Speaker 6: that disappeared.
Speaker 5: We'll tell us the circumstances of the the arrest and
Speaker 5: the setup.
Speaker 6: They came. I came from seeing and a certain person
Speaker 6: who didn't get arrested, made the arrangements, which one of
Speaker 6: them happened to be undercover. A husband and wife team
Speaker 6: gave me the money made it, and I made arrangements
Speaker 6: with someone else to see them at another time with
Speaker 6: what they asked for. When certain things didn't take place
Speaker 6: because certain elements of their team jumped the gun and
Speaker 6: snatched other people off before anything actually took place, And
Speaker 6: only one transaction had taken place was them handing over
Speaker 6: the money. They didn't wait to get what they were
Speaker 6: supposed to get, just a little fire case. The money
Speaker 6: was missing. That angered them.
Speaker 5: Hm.
Speaker 6: And they sent me in front of h They sent
Speaker 6: me in front of the hanging judge wasn't even in
Speaker 6: the drug court. Sent me to the hanging judge. Judge left.
Speaker 6: But what happened was I they took me out of
Speaker 6: Judge left court and sent me across the street to
Speaker 6: one eleven, which is the drug court in New York.
Speaker 6: Everybody knows you in one eleven New York, you in
Speaker 6: the drug court. So they took me out of Judge
Speaker 6: left court at one hundred centis Street and sent me
Speaker 6: over to one and eleven Judge Benjamin and I got
Speaker 6: a hung jewelry, so and so so they hung, they refiled,
Speaker 6: and they sent me back in front of Judge's left.
Speaker 5: Oh and wow, that's.
Speaker 6: He was determined to get me. And the reason when
Speaker 6: he s when I've got sentenced, my lawyer told told him,
Speaker 6: he said, look, you can't sentence mister Talley to the
Speaker 6: maximum amount of time under this conviction, Because if you
Speaker 6: sentenced him to the maximum amount of time, then what
Speaker 6: do you give a drug dealer the caliber of leroy
Speaker 6: Nikki Bahd? So I got the second highest standard under
Speaker 6: the statue as opposed to the maximum.
Speaker 5: So what was your actual sentence?
Speaker 6: Fifteen to life?
Speaker 5: Okay? Fifteen to life okay? So he could apply for
Speaker 5: parole after fifteen years? Yeah, and not in an actual
Speaker 5: fifteen years or fifteen actions could behavior?
Speaker 6: No straight fifteen In New York when they say fifteen
Speaker 6: twenty five fifty to life, that number that you get
Speaker 6: you have to do every single day of it. Oh yeah, So.
Speaker 5: This was a serious bit, Wasn't this changes your life
Speaker 5: seventeen years? I mean not that everything doesn't change your life, but.
Speaker 6: So it changes my life. It's definitely changing my life.
Speaker 5: And what did you do to sort of survive? I mean,
Speaker 5: it's it's the tedium, it's the every day, it's the everything,
Speaker 5: and it's the same old.
Speaker 6: And it's every day the same. And I couldn't even
Speaker 6: begin to tell you what I did. You know, through
Speaker 6: the riots and the stabbings and the murders and the
Speaker 6: gang fire, ain't sent the police shooting off the roof
Speaker 6: into the yard and shooting people, and yeah, you know
Speaker 6: it's it's prison is mind boggling and is boring, and
Speaker 6: him it's like crazy. Well yeah, uh.
Speaker 5: Yeah, so but you have plans when you and you're
Speaker 5: you're bettering yourself, you're staying in shape, you're playing basketball
Speaker 5: in there. You said, it's it's good.
Speaker 6: And I mean came one of the problems that I
Speaker 6: caught while I was in prison. There was a deputy
Speaker 6: superintendent nothing, and you know, he looked at the people
Speaker 6: that I maintained contact with outside of prison and the
Speaker 6: people who you know, stayed in contact with me, entertainers, actors, actresses.
Speaker 6: He was so irate with me. He asked me, who
Speaker 6: do you think you are? And I just you know,
Speaker 6: I didn't even pay him no mind. He said, if
Speaker 6: you because I I let me back up a little bit.
Speaker 6: One of the things I did do while I was
Speaker 6: in prison, I was a advocate for prisoners' rights and
Speaker 6: the people that I was associated with in the prison
Speaker 6: system of the prisoners brought a different kind of order
Speaker 6: to the prison. So I wielded a lot of power
Speaker 6: inside of the prison wall as far as influence and
Speaker 6: a for prisoners, but the influence that I wielded came
Speaker 6: from a pen and paper. So whenever there was a
Speaker 6: problem or a prisoner had a problem, they came to
Speaker 6: me and my crew because I got on the Grievance Committee,
Speaker 6: so they came to me and the rest of the
Speaker 6: grievance crew. And it was the first time that the
Speaker 6: Grievance Committee was sh powerful on behalf of the prison population.
Speaker 6: Because most of the time that job was filled with
Speaker 6: people prisoners that the police could wield the power with
Speaker 6: an influence, and a lot of the times they had,
Speaker 6: you know, their reputations weren't upstanding. But when I got
Speaker 6: on the Grievance Committee and the people that came with me,
Speaker 6: there was no question about who we were and what
Speaker 6: we were about. Our reputations were solid, and we did
Speaker 6: things for prisoner's families and other prisoners, uh rule regulations
Speaker 6: or prison guards doing the wrong things to other prisoners.
Speaker 5: So you know, I.
Speaker 6: Rubbed the lot of the prison guards the wrong way.
Speaker 6: Hence that's why they were trying to get rid of
Speaker 6: me by any means necessary.
Speaker 5: Right, But so so you're very active, no I'm.
Speaker 6: S I'm so. You know, those are the things that
Speaker 6: I did, you know, while I was in prison, Not
Speaker 6: that I set out to do 'em, but there was
Speaker 6: a niche that needed to be filled and I I
Speaker 6: gravitated towards it.
Speaker 5: Now you again are working the get out of there.
Speaker 5: That's your main goal is to get out nuts. You know,
Speaker 5: most people get out and do something different. And so
Speaker 5: you get out after seventeen years, Yeah, obviously you're paroled.
Speaker 5: You got to be on your best behavior. What do
Speaker 5: you do when you get out?
Speaker 6: I got a medical license, I opened a couple of
Speaker 6: businesses with some of my friends from Nigeria. I worked
Speaker 6: with them for a couple of years. I did promoted
Speaker 6: a few concerts. I worked on as a DJ onio
Speaker 6: a major radio network. You know, I just feeling my
Speaker 6: way back into society.
Speaker 5: And how long has it been since you've been released?
Speaker 6: Oh, I've been on not twelve years, twelve years?
Speaker 5: And this book here again I wanted to ask this
Speaker 5: saved this question. Why did you decide to call it
Speaker 5: Prisoner of Dreams? And how long did this very very
Speaker 5: personal and exhaustive effort. How long did it take you
Speaker 5: from beginning to end, we'll say in the writing process,
Speaker 5: tell us a little bit about and why prisoner of Dreams?
Speaker 5: What is the meaning behind that Prisoner of Dreams? Is?
Speaker 6: An article came They had written an article about me
Speaker 6: playing basketball and fashion design and some of the actresses
Speaker 6: that I knew who came to see me when I
Speaker 6: had one of the small bids that I got out on.
Speaker 6: And also a coach of the Golden State Warriors came
Speaker 6: into the prison to get me out so that I
Speaker 6: could play for the Golden State Warriors.
Speaker 5: Right, So.
Speaker 6: The San Jos Mercurynews Parade magazine where the article appeared,
Speaker 6: called that article prisoner of Dreams. So I said, we
Speaker 6: all are prisoners of our dreams. So I applauded to
Speaker 6: the book, saying, if you look, you know, and I
Speaker 6: wrote about that how I saw myself in the book
Speaker 6: and what I was gonna do. And am I a
Speaker 6: man that I truly believe myself to be And I
Speaker 6: am no longer a prisoner of my dreams. I'm gonna
Speaker 6: start to live 'em again. Right, And that's how the
Speaker 6: title came about.
Speaker 5: Right, And you've been doing the book signings. What what
Speaker 5: is it like? I mean, you've done so many things
Speaker 5: in your life and so many things that are tough,
Speaker 5: and you've and you've survived, you persevered. What's it like
Speaker 5: doing this? I know I've done good book signings and
Speaker 5: I really enjoyed them. What's it like for you to
Speaker 5: be an omin regarded as.
Speaker 6: I'm enjoying them. I'm having a time of my life.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I'm having the time of my life.
Speaker 5: Uh.
Speaker 6: You know my thing now is that I'm earning a
Speaker 6: living and it's safe money. I don't ever have to
Speaker 6: worry about someone coming for me to take it.
Speaker 5: Yeah, well that's it. Yeah, that's a good feeling. And
Speaker 5: Prisoner of Dreams. Uh, you have a website regarding the
Speaker 5: book at all? How can people if they're feel necessary
Speaker 5: to contact They can go.
Speaker 6: To prison of Dreams dot com. They can go to
Speaker 6: Amazon dot com. They could go to Bonds and Nooble
Speaker 6: dot com. They can go to Strategic Media Books dot com.
Speaker 6: Those are probably and Facebook.
Speaker 5: Are you on Facebook under your name or under Prisoner
Speaker 5: of Dreams?
Speaker 6: Under my name and under Prisoner of Dreams?
Speaker 5: Great? So that's interesting. Okay, that's good. I want to
Speaker 5: thank you very much Rick for coming on and talking
Speaker 5: about your book. Prisoner Dreams. Congratulations on this very fascinating story.
Speaker 5: Thank you, thank you for writing it and sharing it
Speaker 5: with our audience tonight. Thank you very much, Rick, thank
Speaker 5: you for having me. I want to say again, thank
Speaker 5: you very much. And you've been listening to end Sure Sure.
Speaker 6: In my book, I talk about you know a lot
Speaker 6: of people who were legends in their own in their
Speaker 6: own time. I'm truly legends and that lifestyle. On the
Speaker 6: twenty first of this month, Freddie Meyers passed away. I'm
Speaker 6: not sure if you're familiar with his name, but New
Speaker 6: York Freddy Mayers. There's movies and things about to come
Speaker 6: out about him. He passed away. He did twenty four years.
Speaker 5: So well, thank you very much, Rick for this which
Speaker 5: is the best of luck. And hope to hear from
Speaker 5: you again soon. Thank you all right, Thank you all right.
Speaker 5: Have a good night, you too,