The Joe Rogan Experience - Joe Rogan Experience #208 - Freeway Rick Ross

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00:01:37.000 It's a staple in my diet. 1.00

00:01:39.000 I take that shit every day. 1.00

00:01:40.000 I just took three right before this meeting because Rick Ross is here and we're about to get busy. 0.99

00:01:45.000 This is going to be interesting, ladies and gentlemen.

00:01:46.000 Strap yourself in.

00:01:48.000 Here we go.

00:01:51.000 The Joe Rogan Experience.

00:01:53.000 Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night, all day.

00:01:57.000 Ladies, ladies and gentlemen, we're going into the rabbit hole today.

00:02:07.000 This is going to be an interesting one.

00:02:09.000 This is going to be a weird one.

00:02:10.000 We have here former aspiring tennis star.

00:02:13.000 Is that true?

00:02:14.000 That's true.

00:02:14.000 You were an aspiring tennis star?

00:02:16.000 I was an aspiring tennis star, yeah.

00:02:18.000 This is a man who eventually went on to become probably the most famous drug dealer in the history of Los Angeles.

00:02:25.000 I would say that's as accurate as you can get.

00:02:28.000 Yeah, yeah.

00:02:28.000 You're the most...

00:02:29.000 If not the United States.

00:02:31.000 If not the United States.

00:02:32.000 Not the biggest.

00:02:32.000 It's right up there, though.

00:02:33.000 The most famous.

00:02:35.000 Not the biggest, but the most famous, yeah. 1.00

00:02:36.000 You got a dude who stole your fucking name. 1.00

00:02:38.000 No, no, no. 1.00

00:02:38.000 Like, three people stole my name, for sure. 1.00

00:02:41.000 Three people?

00:02:42.000 Yeah, three people.

00:02:42.000 Three rappers or three different drug dealers?

00:02:48.000 Rappers.

00:02:49.000 Let me see.

00:02:50.000 We know the guy who's probably the most famous out of all of them is William Roberts who goes by Rick Ross.

00:02:57.000 And he's the rapper that is a former corrections officer.

00:03:00.000 Correctional officer.

00:03:01.000 How hilarious is that?

00:03:02.000 And they say he's the best gangster rapper ever.

00:03:04.000 Better than Pac and Biggie.

00:03:06.000 That's nonsense.

00:03:07.000 And then we got my man, who I'm cool with, you know, and I don't mind him using parts of my name.

00:03:12.000 It's Freeway out of Philly.

00:03:13.000 And we also have, it was a Freeway Rich out of Kansas City that did pretty good in the Midwest.

00:03:20.000 There are also some guys right now out of Ohio who go by the name of the Freeway Boys.

00:03:27.000 That's four different groups that have taken my name and parts of my persona and used it.

00:03:35.000 One of them got very famous though.

00:03:37.000 Very famous right now, yeah.

00:03:39.000 That's fascinating.

00:03:41.000 And you know what's really fascinating?

00:03:43.000 It's kind of weird too, you know, to take somebody's name and identity and claim it as your own and their background.

00:03:50.000 What's hilarious, I'm going to send Brian a link of where he talked about it. 0.99

00:03:54.000 He had come on this dude's show, and the guy asked him about it, and his reasoning response was so stupid. 0.88

00:04:02.000 It's amazing the guy is as successful as he is, because he was like, you know, no, no, no, that happened like 10 years ago. 0.97

00:04:10.000 I got that nickname.

00:04:11.000 I wasn't even about that. 0.99

00:04:13.000 What the fucking answer is that? 1.00

00:04:14.000 That shit doesn't even mean... 1.00

00:04:15.000 When you know, you know that the dude exists. 1.00

00:04:18.000 I know, okay?

00:04:19.000 I'm a white stand-up comedian.

00:04:21.000 I know who Freeway Ricky Ross is. 1.00

00:04:24.000 You don't know, and you're a fucking corrections officer who became a rapper. 0.99

00:04:29.000 And you're in that world, and you don't know who Rick Ross is, and you just happen to have his fucking name. 0.99

00:04:34.000 Well, you know, the guy... 0.99

00:04:36.000 One thing I gotta get a guy is he's powerful.

00:04:38.000 He done put some moves together now that he's getting courts...

00:04:42.000 And everybody will do what he wants them to do.

00:04:44.000 So whatever he's doing, he's damn good at it.

00:04:46.000 I mean, you know, to have the judge to rule in his favor the other day was like really, really ironic to me.

00:04:53.000 I could not believe that somebody could say that if somebody steals something from you, no matter how long it is that it takes you before you catch them and can bring them to the jurisdiction's attention, How could they say that the statute of limitations had ran out?

00:05:11.000 That was just so crazy to me.

00:05:13.000 How do you have a statute of limitations on your name?

00:05:16.000 That's what I was saying.

00:05:17.000 I mean, if somebody steals something from you, I mean, it takes you 10 years to catch them with it, and you catch them with it, it has all the makings on it that is yours, how could you not be made to give it back?

00:05:29.000 You know what I'm saying?

00:05:30.000 You said, oh, well, he had his 10 years, so now it's his.

00:05:32.000 Well, what's really crazy is that it's in the most...

00:05:35.000 I mean, rap...

00:05:36.000 The world of rap is supposed to be the most legitimate world ever. 1.00

00:05:40.000 Like, you can't get caught with any bullshit. 0.99

00:05:43.000 You can't get caught faking anything. 1.00

00:05:45.000 If you get caught faking anything, people will turn on you.

00:05:48.000 It used to be like that.

00:05:49.000 It used to be like that.

00:05:50.000 If you beat a lyric...

00:05:51.000 Yeah.

00:05:52.000 If you bit somebody's rhyme or lyric, you are done.

00:05:55.000 Yeah.

00:05:55.000 You know, remember Nelly Vanelli?

00:05:57.000 I mean, those guys last...

00:05:58.000 Millie Vanelli?

00:05:59.000 Nelly Vanelli?

00:06:01.000 Yeah, yeah.

00:06:02.000 Well, those guys weren't really rappers, though.

00:06:04.000 You know, but I mean, Rick Ross is like...

00:06:05.000 But it was still during the time of genuine, real.

00:06:08.000 Yes.

00:06:09.000 And now I think that the time has changed so much that it's not about real anymore.

00:06:14.000 It's about...

00:06:16.000 I'm faking it.

00:06:17.000 Well, it's once someone gets popular enough that they bypass the underground hardcore fans and they make it into the mainstream and then they become a part of pop culture.

00:06:28.000 Like this, everyday I'm hustling.

00:06:30.000 That just got into the mainstream culture.

00:06:33.000 Because the words in between that, they're not good.

00:06:36.000 He's not a good rapper.

00:06:38.000 It's that everyday I'm hustling is just so good. 0.99

00:06:41.000 When you hear that in a club, you're like, damn, that's good. 0.93

00:06:44.000 You know, it's just such a good hook that that made him. 0.98

00:06:47.000 I mean, that's where it all took off for him.

00:06:49.000 Exactly.

00:06:49.000 And then you have Universal behind you pushing.

00:06:52.000 Yeah.

00:06:52.000 You know, they start pushing stuff down our kid's throat, you know, and next thing you know, they're taking it.

00:06:58.000 That's fascinating.

00:06:59.000 So he's got your name now.

00:07:00.000 So now it's legal that he's got your name. 1.00

00:07:03.000 Why wouldn't he use his own fucking name? 1.00

00:07:05.000 I don't know. 1.00

00:07:05.000 Rick Ross is just a name, you know what I mean? 1.00

00:07:08.000 It's not like Starchild, Beyond the Grave, you know what I mean? 1.00

00:07:11.000 You don't have some crazy fucking name. 0.99

00:07:13.000 You know what I mean? 1.00

00:07:14.000 What's his name?

00:07:15.000 His real name?

00:07:16.000 William Roberts III. What's wrong with Bill Roberts?

00:07:19.000 I don't know.

00:07:20.000 How about Bill Roberts III? I'm ready to wrap it up here.

00:07:23.000 Rick Ross.

00:07:23.000 Rick Ross sounds like a guy who sells you real estate.

00:07:26.000 You could be like on one of those billboards that they have on the bus stops.

00:07:30.000 Rick Ross, a big smile on your face.

00:07:32.000 If my mom were to name me William Roberts, my name would be William Roberts.

00:07:35.000 Yeah, you'd be Freeway Will Roberts.

00:07:37.000 Exactly.

00:07:38.000 What's wrong with that?

00:07:42.000 Hey man, we can't hear you in the background.

00:07:44.000 There's no microphone.

00:07:44.000 Even that, everyday I'm hustling is something that I used to say.

00:07:50.000 He got that out of a book that Gary Redworld called Dark Alliance.

00:07:54.000 And you know, I was telling Gary that I'm hustling every day.

00:07:57.000 So he took that and turned it into a song.

00:08:00.000 So, I mean, you know, I don't know what it is with this guy.

00:08:03.000 You know, he tattooed my name on his hand.

00:08:06.000 That's so strange!

00:08:07.000 I mean, I'm a little...

00:08:08.000 That's so strange!

00:08:09.000 It's a little weird, you know? 0.95

00:08:10.000 And he used to be a corrections officer, which is really fucked up, because to become a corrections officer, they gotta do a background check on you. 0.97

00:08:17.000 Oh, man. 0.98

00:08:17.000 They gotta make sure you're not a felon. 0.98

00:08:18.000 Squeaky clean. 1.00

00:08:19.000 Yeah, you can't be this gangster dude and be a fucking guy who is a corrections officer. 0.99

00:08:26.000 We should get his application and read what it says, what it takes to be a correctional officer. 0.99

00:08:31.000 All the criteria.

00:08:32.000 Yeah.

00:08:33.000 How about the pictures of him with the outfit on?

00:08:35.000 You seen that?

00:08:36.000 I saw those. 1.00

00:08:37.000 Shit's ridiculous. 1.00

00:08:38.000 I saw it with the smooth face. 1.00

00:08:39.000 What's really fucked up is there's a video of him, an old video of him, and you're on the video. 1.00

00:08:45.000 You're on the beginning of it, and then he comes out like, he knew who the fuck you were. 0.99

00:08:49.000 He put you in his video, right? 0.99

00:08:51.000 Yeah, but he said he didn't know who I was.

00:08:53.000 Under oath, too.

00:08:54.000 Yeah.

00:08:55.000 How do you not bring that video in and just stick that in his face and it should be case closed?

00:08:59.000 Well, the judge didn't want to see that.

00:09:01.000 Whoa.

00:09:02.000 So is the judge just getting bribed?

00:09:04.000 Must be.

00:09:05.000 I mean, you know.

00:09:06.000 Has to be.

00:09:07.000 It looks funny to me.

00:09:08.000 How can you...

00:09:09.000 That has to be bribery.

00:09:11.000 100%.

00:09:11.000 That judge should be in jail.

00:09:12.000 There's no doubt about it. 1.00

00:09:14.000 That's your fucking name, man. 1.00

00:09:15.000 That's your fucking name. 1.00

00:09:16.000 I mean, and to let this guy come in court and say that... 1.00

00:09:19.000 He never heard of you.

00:09:20.000 He never heard of me.

00:09:21.000 That's hilarious.

00:09:22.000 And how he invented the name, you know, was like, wow.

00:09:25.000 You know, he gave us some elaborate story. 1.00

00:09:28.000 When I heard him on this video, it was so stupid. 0.98

00:09:31.000 He was like, no, the name came about like 10 years ago. 0.99

00:09:33.000 Like, what does that mean?

00:09:35.000 It was like a non-answer to the question. 0.99

00:09:39.000 And then he tried to beat past it, the question, just talk about how people just like to talk a lot of shit and start a lot of shit. 0.99

00:09:46.000 And I'm like, what? 1.00

00:09:46.000 Yeah, he likes to bolo. 1.00

00:09:47.000 He likes to bolo people when you come in. 0.91

00:09:50.000 Either you're going to do the interview or you ain't going to do the interview.

00:09:53.000 I ain't going to talk about this.

00:09:54.000 I'm going to talk about what I want to talk about.

00:09:56.000 Oh, I see.

00:09:57.000 So he doesn't just come in and just have a conversation with you.

00:10:00.000 He comes in with a specific set of rules.

00:10:03.000 Exactly.

00:10:03.000 I think most of his interviews are rehearsed and written down the way they seem like to me.

00:10:10.000 I mean, everything about this guy is suspect.

00:10:14.000 When I was in jail, somebody wrote me a letter and said, Hey, his beard is fake.

00:10:17.000 What?

00:10:20.000 Could you imagine you catch him backstage gluing black cotton balls on his face? 0.91

00:10:25.000 Yeah, this chick wrote me and said, oh, his beard is fake, too.

00:10:28.000 I mean, you know, it's just so much stuff.

00:10:30.000 You know, you hear people, you know, shooting your messages and all kind of stuff like that there, man.

00:10:37.000 Matter of fact, a couple of weeks ago, I get a call and it was a guy that was in jail.

00:10:42.000 While he was a correctional officer.

00:10:43.000 You should hear the story this guy had to say.

00:10:47.000 What'd he have to say?

00:10:48.000 What'd he say?

00:10:49.000 Oh, man, he said this guy was one of the worst CEOs that you could be.

00:10:53.000 You know, he was one that...

00:10:55.000 See, a CO really doesn't have power. 0.93

00:10:57.000 He has to go to his boss and tell his boss on you.

00:11:00.000 So he said that this guy was running around the cell, sneaking, trying to hear what they talking about.

00:11:04.000 And if they shooting dice, he'd run up and tell his boss, "Hey, they're down there shooting dice, boss. 0.95

00:11:08.000 Let's go get 'em." - Really? - Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:11:10.000 That's the kind of guy they use him for.

00:11:12.000 And then like when they do raids, you know, when they raid your cell, he would be the first one they push in, you know, the big fat guy, you know, 'cause everybody be kind of scared of the big fat guy.

00:11:22.000 So they would all get behind him and shove him up in the cell so all this big blob of meat is coming at you, you know?

00:11:30.000 So he was their battering ram.

00:11:32.000 Yeah.

00:11:33.000 Oh, that's hilarious.

00:11:34.000 Wow. 0.99

00:11:35.000 It's so fucked up that that guy got legitimate, that all of a sudden he's a legit rap star. 1.00

00:11:40.000 Man. 0.99

00:11:41.000 It's fascinating.

00:11:42.000 It's fascinating how that snuck by, you know?

00:11:45.000 Well, you know...

00:11:47.000 Our people just let him slide him on in there on us, you know, and slowly and slowly he was accepted, you know.

00:11:55.000 It seems like that can't last.

00:11:57.000 It seems like, you know, rappers have a short shelf life anyway, a lot of them.

00:12:00.000 I mean, there's dudes like Jay-Z and Nas that will just stick around just because they're so talented.

00:12:05.000 You can't stop them.

00:12:06.000 But a lot of rappers, they come for a little while and then they go, I kind of think this is going to take wind out of his sail eventually.

00:12:13.000 Well, I don't know, you know, when those people put, when labels put that money behind you and you become their money cow, you know, they have a sense of just shoving you down everybody's throat, you know, keeping you on the radio.

00:12:25.000 Right.

00:12:25.000 And anything people hear on the radio, you know, they believe it.

00:12:28.000 Once they can get money out of you, they know they can keep getting money out of you, so they just use you as a cow.

00:12:33.000 They just use you as a cow. 1.00

00:12:34.000 So they keep milking you and keep milking you.

00:12:36.000 And it's going to be up to the people to say, you know what?

00:12:39.000 We don't care how many times you shoved this guy in our face.

00:12:41.000 We're not buying him.

00:12:42.000 We know he's a correctional officer.

00:12:44.000 We know he never sold drugs. 0.94

00:12:46.000 We know he's a fake.

00:12:47.000 And we know he stole Rick Ross' name.

00:12:49.000 And he's got your name tattooed on his body.

00:12:51.000 And we want him to give it back.

00:12:52.000 You know what I'm saying?

00:12:53.000 That's what the streets need to tell him. 1.00

00:12:54.000 Give Rick back his fucking name. 1.00

00:12:56.000 Yeah, give him back his fucking name, bitch. 1.00

00:12:58.000 If it makes me feel any better, he was on a TV show and he left his hat there and our friend Tom Segura stole his hat and he wears it every day. 1.00

00:13:09.000 Tommy!

00:13:10.000 Oh, that's hilarious.

00:13:12.000 That's beautiful.

00:13:13.000 Yeah, Tommy was excited that I'm going to talk to you.

00:13:15.000 He's a stand-up comedian, good friend of mine.

00:13:18.000 Now your story is you were an aspiring tennis star and then you went on to make somewhere in the neighborhood roughly of like $600 million from selling crack in Los Angeles.

00:13:29.000 Yeah, in like two years I did that.

00:13:31.000 That was my last two years.

00:13:32.000 I don't know.

00:13:33.000 Before that, I made a lot of money.

00:13:36.000 What's really crazy is that this all has a connection, not just to Los Angeles, but to Ronald Reagan and Oliver North and the Contras in Nicaragua.

00:13:49.000 This is what...

00:13:49.000 A lot of people don't know.

00:13:51.000 There's crazy conspiracy theories of people always talking about, oh man, the CIA sells drugs, and then, you know, Lee Harvey Oswald didn't act alone, and we never landed on the moon. 1.00

00:14:00.000 And when you talk about conspiracies, people go, what the fuck are you talking about, you crazy asshole? 1.00

00:14:04.000 You really believe the CIA sold drugs? 1.00

00:14:06.000 Well, yeah, they did.

00:14:08.000 Not only did they sell drugs, Michael Rupert exposed it when the CIA director tried to come to Watts and have this big meaning to try to prove...

00:14:15.000 I remember that.

00:14:16.000 Yeah. 1.00

00:14:17.000 Michael Rupert's a bad motherfucker. 1.00

00:14:18.000 I saw that on Nightline. 1.00

00:14:21.000 I mean, even in their own investigation, though, the CIA admitted that they knew about it, that their operatives were selling drugs.

00:14:29.000 Now, they did this to fund the Contras because the Congress had cut off funding.

00:14:35.000 Absolutely.

00:14:36.000 So they needed money to fund the Contras' war against the Sandinistas, who were backed by the Russians.

00:14:42.000 Right.

00:14:43.000 And this was during the Cold War, and they were supposedly worried that the Russians were going to take over Nicaragua.

00:14:48.000 Is that the idea?

00:14:49.000 Well, that was what they feared.

00:14:51.000 You know, I read a couple books on it after I found out after the story broke.

00:14:55.000 I wanted to know more about what I was involved in.

00:14:58.000 And what they feared is that the Sandinistas, basically, Russia had gave the Sandinistas like $100 million.

00:15:04.000 And Congress had cut off all monies to the Contras.

00:15:09.000 So they had to figure out a way to raise this money to defeat this army that had $100 million.

00:15:16.000 You know, back then I guess $100 million probably would be equivalent to a billion dollars right now today.

00:15:21.000 So they were looking for ways to...

00:15:26.000 To raise this money.

00:15:27.000 So what they decided to do was sell weapons to Iran, convert that money back to Nicaragua to these guys, and these guys could take that money and go and buy drugs.

00:15:36.000 That way it wouldn't leave a paper trail back to the U.S. And that's basically what they did.

00:15:42.000 And that's what got exposed with the Oliver North trial, and that's when Ronald Reagan had to get on TV and said he couldn't remember.

00:15:49.000 Yeah, yeah.

00:15:50.000 He couldn't remember whether or not they sold arms to people who hate us.

00:15:54.000 And then you know, too, in the Kerry investigations, they told him to stop.

00:15:58.000 Right at the drugs, when they started to go into the part about the trafficking and the cocaine, they had it stopped, the hearings.

00:16:05.000 Why'd they have the hearings stopped right then?

00:16:06.000 I don't know.

00:16:07.000 Just too inflammatory, too problematic?

00:16:11.000 I guess so.

00:16:12.000 My documentary is going to explore that.

00:16:14.000 My producer and director for my documentary was sitting there in the Senate hearings, so he's bringing all those tapes.

00:16:22.000 When is this documentary going to come out?

00:16:24.000 This documentary should be out in like November.

00:16:26.000 Of next year, we're hoping.

00:16:28.000 Now, did you find out about this connection between the Contras and the Sandinists and all this while you were in jail?

00:16:34.000 Yes, I was in jail.

00:16:35.000 I was in 96. So you had no idea about the CIA connection?

00:16:39.000 No, I didn't care, man.

00:16:40.000 I was just trying to make money.

00:16:41.000 You know, I was a kid in South Central and I was illiterate.

00:16:45.000 I couldn't read, couldn't write.

00:16:47.000 And I found out that my tennis career was basically over because I couldn't go to college.

00:16:52.000 There's no way I was going to college.

00:16:53.000 So where were you playing tennis?

00:16:54.000 You know, like tournaments and stuff?

00:16:55.000 Yeah, I played tournaments, Southern California tournaments.

00:16:58.000 And you know, when you play those tournaments, you don't have to turn in your report card.

00:17:01.000 You know, you just go out and play.

00:17:02.000 They don't ask you that.

00:17:03.000 I also played high school tennis.

00:17:05.000 And I had dreams of going to college and playing college tennis.

00:17:09.000 And all that was derailed, you know, when it was discovered that I couldn't read or write.

00:17:14.000 Wow.

00:17:15.000 So how did you get through school if you couldn't read or write?

00:17:17.000 They just passed you.

00:17:18.000 Yeah, man, you know, teachers, they don't really care about If you're getting your education or not, for sure at that time.

00:17:26.000 And by me being a good student, I guess, they just kind of like, Felt they were doing me a favor by just letting me get through.

00:17:36.000 But being a good student, how can you be a good student if you can't read or write?

00:17:39.000 Well, I didn't cause them any problems.

00:17:41.000 I see what you're saying.

00:17:41.000 So you were just dealing with a wild bunch of kids and you were a nice guy.

00:17:46.000 Right.

00:17:47.000 Sit in my seat.

00:17:48.000 You know, probably go to sleep in class most of the time, you know.

00:17:51.000 Wow.

00:17:51.000 And don't cause a teacher no problems.

00:17:53.000 You know, if it was time for me to read, I would go to the principal's office, get my swats for being bad in class that day.

00:18:00.000 And, you know, the next day I'd come back and go back to sleep.

00:18:03.000 Wow.

00:18:04.000 Isn't it amazing that the standards are so low that all you have to do to be a good student is not be crazy in a problem.

00:18:10.000 Exactly.

00:18:11.000 You don't have to participate at all.

00:18:12.000 That's amazing.

00:18:13.000 And I never really participated in class.

00:18:16.000 You know, none that I can remember.

00:18:17.000 Well, I've always said that the number one problem in this country for sure is that we don't care about other people's kids.

00:18:22.000 We don't care about how other people's kids are growing up.

00:18:25.000 We don't care. 1.00

00:18:25.000 If it's not your kid that's illiterate, if it's not your kid that's growing up without a father, if it's not your kid who's growing up in poverty, doesn't know where the next meal is, You don't give a fuck. 1.00

00:18:33.000 But meanwhile, you give a fuck about what's happening in another part of the world, you know, freedom in Afghanistan and all this nutty shit that went on in Iraq. 1.00

00:18:40.000 Our real war is with our own people that we have to live with, our own national community. 0.99

00:18:46.000 And our national community has six bots, and these six bots are the ghettos. 0.88

00:18:50.000 And it's real simple.

00:18:50.000 If you get an unlucky roll of the dice and you're born in that six bot, well, guess what?

00:18:55.000 You're fucked. 1.00

00:18:56.000 You're fucked. 1.00

00:18:57.000 You gotta figure out a way out of that somehow or another but the odds are long against you. 1.00

00:19:01.000 Long against you.

00:19:02.000 And that's a real travesty.

00:19:04.000 It is. 0.99

00:19:04.000 We as human beings concentrate on some shit that's going on in another part of the world that's not even connected to us and we don't concentrate on people that we're gonna fucking come in contact with. 0.99

00:19:13.000 And spending billions. 0.99

00:19:14.000 Yeah.

00:19:14.000 Spending more than that, trillions.

00:19:16.000 And we're not concentrating on the people that we're really going to come in contact with. 0.99

00:19:20.000 The people that are going to grow up and be a problem with everybody they interact with because their life is fucked from the get-go. 0.99

00:19:26.000 And be a problem for your kids. 0.99

00:19:27.000 Yeah.

00:19:28.000 Isn't that amazing?

00:19:28.000 Just imagine, you know, in a few years, your kid is walking down the street and he run into one of these kids that didn't get it, you know?

00:19:35.000 And you get robbed.

00:19:37.000 Your situation is so crazy.

00:19:39.000 It's so hard to wrap your head around.

00:19:42.000 You were involved.

00:19:44.000 You were a part of this gigantic machine and you didn't even know about it.

00:19:49.000 You just were trying to sell crack and you just trying to make some money.

00:19:53.000 They gave me a way out.

00:19:56.000 How did it start?

00:19:58.000 How did I start selling?

00:19:59.000 Oh man, I was sitting on my porch one day and I was so broke.

00:20:03.000 And one of my big homies called me.

00:20:05.000 He said, I got the new thing.

00:20:08.000 I said, huh?

00:20:09.000 He said, man, come over here right now.

00:20:11.000 So I jumped in my car.

00:20:13.000 I had an old 66 Chevrolet.

00:20:16.000 I threw a dollar worth of gas in there and I drove to his house.

00:20:22.000 That might have been my last dollar, right?

00:20:24.000 Wow.

00:20:24.000 I'm like, wow, I'm going to put my last dollar in the tank.

00:20:27.000 I'm through now.

00:20:28.000 So when I get to his house, he laid it out.

00:20:32.000 It was cocaine.

00:20:35.000 And he was like, man, this is a new thing.

00:20:37.000 And I saw the movie Superfly and I'm like...

00:20:40.000 Wow.

00:20:41.000 Superfly.

00:20:43.000 That's me.

00:20:45.000 When I saw Superfly, man, I just love that movie.

00:20:50.000 It's hilarious now.

00:20:51.000 You try watching it now?

00:20:52.000 It's kind of hilarious.

00:20:54.000 Yeah, yeah.

00:20:54.000 I might have to do that.

00:20:56.000 When I finally bought my first VCR. Just the way they're dressed, the way they talk.

00:21:00.000 He goes, my hall, my vines.

00:21:03.000 He goes, this is all I ever wanted in life.

00:21:05.000 My hall, my vines, a white woman like you. 1.00

00:21:08.000 and you know my hall like that's what they used to call their car my vines was his clothes you know it's like the nicknames were hilarious the ones that didn't stick i haven't watched that since like 82 or something man wow but when i bought my first vcr man that was the first one i had i threw it right up in there whoop Wow.

00:21:28.000 Okay, so you go over your friend's house.

00:21:30.000 He's got it all.

00:21:31.000 Now, this is crack, or this is just cocaine or crack?

00:21:34.000 It's powder, right?

00:21:35.000 But he's cooking it in the rock at that time.

00:21:38.000 Now, who taught everybody to cook it? 0.99

00:21:40.000 How the fuck did that come about? 0.98

00:21:41.000 Because that, to me, is a massive mystery that someone figured out how to take cocaine and turn it into a more addictive, easier distributor. 0.99

00:21:47.000 It was already guys cooking it when I started, right?

00:21:50.000 But it was only a few of them.

00:21:52.000 But his freebase is different than crack, right?

00:21:54.000 Yeah, FreeBase.

00:21:55.000 Like Richard Pryor had a FreeBase, but it's still the same product.

00:21:58.000 They were cooking, but they were just taking coke and cooking it?

00:22:01.000 How were they doing it?

00:22:01.000 Yeah, you cooked it with ether.

00:22:03.000 Oh.

00:22:03.000 Which was a much more difficult process.

00:22:06.000 But it's still the same product, technically.

00:22:09.000 The only difference is that with FreeBase, I mean with what they call crack, because we didn't call it crack, we called it ReadyRock.

00:22:18.000 ReadyRock.

00:22:18.000 Yeah, we called it ReadyRock.

00:22:19.000 The difference is with ReadyRock is you use baking soda.

00:22:23.000 Now, what I did is...

00:22:25.000 In my neighborhood, there's three guys that could cook it.

00:22:29.000 These guys were very expensive.

00:22:33.000 Very, very expensive to cook it.

00:22:35.000 So what I did is once I learned how to cook it from these guys, because I kept watching them do it over and over and over again, and they keep charging me to cook three grams, they might charge you $175.

00:22:47.000 So I keep paying...

00:22:48.000 How does three grams cost us?

00:22:50.000 What is it when you sell it?

00:22:51.000 Back then, three grams...

00:22:53.000 Back then, three grams would have been about $900.

00:22:57.000 So out of $900, you pay them $175.

00:22:59.000 That's pretty pricey.

00:23:00.000 It was pricey.

00:23:02.000 But what they did, it took them 10 minutes, 15 minutes.

00:23:05.000 Yeah, I mean, you think getting the Coke is the hard part.

00:23:08.000 That's the really hard part.

00:23:09.000 But then you got to cook it up.

00:23:10.000 So, you know, that was another part.

00:23:12.000 But once I learned how to do it, what I did is I just started showing all my little friends how to do it.

00:23:16.000 You know, so that became like a job for them.

00:23:18.000 They could just cook and make, you know, what other guys were charging $175, they could charge $125 and, you know, and just sold the market up.

00:23:26.000 But it's weird that Coke is expensive, but crack is not.

00:23:30.000 Mm-mm.

00:23:32.000 Not true.

00:23:32.000 That's a misconception.

00:23:33.000 It is a misconception.

00:23:35.000 Big misconception.

00:23:36.000 Crack is expensive?

00:23:37.000 There is no crack without Coke.

00:23:40.000 Right.

00:23:40.000 So if you took a key of Coke...

00:23:44.000 And you cooked it in the crack, the price don't drop.

00:23:47.000 So what is the benefit of cooking it?

00:23:49.000 The price goes up.

00:23:50.000 You make more money.

00:23:52.000 Do you need less to get high?

00:23:53.000 Is that what it is?

00:23:54.000 No, no, no.

00:23:57.000 It don't really have anything to do with the high.

00:24:00.000 See, if you spend $40,000 for a key of powder, you still got to get at least $40,000 for the key of cooked.

00:24:08.000 Right.

00:24:09.000 But people think that it's cheaper.

00:24:12.000 There's some misconception that they have put in people's mind that rock is cheaper.

00:24:16.000 No, no, no, no, no, no.

00:24:17.000 It's still the same key of cocaine.

00:24:19.000 You still have to get your money back out of it.

00:24:21.000 If you spend $40,000, you still got to sell that rock for $40,000.

00:24:26.000 So what is the benefit of turning it into rock, then?

00:24:28.000 They can smoke it.

00:24:30.000 Yeah.

00:24:31.000 Is that better?

00:24:32.000 It's a better high, they say, than smoking powder.

00:24:35.000 Do you need less of it to get high that way?

00:24:38.000 No. 0.99

00:24:40.000 So there's no benefit financially going the way of crack opposed to coke if you're trying to get fucked up? 0.99

00:24:46.000 No. 0.99

00:24:46.000 If you take powder and put on that pipe, it's going to burn different. 0.99

00:24:48.000 So it turns the pipe all black and gooey.

00:24:52.000 But rock, it took all the impurities out of the coke.

00:24:56.000 So now you're just smoking pure cocaine.

00:25:01.000 And they like that better.

00:25:03.000 And that's what the baking soda comes in?

00:25:05.000 That's what the baking soda did. 0.73

00:25:06.000 And that pulls the impurities out?

00:25:08.000 Is that how it works?

00:25:09.000 Right.

00:25:09.000 It cooked all the impurities out of it and turned it into a gel.

00:25:13.000 Now, you meet this guy.

00:25:15.000 You go over to his house.

00:25:16.000 He's got the Coke.

00:25:17.000 And you decide, alright, this is it.

00:25:19.000 This is what I'm going to do.

00:25:20.000 I'm going to be super fly now.

00:25:21.000 Did a light bulb go off in your head?

00:25:23.000 No, I didn't believe him, man.

00:25:25.000 Really?

00:25:25.000 He showed me something that was about the size of a...

00:25:28.000 One of those little match heads and told me it was worth $50.

00:25:30.000 That's my boy, too, though, you know?

00:25:32.000 That's my boy, right?

00:25:33.000 If it'd been somebody else, I never would've...

00:25:35.000 I wouldn't even touch it.

00:25:37.000 But this was my boy telling me this.

00:25:38.000 He said, man, that's worth $50.

00:25:40.000 I'm like, come on, Mike, stop it.

00:25:43.000 I mean, $50, man.

00:25:45.000 The police would never catch me with that.

00:25:47.000 You know, I'm talking about something so small, you could barely see it.

00:25:51.000 You know, I could put it in my fingernails.

00:25:52.000 And he telling me that's worth $50, and I just spent my last dollar on gas, and now he telling me that this little thing is worth $50, so I can make my money back.

00:26:02.000 What's $40?

00:26:03.000 And he gave it to me.

00:26:04.000 He'll take it and go.

00:26:05.000 Wow.

00:26:07.000 So, you know, I go and I'm going around trying to figure out was it really Coke, you know, so I'm going to everybody and asking and asking and nobody really knew what it was.

00:26:16.000 What year was this?

00:26:18.000 79, end of 79, beginning of 80. Now, in the 80s, for people who don't know, I was living in Boston at the time, and I remember when crack hit, and it was like a wave of crime just took over.

00:26:33.000 It was weird.

00:26:34.000 It was like a real noticeable increase in crime once crack had become a part of the culture.

00:26:42.000 Well, you know what?

00:26:43.000 When people start smoking cocaine, they're gonna do whatever they can to keep that high going, you know?

00:26:53.000 Beg, steal, borrow, you know?

00:26:56.000 I mean, it was something about it where they said it was so joyful that you never wanted to stop.

00:27:02.000 Wow.

00:27:04.000 Some guys used to say it was the best sensation that they'd ever had before. 0.98

00:27:07.000 And you never fucked with it. 0.96

00:27:09.000 I tried it about one week, maybe a week and a half. 0.98

00:27:13.000 For a whole week?

00:27:13.000 Yeah.

00:27:14.000 Damn. 0.99

00:27:15.000 Was this in the beginning? 1.00

00:27:16.000 In the beginning.

00:27:18.000 Yeah, in the beginning.

00:27:19.000 I caught myself early.

00:27:21.000 I went through a phase where we thought we came up on some money and then I thought I was rich.

00:27:27.000 I had about $10,000.

00:27:30.000 And then all my friends were like, man, come on, let's smoke something in weed.

00:27:34.000 Wow.

00:27:35.000 And the good thing, though, I had never smoked weed before in my life.

00:27:39.000 That's a good thing?

00:27:40.000 It was at that time, yeah.

00:27:43.000 So that's probably what helped save me from becoming an addict.

00:27:49.000 So that you weren't used to smoking things?

00:27:51.000 Right, I wasn't used to smoking.

00:27:52.000 I was a tennis player.

00:27:53.000 Right, right, right.

00:27:54.000 You were healthy.

00:27:54.000 I was healthy.

00:27:55.000 So when I started smoking, you know, started putting and lacing it in the weed and smoking.

00:28:00.000 And I looked up and my money was like...

00:28:03.000 Wow, man.

00:28:04.000 You had 10,000.

00:28:05.000 You down to like 500 now.

00:28:07.000 Wow.

00:28:08.000 Yeah.

00:28:09.000 That quick?

00:28:10.000 That quick.

00:28:10.000 It was going quicker.

00:28:11.000 How'd you stop?

00:28:12.000 Was it hard?

00:28:13.000 No, I just quit.

00:28:14.000 I said, man, this ain't what you went into the game for.

00:28:16.000 But was it difficult physically?

00:28:17.000 Did you have withdrawal symptoms?

00:28:19.000 No withdrawals.

00:28:19.000 Uh-uh.

00:28:20.000 No.

00:28:20.000 Well, you have a strong mind.

00:28:21.000 You probably pulled yourself out of it.

00:28:22.000 It's also in there a week, you know?

00:28:24.000 I think that's all it takes.

00:28:26.000 I did it for about a week.

00:28:28.000 I never felt the addiction.

00:28:29.000 I did the baking soda thing.

00:28:31.000 How often did you do it?

00:28:33.000 For that week, I probably did it twice, three times.

00:28:36.000 Two times a day?

00:28:39.000 Three times for the whole week.

00:28:41.000 I was also doing a lot of cocaine at that point and I never liked the crack.

00:28:49.000 Is it some people get addicted and some people don't?

00:28:51.000 Is it one of those things?

00:28:52.000 You gotta pull yourself and you gotta find a reason why you wanna quit.

00:28:56.000 See some people, like I got an uncle, he's been getting high since the day I started.

00:29:01.000 And you know what he tell me?

00:29:02.000 What?

00:29:03.000 I don't wanna quit.

00:29:04.000 What am I gonna quit for?

00:29:08.000 We had a friend who was a comedian who was a heroin addict who wound up dying.

00:29:13.000 Mitch Hedberg, very funny guy.

00:29:15.000 Really, really funny dude.

00:29:17.000 And they tried to stop him a few times. 1.00

00:29:18.000 He's like, bitch, I ain't stopping shit. 1.00

00:29:20.000 That was his attitude. 1.00

00:29:22.000 He's like, this is me.

00:29:23.000 I like this.

00:29:24.000 I mean, a person should be allowed to do whatever it is with their life as long as they don't hurt anybody else or infringe on your rights that they want to do.

00:29:32.000 I agree, 100%.

00:29:33.000 Now, you're sitting there.

00:29:35.000 How old were you when this happened?

00:29:38.000 When I started?

00:29:39.000 1920. So you're 1920, you get started in it, and then how do you go about going from that to everything branching out to you being the biggest, most famous guy?

00:29:51.000 It was, I guess you would say, like an evolution, you know, learning process.

00:29:56.000 You know, the first time I learned, that first piece of cocaine I got, I got beat out of it.

00:30:00.000 Another one of my big homies beat me out of it, you know, told me let him test it, let him smoke it, and you know, it wasn't big as a match head, so he cut it in half, and he smoked a piece of it, and he was like, oh, that's the way they used to do, you know, when they smoke it, and smack their lips, and tastes all right.

00:30:18.000 I need another piece, though, to make sure it's good.

00:30:21.000 You don't want to go out there selling nothing ain't right.

00:30:24.000 Chipped it again, and the whole thing was gone.

00:30:26.000 There was a little teeny-weeny piece left, and he's like, man, I'm gonna go and smoke that, too, and then I'll just pay you Friday.

00:30:35.000 Pay you Friday.

00:30:36.000 It's never happened, never, has it?

00:30:38.000 Hamburger today.

00:30:38.000 Never.

00:30:39.000 I never got that 50. Never?

00:30:41.000 You probably never will.

00:30:42.000 Those I'll Pay You Friday guys, they never pay.

00:30:45.000 They don't.

00:30:46.000 So that was my business in the cocaine business. 0.98

00:30:50.000 So right away you went, okay, I got to be a little more prudent with my fucking, my resources here. 0.97

00:30:54.000 It started and ended right there, right? 0.97

00:30:57.000 I felt like my career was over.

00:31:00.000 How was I going to go back to Mike and tell you, my man, I'm going to go tell my man, man, I ain't got the $50, man.

00:31:06.000 Wow.

00:31:07.000 I want to re-up, but I don't have the $50.

00:31:09.000 But what happened is that guy who beat me out to $50, And he taught me another lesson.

00:31:16.000 He come right back that day with somebody that won $100.

00:31:20.000 See, like with people who use, if they owe you, then they'll come and they'll bring somebody else with them and say, oh man, this ain't my money, this is his money.

00:31:31.000 That's hilarious.

00:31:33.000 So he came back with somebody who wanted to buy a hundred dollars worth.

00:31:36.000 And I called my man.

00:31:37.000 I said, man, I ain't got your 50, but somebody else want to buy a hundred dollars worth if you want it.

00:31:42.000 And he shot over there, served him that. 0.97

00:31:44.000 And next thing you know, this guy who beat me out to 50 kept bringing person after person after person.

00:31:49.000 And next thing I know, I'm making $200 a day, $300 a day.

00:31:55.000 But now I'm giving all the money to my man, and one day I was just like, man, I'm going into business for myself.

00:32:01.000 So how did you get a distributor?

00:32:04.000 Well it started just like that.

00:32:06.000 I started off just getting it from him and then I've been talking about going to Venice Skill Center to do upholstery and me and this teacher there that taught the class had become really, really good friends.

00:32:19.000 We played tennis together and I just stopped going around him because I spent all my time selling coke.

00:32:26.000 And one day I go down, you know, just to see him, because this was my man, and I hadn't seen him, and I said, man, how you doing?

00:32:33.000 He's like, man, where you been, man?

00:32:36.000 I was like, man, you don't want to know where I've been.

00:32:41.000 So I went on and told him, I was like, man, I've been selling coke, you know, that's what I'm doing now.

00:32:47.000 He's like, what?

00:32:49.000 He's like, all right, my man.

00:32:51.000 Wow.

00:32:52.000 So he had a whole different...

00:32:55.000 Attitude than I thought he was going to have.

00:32:56.000 But you know, he was fly.

00:32:58.000 I used to like his little jewelry, and he'd do a brand new Cadillac and all that, right?

00:33:03.000 So he said, man, come by the house.

00:33:05.000 So I go by the house, man, and he lay it all out.

00:33:07.000 He's like, man, you think I got this house, this Cadillac, and these clothes, and I like this here on a teacher's salary?

00:33:14.000 No way.

00:33:15.000 He said, man, I travel with the world.

00:33:17.000 He said, I should sell coke, but I just backed up for a while.

00:33:20.000 Whoa.

00:33:21.000 It's hard to do that, right?

00:33:23.000 He had the Nicaraguan connection.

00:33:24.000 Yeah, you got to be really, really strong to back up without going to prison or getting killed.

00:33:29.000 Very few people do, right?

00:33:31.000 Very few do.

00:33:31.000 I don't know not one person that just quit on their own, I don't think, without going to prison.

00:33:39.000 Wow, that's amazing.

00:33:40.000 So this guy gets you the Nicaraguan connection.

00:33:42.000 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:33:43.000 He called his guy up, man, and his guy was like...

00:33:49.000 I'm from Nicaragua, you know, spoke broken English and gave me some prices, man.

00:33:54.000 And it was like all love.

00:33:56.000 I was like, man, I'm going to be rich.

00:33:59.000 Wow.

00:34:00.000 So are you familiar with how they got it into the country?

00:34:05.000 Or at the time, did you know how they were getting into the country?

00:34:08.000 No, I didn't.

00:34:08.000 My mind wasn't that big, you know.

00:34:10.000 You were 20. I'm 20 years old.

00:34:12.000 Never had nothing.

00:34:13.000 Right.

00:34:14.000 You know, I hadn't had...

00:34:16.000 I had never had $1,000 before I started selling coke.

00:34:18.000 I don't know if I had ever had $500.

00:34:21.000 You know what I'm saying?

00:34:22.000 Right, right, right.

00:34:22.000 So, I'm just thankful that I'm in this position.

00:34:26.000 I ain't asking no questions.

00:34:27.000 You know what I'm saying?

00:34:28.000 I'm like Superfly.

00:34:29.000 Don't ask no questions.

00:34:31.000 As long as the man lets you be the man, leave it alone.

00:34:34.000 You know?

00:34:35.000 And that's the way I was.

00:34:36.000 That was the attitude I had.

00:34:37.000 I was just going along with the process.

00:34:40.000 Wow.

00:34:42.000 That's got to be a crazy position to be in, man.

00:34:44.000 All of a sudden, it starts taking off and you see it and then you're just rolling in this money.

00:34:49.000 I mean, it really is like a movie, right?

00:34:51.000 Did it feel like a movie to you?

00:34:53.000 Like all of a sudden you go from being broke to just bawling.

00:34:56.000 It was like a dream, you know?

00:34:57.000 You feeling like, you know, finally God had recognized you.

00:35:02.000 You know, all this time you had been ignored by God and now all of a sudden, you know, all the things that you had prayed for and hoped would happen in your life had just taken place.

00:35:12.000 Wow, that's a crazy way to put that.

00:35:14.000 God had recognized you.

00:35:16.000 That's how I felt, you know, honest.

00:35:18.000 You know, I felt that it was a blessing from God that, uh, That I've been put in that position.

00:35:22.000 And now, you know, my family wouldn't have no more hungry nights.

00:35:25.000 And we wouldn't be worried about the lights getting cut off, the gas.

00:35:29.000 And, you know, those roaches and rats weren't going to be running through the house no more because I was going to get some...

00:35:35.000 Rat traps.

00:35:36.000 Some rat traps and get rid of them, you know.

00:35:38.000 And we was going to patch them holes up in the cabinets.

00:35:41.000 And, you know, all the things that I regretted when I was a kid, you know, standing in line with food stamps, all that was over with.

00:35:49.000 Did you learn how to read at this time?

00:35:51.000 Nah, man.

00:35:52.000 I didn't learn how to read.

00:35:52.000 I went to prison.

00:35:54.000 Wow!

00:35:54.000 That's amazing.

00:35:57.000 That's amazing.

00:35:58.000 I was forced to learn how to read.

00:35:59.000 What did you do with the money?

00:36:00.000 How'd you bank?

00:36:02.000 Man, I had big safes.

00:36:04.000 I had safes.

00:36:06.000 They come out to Queen Mary, weigh 2,500 pounds.

00:36:09.000 One time they stole my safe out of my house.

00:36:11.000 I said, they'll never do that again.

00:36:13.000 And this dude put me up on these safes that it took like a little train tractor ringing through.

00:36:18.000 Wow.

00:36:19.000 They wasn't moving that.

00:36:20.000 There's not to be a professional safe mover to move them up out your house.

00:36:24.000 When they stole the safe out of your house, how much was in the safe?

00:36:27.000 Man, I think one time they got like...

00:36:30.000 Maybe $180,000, $160,000.

00:36:32.000 Wow, in cash, in a safe.

00:36:34.000 Yeah.

00:36:35.000 And you just weren't home or something?

00:36:37.000 They knew when you were leaving?

00:36:38.000 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:36:39.000 They knew.

00:36:41.000 It probably was an inside job.

00:36:42.000 Of course.

00:36:43.000 You know how that go.

00:36:44.000 One of your family members opened the door and let them in.

00:36:47.000 Isn't that crazy?

00:36:49.000 That's crazy to think about, isn't it?

00:36:51.000 Yeah, yeah.

00:36:52.000 So then you got a big giant safe and you kept it all inside.

00:36:55.000 You mean you had to be locked down at all times.

00:36:57.000 If you had that kind of cash around, you're not dealing with banks at all?

00:37:00.000 Oh no, no, no.

00:37:02.000 I didn't go to no bank, man.

00:37:03.000 You know my mom, she used to take, because I had a couple of properties in my name, and so my mom, I used to let her go and collect all the rents of my Section 8 checks. 0.80

00:37:13.000 And she used to just throw them in the bank, because I'd pay the mortgages and stuff out of my dope money. 1.00

00:37:20.000 The banker used to say, tell your son to come in and meet us.

00:37:25.000 That's funny.

00:37:26.000 He's doing pretty good in real estate.

00:37:28.000 Wow, that's hilarious.

00:37:29.000 So did you come up with a bunch of businesses to sort of mask your money?

00:37:32.000 Yeah, I had a custom time, wheel shop, car wash, shoe store, beauty salon, junkyard, motel, bought an old theater, and I had apartment buildings all over the place.

00:37:47.000 I used to build apartment buildings.

00:37:48.000 That was like one of my hobbies.

00:37:50.000 Did you have to show how you got the money to buy any of these businesses or start any of these businesses?

00:37:55.000 I figured out how to launder.

00:37:56.000 You know, people taught me how to launder the money.

00:37:58.000 Right.

00:37:58.000 How you go to the bank and you get the cashier's checks.

00:38:03.000 So we figured it out how to get around it.

00:38:06.000 Now, all this time you couldn't read.

00:38:08.000 No.

00:38:09.000 That's amazing.

00:38:10.000 So when you went into the banks and fill out the paperwork, how did you do that?

00:38:14.000 Well, I would just have somebody else to do it for me.

00:38:16.000 If I'm buying a piece of property, the real estate agent would do most of the work.

00:38:20.000 Now, I've had times where they told me one thing and it wasn't what it was.

00:38:24.000 So those are the chances that you take when you can't read or write.

00:38:27.000 Wow.

00:38:28.000 Like one time I had a building that I bought and they told me that the note was going to be three thousand a month and the note turned out to be sixty two hundred a month so it cost me like thirty two hundred a month because i couldn't read the contract wow so i mean it's costly when you don't know how to read that's incredible that you accomplish so much without learning how to read that's that's amazing well you know what what i felt is that i had developed a sense of people I could feel good

00:38:58.000 people and bad people just sensing who to deal with and who not to deal with.

00:39:04.000 You make some mistakes, but overall I think that You know, I did alright with some of them.

00:39:10.000 So as long as you were making them money, everybody was making money, everybody was happy.

00:39:14.000 Yeah.

00:39:14.000 You know, I paid for Anita Baker's first album, too.

00:39:17.000 Wow.

00:39:18.000 Seriously?

00:39:19.000 Wow.

00:39:19.000 That's awesome.

00:39:20.000 Yeah, I financed Beverly Glen Music.

00:39:22.000 Otis Smith, who was the owner of the label, rest in peace, he used to take care of me when I played tennis.

00:39:29.000 He'll buy me tennis shoes and rackets.

00:39:31.000 And so when I came up, I ran into him one day and he wasn't doing all that well.

00:39:35.000 So, you know, returned the favor.

00:39:38.000 Oh, wow.

00:39:38.000 That's beautiful.

00:39:39.000 He got his tenfold, you know?

00:39:41.000 Yeah.

00:39:42.000 When they say you get a tenfold, he used to buy me a tennis shoes and rackets.

00:39:44.000 I get him $600,000.

00:39:48.000 Wow.

00:39:49.000 So, you know, sometimes you do a good deed, they come back to you.

00:39:52.000 Might be, you know, took, well, we 10, 15 years, but.

00:39:56.000 So how did it all come apart?

00:40:00.000 Man, it was coming apart from the beginning.

00:40:06.000 Right away, it was just crazy.

00:40:08.000 What wound up happening is, you know, they created this task force called the Freeway Task Force.

00:40:13.000 Yeah, that was each group of officers.

00:40:15.000 Just to go after you?

00:40:16.000 Yeah.

00:40:16.000 Because you were Freeway Ricky Ross.

00:40:18.000 Yeah, yeah.

00:40:18.000 They said that my name was ringing so much downtown that City Hall had a special meeting.

00:40:26.000 Wow.

00:40:26.000 They said, who is this guy in South Central making all this money that everybody in South?

00:40:30.000 Because what I found out is when I finally got arrested is that not the people who wasn't really telling on me, right, to get me in trouble.

00:40:38.000 They was bragging about me.

00:40:41.000 Yeah, homeboy Rick, he's a millionaire.

00:40:44.000 He got this, he got that.

00:40:46.000 He's running the whole hood, you know.

00:40:47.000 So this is creating a hysteria downtown.

00:40:52.000 And they're like, well, who is this guy?

00:40:53.000 Why is everybody talking about him?

00:40:55.000 And what I found out, these guys are in jail talking about me, too.

00:40:58.000 You know, like they're sitting in holding tanks and they're having conversations about Freeway Rick.

00:41:02.000 And so the guards are hearing this.

00:41:04.000 And they go and report it, and so now everybody wants to know, now who is this guy?

00:41:08.000 Imagine if it was Rick Ross, the fake Rick Ross, who was hearing about the real Rick Ross, and went and reported you. 0.99

00:41:14.000 Imagine if we find that shit out. 0.99

00:41:16.000 Hey, hey. 1.00

00:41:17.000 Could you imagine? 0.99

00:41:18.000 I mean, that's a goddamn connection right there. 0.99

00:41:20.000 We might have fucking found the magic bullet. 1.00

00:41:26.000 Ah! 0.99

00:41:28.000 That's hilarious.

00:41:30.000 That's hilarious.

00:41:31.000 So they hear about you through legend.

00:41:34.000 You just become a...

00:41:35.000 Now, are you aware of how famous you are at this time?

00:41:38.000 No, I'm in a shell.

00:41:40.000 See, my guys know that they can't talk about me.

00:41:43.000 You talk about me to your girls and nobody.

00:41:46.000 You tell them what?

00:41:47.000 None of my business.

00:41:48.000 If they ain't in our business, they don't even know our business.

00:41:53.000 It wind up getting past the line, you know, when you got that line, but it jumped over that line and everybody knew.

00:42:00.000 Became public.

00:42:00.000 Yeah, it became public.

00:42:01.000 And you had no idea?

00:42:02.000 I had no idea it was public.

00:42:03.000 You thought you were just like a cat hiding under the couch and you think you're hidden but your tail's poking out?

00:42:11.000 You know, they think you can't see him. 1.00

00:42:13.000 You're like, bitch, I see you. 1.00

00:42:14.000 Yeah, you're mine. 1.00

00:42:16.000 You're all mine.

00:42:17.000 And that's what I was living under.

00:42:19.000 I was living under that illusion that nobody knew who I was because I didn't drive the fancy cars, you know.

00:42:25.000 I could walk in a restaurant and nobody would spot me.

00:42:27.000 Right, right, right.

00:42:28.000 They wouldn't be pointing, oh, they're gonna wreck over there.

00:42:30.000 So you kept it low-key.

00:42:31.000 You stayed in the same house?

00:42:33.000 You know, I had houses all over.

00:42:35.000 You have a bunch of houses.

00:42:36.000 A bunch of houses, but they wasn't, you know...

00:42:38.000 Mid-level.

00:42:39.000 You get in mansions, nothing crazy.

00:42:41.000 Right. 0.99

00:42:42.000 Pasadena estates with giant lawns and fountains and shit. 0.99

00:42:45.000 None of that, right? 0.98

00:42:46.000 Yeah, nothing like that.

00:42:48.000 It's not worth it.

00:42:48.000 But what else I found out, though, is that, see, my guys have become so big in their own rights, is if they mention your name one time to their little workers...

00:43:00.000 And then their workers run out, oh man, the homie Rick took care of us. 0.77

00:43:05.000 And these guys' words were so powerful that they would only have to mention you one time.

00:43:11.000 You know, they like, I guess you would call them almost like evangelists.

00:43:14.000 And that you keep having these type of guys mention your name, then the next thing you know your name is everything.

00:43:21.000 This is all what you surmised once you got into prison, really sat down with all the time in the world.

00:43:27.000 To analyze what was going on.

00:43:29.000 How long did it last?

00:43:31.000 How many years did you sell for?

00:43:33.000 Eight years.

00:43:34.000 So you were 28 when you got arrested.

00:43:35.000 Yep.

00:43:36.000 Wow.

00:43:36.000 Wow, that's crazy.

00:43:38.000 That's a long career for a drug dealer.

00:43:40.000 It's huge.

00:43:41.000 Yeah, most of my friends who started and got big two years, three years, and they gone.

00:43:47.000 What kind of car were you driving to try to stay low key?

00:43:51.000 Man, I had a Ford LTD station wagon.

00:43:56.000 With the wood grain on the side.

00:43:58.000 I had the exact same car.

00:43:59.000 Wood grain on the side.

00:44:00.000 And I had the little bird.

00:44:01.000 You know, the little funeral home bird.

00:44:04.000 Wow.

00:44:04.000 On the side of the windows.

00:44:06.000 I had a 1981 of this.

00:44:07.000 But wait a minute, the funeral home bird, did you have that on purpose?

00:44:10.000 You put that on there?

00:44:11.000 Yeah, I put that on there.

00:44:11.000 So it looked like a funeral home car?

00:44:13.000 Yeah, the police put up on the side of that, they looked the other way.

00:44:15.000 Nobody want to look in that car.

00:44:17.000 That's a...

00:44:17.000 That's hilarious.

00:44:18.000 So it was almost like a hearse.

00:44:20.000 Yeah, how many people you know want to look in the funeral home car?

00:44:22.000 That's brilliant. 0.99

00:44:23.000 That's fucking brilliant. 0.99

00:44:25.000 So you were driving around in a scam car. 1.00

00:44:28.000 Wow.

00:44:28.000 I knew if the police tried to pull that thing over, the police was in there.

00:44:32.000 That's hilarious. 0.97

00:44:33.000 But you must have looked at Ferraris and Lamborghinis and said, God damn, I could just go buy one of those. 0.93

00:44:39.000 Oh, my guys had them. 0.95

00:44:40.000 You know, if I want to go out in a Ferrari, I just call one of my guys.

00:44:42.000 Man, I'm going to use your Ferrari tonight.

00:44:44.000 Oh, that's cool.

00:44:46.000 You're a vet, you know, without the headaches.

00:44:49.000 Right, right.

00:44:49.000 I ain't got to put it up.

00:44:51.000 How did you get so smart?

00:44:53.000 That's amazing.

00:44:54.000 It just started coming, you know, just little by little, you know.

00:44:59.000 So I'm going to say, no, don't wear no jewelry.

00:45:01.000 Because if you wear jewelry, everybody's going to know you sell drugs.

00:45:03.000 Right, right, right.

00:45:04.000 I didn't want my mama to know I sold drugs. 0.92

00:45:06.000 What did you tell your mama you were doing?

00:45:08.000 I didn't.

00:45:09.000 You know, when she found out I had all that money, man, she...

00:45:12.000 One day, because my spot is like...

00:45:16.000 My spot was like two or three miles from my house.

00:45:21.000 So what I would do is I would go to the spot, work, and every time I'd get like $2,000, I'd run to the house and put it up and run back to the track because you don't want to be standing out on the track with too much money because the police come over, man, where you get $3,000?

00:45:32.000 What you doing standing out with all this money?

00:45:35.000 Problems.

00:45:36.000 So what I would do is every time I'd get a couple thousand dollars, I'd run to the house and put it up.

00:45:40.000 So my mom see me keep running the house, you know, back and forth, back and forth, all day long.

00:45:44.000 I'm doing this all day, all night.

00:45:45.000 I don't do nothing else.

00:45:46.000 I ain't got a girlfriend.

00:45:49.000 I'm single, right?

00:45:50.000 Right.

00:45:50.000 This is my love is to be out on the track.

00:45:53.000 I'm doing this 18, 19 hours a day.

00:45:55.000 Wow.

00:45:56.000 Sleeping, jumping right back in.

00:45:58.000 Yeah.

00:45:58.000 And all the time you're sleeping, you're losing money.

00:46:00.000 Sometimes I sleep in the car on the spot, you know?

00:46:03.000 Wow. 1.00

00:46:03.000 With shit on you? 1.00

00:46:05.000 Just a little bit, though. 1.00

00:46:07.000 Are you packing a gun?

00:46:08.000 Well, I got my boy standing out.

00:46:10.000 He's standing back.

00:46:11.000 Like, for instance, we stand out on the street and we call it curb service.

00:46:15.000 Now I would be standing out on the curb and then he would be sitting like in somebody's yard with the pistol.

00:46:21.000 So if somebody got at me or something like that, then he would just bust out and start running.

00:46:26.000 Right.

00:46:26.000 So he's from a different vantage point.

00:46:28.000 They don't even see him as a part of you.

00:46:30.000 They don't even see him as like the police.

00:46:32.000 If the police come and raid, they're going to grab us standing out on the block and they're not going to bother him because he's up in somebody's yard.

00:46:38.000 Right.

00:46:38.000 So, you know, we had a little crazy system that we had lined up, man.

00:46:42.000 That's brilliant.

00:46:44.000 So you had a spot, was like on a street corner or something like that?

00:46:51.000 81st in between Hoover and Vermont.

00:46:53.000 It was like apartment complexes, you know, a bunch of apartment complexes.

00:46:58.000 And how do you get a spot?

00:46:59.000 Do other dudes try to move in on your spot because they know that everybody goes there to buy?

00:47:03.000 Well, at that time, nobody was trying to move in on my spot because nobody really could get the cocaine.

00:47:08.000 They didn't know how valuable cocaine was.

00:47:12.000 They didn't really...

00:47:13.000 Really, I had abandoned the spot when other guys started coming in.

00:47:17.000 You know, I had gotten so big.

00:47:19.000 See, I didn't stay out on the streets long.

00:47:21.000 Because I took all my money and parlayed it back into the game.

00:47:23.000 So I got big so fast that I was able to then start selling these guys three grams.

00:47:32.000 And then they would go out and sell it.

00:47:34.000 And I was just making like $50, $75 off every three grams that I would sell them.

00:47:38.000 And that started to be so much money.

00:47:40.000 That I didn't even need to sell 50s and 100s anymore.

00:47:43.000 So people just, they became, you were like the main dude and everybody sold it for you.

00:47:49.000 Right, right.

00:47:50.000 So then where did you keep everything?

00:47:52.000 Did you have like a warehouse?

00:47:53.000 Like how did you have it set up so you could hide it?

00:47:55.000 Well eventually what I did is I set up spots.

00:47:58.000 Like say for instance if you, eventually when I got real big, I have like $50 spots.

00:48:04.000 And if you go to my spot and spend $50, Would be like going to somebody else's spot and spend a hundred dollars.

00:48:11.000 You could do what they call double up.

00:48:13.000 You could double your money.

00:48:14.000 You buy fifty dollars worth, you can make fifty more.

00:48:18.000 Now, if you would go there and you start buying those fifties and you get up to spending two thousand, then the people at that house would take you to another house where you would have to come there and spend two thousand.

00:48:29.000 Then if you got up to buying ten thousand, then you would get to go to another house.

00:48:33.000 And then we would have A lot of these $50 houses, they would be just all over the place.

00:48:39.000 And then it would just be a few $2,000 spots.

00:48:43.000 And then it would be even less $10,000 spots.

00:48:46.000 And this is all for distributors.

00:48:48.000 Right.

00:48:49.000 This is all for distributors.

00:48:50.000 So you had like distributing houses.

00:48:52.000 You had like a whole tier system.

00:48:54.000 Right.

00:48:54.000 Absolutely.

00:48:55.000 That's brilliant.

00:48:55.000 Absolutely.

00:48:56.000 I didn't know exactly how they called it at the time.

00:49:00.000 But I knew...

00:49:01.000 See, what I did is I dealt with people the way...

00:49:05.000 I wanted to be dealt with.

00:49:06.000 I knew the problems that I had when I was coming up, so I tried to cut out all their problems for them.

00:49:11.000 I didn't want them to have to deal with none of the headaches.

00:49:13.000 You know, not worrying about how to cook it, how to get it at a safe price, how to make sure that the place was safe.

00:49:21.000 I took care of all that for them.

00:49:23.000 When they came to me, they knew they was going to get their proper stuff.

00:49:27.000 They knew they weren't going to be robbed.

00:49:29.000 They knew how they would be able to re-up again.

00:49:32.000 Everything was like cookie cutter form almost.

00:49:35.000 Wow.

00:49:36.000 That's amazing.

00:49:37.000 So you're doing this for eight years.

00:49:39.000 You said from the beginning it was crazy, but when did you start getting legal problems?

00:49:45.000 Man, my problem started in around 86. How many years in was that?

00:49:50.000 Six years, six and a half years almost.

00:49:52.000 So what was it?

00:49:54.000 They started arresting you?

00:49:55.000 They started asking you where you're getting money from?

00:49:57.000 The Freeway Task Force, man, they started to go crazy.

00:50:00.000 First, they started to raid spots that we didn't even sell drugs at.

00:50:05.000 You know, they started raiding my girlfriend's houses and planting drugs on them, you know, because I didn't keep drugs at my girlfriend's house because I stayed there, you know.

00:50:14.000 But those were the easiest spots to figure out, you know, where that were connected to me, you know, where people came over because they would let their friends come over.

00:50:22.000 Like my work spots, you didn't come to my work spot unless you sold drugs.

00:50:26.000 Wasn't no need for you coming over there.

00:50:28.000 Don't even, you know, don't even ask where that's at.

00:50:30.000 Right.

00:50:30.000 So they raided my girlfriend's houses and then they would take them to jail for drugs and stuff like that there.

00:50:36.000 So I'm like, wow.

00:50:38.000 So then they started to get my guys.

00:50:40.000 You know, they started to catch my guys driving down the street, and they were playing drugs on them.

00:50:44.000 And it just got really crazy until it got to the point where one night I'm coming from a basketball gym.

00:50:52.000 I'm going to adjust your mic real quick.

00:50:53.000 Okay.

00:50:54.000 Just put it like this.

00:50:55.000 It makes a big difference when you're talking to it.

00:50:58.000 Yeah, all right.

00:50:58.000 Okay, there we go.

00:50:59.000 Yeah, so I'm riding down the street one day, and...

00:51:03.000 My and my guys, and we said, man, look at all the homies over there playing dice. 1.00

00:51:07.000 So they was at my tire shop. 0.99

00:51:09.000 So we jump out, go by, holler at them, you know, see who winning the crap game. 0.98

00:51:12.000 And when we get ready to leave, the whole crap game come with me, you know, like it's 10, 11 o'clock at night. 0.97

00:51:18.000 So they all want to walk me out to the car and make sure everything is good.

00:51:21.000 So I jump in the car and pull off, and I look in the rearview mirror, and it's a car following me with no lights on.

00:51:27.000 So, we're going to high-speed chase, you know, chase for a few minutes through the hood, trying to lose them, and then I look up, cars all around us coming, lights popping on, you know what I'm saying?

00:51:37.000 I'm like, oh man, set up.

00:51:39.000 So, uh...

00:51:41.000 I wind up getting out the car, jumping out the car, leave the car rolling, and jump out and get away.

00:51:46.000 Well, they shooting at me.

00:51:48.000 Police.

00:51:48.000 Bam, bam, bam, bam, bam.

00:51:50.000 Bullet's whizzing across my head and the whole nine yards.

00:51:54.000 And I get away.

00:51:56.000 So once I get away, the next morning my lawyer called me and said, man, you had two kilos of cocaine on you that night.

00:52:04.000 I said, man, I ain't had no cocaine that night.

00:52:07.000 He said, yeah, they said you had two keys of cocaine and you shot at the police.

00:52:12.000 So my mom called me, you know, she's crying. 0.86

00:52:17.000 Oh, the police been by here, raided the house, had everybody outside handcuffed and said they gonna kill you.

00:52:23.000 We want you to turn yourself in.

00:52:25.000 So her and my lawyer convinced me to turn myself in and we go in, we, you know, fight the case.

00:52:30.000 I wound up beating it, though, because the drugs were all planted.

00:52:33.000 How did they prove the drugs were planted?

00:52:35.000 Man, it was hard.

00:52:37.000 You know what I'm saying?

00:52:38.000 I stayed in jail for a while.

00:52:39.000 No bail.

00:52:40.000 They had me on a million dollar bail, 1251, where all the property and everything had to be inspected and make sure it wasn't drug proceeds and all that.

00:52:48.000 Man, it was crazy going through all that.

00:52:51.000 But while I was in jail, the cops come down to my cell to interrogate me.

00:52:57.000 So they pulled me out of the cell.

00:53:01.000 Take me to the back of the jail.

00:53:02.000 You know where they whoop people up at and stuff.

00:53:05.000 And starting to ask me a bunch of crazy questions about drugs and all this.

00:53:10.000 About my lawyer.

00:53:11.000 You know, your lawyer should have let you take the deal.

00:53:14.000 Who know why he think he's going to fight this case.

00:53:15.000 You ain't going to win.

00:53:16.000 We always get our man.

00:53:19.000 So during this time that they're interviewing me, they're recording everything.

00:53:23.000 and at the end of the the interrogation they tell me you better not tell your lawyer what happened if we find out that you told him we're gonna uh we're gonna take care of you so i don't even tell my lawyer so we get to court the next time we go to court and uh they got the guy on the witness stand he's testifying i said man you know that guy came down there and seen me like two weeks ago and so he thinking that i ain't gonna tell my lawyer never right So my lawyer sprang it on him,

00:53:53.000 like, man, you was at the county jail a couple weeks ago?

00:53:55.000 And he was like, yeah, because, you know, he signed in, so he knew he had to say yeah.

00:54:00.000 He said, you saw my client.

00:54:02.000 He's like, yeah.

00:54:02.000 He said, you knew he had a lawyer, didn't you?

00:54:04.000 And he's like, yeah, I knew he had a lawyer.

00:54:05.000 Now, don't you record all the conversations when you interview suspects?

00:54:09.000 He said, yeah, I want that tape.

00:54:11.000 He said, Yana, I want that tape.

00:54:12.000 And so they brought the tape in.

00:54:14.000 The tape was all spiced up and cut up and erased and all kind of stuff.

00:54:18.000 Really?

00:54:18.000 So the judge was like, man, get this case out of here.

00:54:21.000 Really?

00:54:22.000 But what they did is they took it to the feds.

00:54:26.000 And had the feds to indict me without the tape, you know, like that.

00:54:30.000 Lost the tape, you know, they never told the feds about the tape.

00:54:33.000 So the tape, so the feds indict me for that case.

00:54:37.000 But then when they do, I had hired a private investigator to invest the cops, to investigate the cops.

00:54:45.000 Then we show them.

00:54:45.000 Hey, look what we got on them.

00:54:47.000 You guys don't want to use them as witnesses.

00:54:49.000 That's hilarious.

00:54:51.000 What did you get on them?

00:54:52.000 Oh man, we had them beating people, playing drugs. 0.66

00:54:56.000 150 people got released from prison behind those cops doing what they did.

00:54:59.000 What a lot of people don't realize is how deep corruption is in some police forces, especially in Los Angeles at a certain point in time, especially like the Rampart District.

00:55:08.000 Like, people don't even know the story behind...

00:55:10.000 That was a criminal gang that was running...

00:55:13.000 Now, do you know Rampart was a fall off from the Freeway Task Force?

00:55:16.000 Really?

00:55:17.000 Yeah.

00:55:18.000 Freeway Task Force was the beginning of that whole thing.

00:55:21.000 The Freeway Task Force was the most elite task force in the country.

00:55:25.000 Just to get you?

00:55:26.000 Just to get me.

00:55:27.000 Wow.

00:55:28.000 I feel fortunate.

00:55:31.000 What's crazy is you're out now.

00:55:33.000 Does it feel weird to be a free man telling this story?

00:55:35.000 How many guys get their own task force?

00:55:37.000 Very few.

00:55:38.000 It was like one in a billion.

00:55:40.000 You get you a little rapper puppet, you know?

00:55:43.000 Hey! 0.99

00:55:44.000 You got a freeway task force, a rapper puppet. 1.00

00:55:48.000 You've lived a fucking charmed life. 1.00

00:55:49.000 You sold $600 million worth of coke, yet you're out on the street. 1.00

00:55:53.000 And now I might be finna get a judge.

00:55:55.000 Wow.

00:55:56.000 You might get a judge?

00:55:58.000 Yeah.

00:55:58.000 What do you mean?

00:55:59.000 In this case, you know, this judge might, I don't know.

00:56:03.000 Which case?

00:56:04.000 This Rick Ross case?

00:56:05.000 Yeah.

00:56:06.000 You think the judge is corrupt?

00:56:08.000 I don't know.

00:56:08.000 Is that what you're saying?

00:56:09.000 I don't know.

00:56:10.000 Are you investigating this judge?

00:56:11.000 I am, yeah.

00:56:12.000 Really?

00:56:14.000 Yeah, I think you should.

00:56:15.000 I mean, I want to know how she came to her conclusions.

00:56:17.000 You know, why?

00:56:18.000 Why did she? 0.99

00:56:18.000 Yeah, those are ridiculous conclusions. 0.99

00:56:20.000 Exactly. 0.96

00:56:21.000 So I want to get to the bottom of it.

00:56:22.000 I'm going to get to the bottom of it, you know.

00:56:24.000 Well, have you found anything?

00:56:25.000 You probably can't talk about it, right?

00:56:27.000 Is she a Freemason?

00:56:28.000 A little bit, a little bit, you know.

00:56:30.000 He ain't no Freemason.

00:56:31.000 He ain't no Freemason.

00:56:33.000 He means the judge.

00:56:35.000 Yeah, but he's not either supposedly right.

00:56:37.000 Is he supposed to be a Freemason or something?

00:56:40.000 The rapper.

00:56:40.000 Rick Ross is supposed to be a Freemason?

00:56:42.000 The fake Rick Ross?

00:56:42.000 He said that before.

00:56:43.000 What should we call him? 0.99

00:56:44.000 What the fuck is his name again? 0.99

00:56:45.000 Billy Bob. 1.00

00:56:46.000 Let's call him Fat Bill.

00:56:48.000 So Fat Bill is supposed to be a Freemason too?

00:56:51.000 I don't know.

00:56:52.000 He said it on a couple songs or something like that.

00:56:54.000 Wow.

00:56:55.000 Okay.

00:56:56.000 But I know the Masons are not really happy with it. 0.94

00:56:58.000 Oh, really?

00:56:59.000 That's hilarious.

00:57:00.000 Yeah, they contacted me.

00:57:00.000 They're not happy with that at all.

00:57:02.000 Wow, so you get arrested.

00:57:05.000 So eventually, how do you wind up getting taken down?

00:57:08.000 You got through all this.

00:57:10.000 You got through this one case where they try to plant two kilos on you.

00:57:13.000 More supplier, Danilo Blandon.

00:57:17.000 He brings me down.

00:57:18.000 Your supplier brought you down.

00:57:20.000 This was the Nicaraguan guy.

00:57:22.000 Yeah, he brought me down.

00:57:23.000 He gave you up.

00:57:24.000 Gave me up.

00:57:26.000 And this is...

00:57:27.000 Delivered me.

00:57:28.000 Oh. 0.99

00:57:29.000 And this is while the Oliver North shit, all that was going down? 0.99

00:57:33.000 Was this before that? 0.99

00:57:34.000 I think it was after that.

00:57:35.000 It was after that.

00:57:36.000 Ali had got his pardon.

00:57:37.000 I need a pardon, too.

00:57:39.000 Anybody out there know Obama, tell him I'm looking for a pardon.

00:57:42.000 I did my part.

00:57:43.000 I mean, why shouldn't I get a library like Reagan?

00:57:47.000 That's hilarious.

00:57:48.000 That's so true, too, right?

00:57:50.000 If you really find out.

00:57:52.000 People think that this is nonsense.

00:57:54.000 The connection between the CIA and selling drugs has been pretty well documented.

00:57:58.000 Go look up a case on a guy named Barry Seal. 0.99

00:58:01.000 Barry Seal was a guy out of Mena, Arkansas, who was, by the way, that's Bill Clinton's fucking stomping grounds. 0.99

00:58:08.000 That's where they were dropping coke. 0.97

00:58:10.000 They were flying coke in from South America, and they were dropping it off in Mena, Arkansas.

00:58:14.000 And the story goes, two kids see the drop. 0.97

00:58:18.000 They catch the kids and kill them.

00:58:20.000 And then they put the kids on the train tracks and say that the kids fell asleep on train tracks. 0.78

00:58:25.000 They were high and they fell asleep and they got run over by trains.

00:58:27.000 So the parents do an autopsy on the bodies and they find knife wounds.

00:58:31.000 Wow.

00:58:31.000 So they find out, no, no, these kids were murdered.

00:58:33.000 They go into the story.

00:58:34.000 It turns out Barry Seals gets busted because it was his plane that was coming in at that time.

00:58:39.000 And then they find out about the coke and he gives up all the information.

00:58:42.000 They wind up assassinating him when he was on his way to trial.

00:58:44.000 Well, man, Gary Webb killed himself, shot himself in the head twice.

00:58:47.000 Twice.

00:58:48.000 With a shotgun.

00:58:49.000 Was it a shotgun he shot himself in the head twice with?

00:58:52.000 I think so.

00:58:52.000 I haven't saw the reports, but I think that's what somebody said was a shotgun.

00:58:56.000 Wow.

00:58:56.000 Yeah.

00:58:57.000 How do you shoot yourself in the head twice?

00:58:59.000 It seems like...

00:59:00.000 You didn't do the job.

00:59:01.000 Yeah.

00:59:01.000 You had a job to do and you didn't finish it.

00:59:03.000 That doesn't seem to make sense to me.

00:59:05.000 Take care of it.

00:59:06.000 I've heard it's possible to shoot yourself in the head twice, but that's also the dude who was the whistleblower for Enron, shot himself in the head twice.

00:59:13.000 Oh, yeah?

00:59:13.000 Yeah.

00:59:14.000 Not too suspicious, right?

00:59:15.000 This gigantic multi-billionaire scam goes down. 1.00

00:59:18.000 One motherfucker starts ratting people out, winds up shooting himself in a car twice in the head. 1.00

00:59:24.000 Wow. 1.00

00:59:24.000 Really? 1.00

00:59:25.000 How many people have committed suicide by a gunshot to the head twice?

00:59:28.000 I mean, I've seen people get knocked out with like a little bitty punch.

00:59:32.000 And you tell me you shoot at yourself and you're awake after that?

00:59:36.000 They had good willpower.

00:59:37.000 Yeah, I guess.

00:59:37.000 Make sure the job was done.

00:59:39.000 Well, I guess if you had any strength left, if you shot yourself in the head and you realized you were still alive and you had any strength left, you would probably shoot yourself in the head. 1.00

00:59:46.000 You know, you'd be like, what the fuck? 1.00

00:59:48.000 I'm gonna just bleed out here in the car? 1.00

00:59:51.000 Americans buy anything.

00:59:53.000 Yeah.

00:59:54.000 So do you think Gary Webb was murdered?

00:59:56.000 I mean, his book, Dark Alliance, essentially what happened is it started out a bunch of articles written for the San Jose Mercury News and it was later published as a book.

01:00:03.000 And in a three-part series, he investigated the Nicaraguan linked to the CIA-backed Contras who had allegedly...

01:00:10.000 It's like he exposed the whole thing and brought the Reagan administration into light and exposed them for essentially being drug dealers.

01:00:18.000 Absolutely.

01:00:19.000 And Gary was an amazing man.

01:00:20.000 I mean, you know, he's the one who stopped...

01:00:23.000 The forfeiture laws.

01:00:24.000 You know, they used to take your property before you were found guilty of a drug crime.

01:00:29.000 And Gary made them stop that and said, hey, at least you got to take this guy to trial, find out he was selling drugs before you take his property.

01:00:35.000 Because before, they would take your property, sell it, and then you get kicked out of prison and you never got convicted.

01:00:40.000 And they'd be like, oh, well, your car is gone.

01:00:42.000 Well, what's hilarious is if you look at how the Patriot Act has been used, you know, how many times the Patriot Act has actually been used for terrorism, it's a tiny, tiny, tiny fraction because the Patriot Act classifies drug selling Yeah.

01:01:05.000 Yeah.

01:01:06.000 fall.

01:01:07.000 It's kind of cute.

01:01:08.000 It's kind of cute how they've figured out how to circumvent the system.

01:01:11.000 Absolutely.

01:01:11.000 I mean, it's crazy the way I saw a thing on CNN the other night, and they were talking about how California has built so many prisons and absolutely no colleges in the past 10 years.

01:01:25.000 I'm like...

01:01:26.000 What happened to an ounce of prevention?

01:01:31.000 We're going with pounds and tons of cure, but no prevention.

01:01:35.000 Well, the worst thing ever happened that could be possible.

01:01:38.000 They made private prisons. 0.99

01:01:39.000 They made it profitable for people to put people in jail, which is fucking insane. 1.00

01:01:44.000 That's some Orwellian shit. 1.00

01:01:46.000 That's some shit that should have been taking place. 1.00

01:01:49.000 It is slavery. 1.00

01:01:50.000 It is slavery.

01:01:51.000 It's 100% slavery, especially when you have certain government organizations that lobby to keep certain things illegal, like drug selling, like nonviolent crimes, like nonviolent drug offenses.

01:02:00.000 When you're telling someone that they don't have control over their own consciousness and because they don't agree with you as to what they can and can't do, you're going to lock them in a cage and profit from it.

01:02:11.000 That's amazing.

01:02:12.000 It's a great business for somebody. 0.78

01:02:13.000 That's fucking amazing, though, that in 2012, with all the access to information that we have today, that that's still a legal thing. 0.95

01:02:21.000 I mean, it's just another piece of perfect advice or perfect information, rather, that shows you how corrupt the system is. 0.97

01:02:29.000 Yeah, it's incredible.

01:02:31.000 It's incredible when you really stop and think about how many prisoners there are.

01:02:34.000 Well, that's good that we got people like you, though, bringing this stuff to light.

01:02:37.000 I mean, I don't see why more people don't stand up, you know, but I guess people saw what happened to Gary and they're like, sure.

01:02:43.000 Yeah, right.

01:02:44.000 Me go out there and put my job on the line and my family and their well-being. 0.98

01:02:48.000 I want to expose shit that's already been exposed. 0.95

01:02:50.000 I come in like third, fourth, fifth, sixth. 0.99

01:02:53.000 I'm not the number one guy breaking the news.

01:02:56.000 So you make sure it's safe. 0.99

01:02:57.000 Shit's already clear. 0.99

01:02:58.000 It's already on the internet. 0.99

01:03:00.000 By the time I hear about it, I'm like a third-hand reporter.

01:03:03.000 Somebody finds it on the internet, they tweet me, I find out about it, and then I go with it.

01:03:08.000 But I actually found out about you through Kevin Booth's documentary, The Great White Hope, American Drug War.

01:03:15.000 Yeah, Kevin's a good guy.

01:03:16.000 Kevin, you know, kept an eye on me when I was in prison, you know, wrote me.

01:03:21.000 I could call Kevin.

01:03:22.000 He interviewed you from prison as well, right?

01:03:24.000 He did, he did.

01:03:25.000 When I met with Kevin, Kevin made my life a little easier while I was in prison, you know.

01:03:29.000 Shout out to Kevin Booth.

01:03:30.000 Kevin produced my first DVD. My first comedy DVD. 1999?

01:03:36.000 2000?

01:03:36.000 I read the book that his buddy wrote.

01:03:40.000 Bill Hicks.

01:03:41.000 Yeah.

01:03:43.000 Kevin's a good guy though.

01:03:44.000 Yeah, he became who he is because of his friendship with Bill Hicks.

01:03:49.000 He used to follow Bill Hicks around and record him.

01:03:52.000 Bill Hicks, as far as stand-up comedians are concerned, one of the top 10 greatest comedians of all time, for sure.

01:03:59.000 Right up there with a lot of people like Richard Breyer.

01:04:01.000 Even though he didn't live very long, died of pancreatic cancer when he was only in his young 30s.

01:04:08.000 So he creates this documentary, The American Drug War, and that's how I heard about you.

01:04:12.000 And that's how I heard about it.

01:04:13.000 Because I had already heard about Barry Seals and Barry Seals and his connection with the CIA and selling drugs.

01:04:20.000 But I didn't know of any one person like you who could be directly connected to the dude that was connected to Nicaragua, that was connected to Oliver North and the whole chain of events.

01:04:32.000 Absolutely, absolutely.

01:04:33.000 I think when Blandon testified against me, He talked about his boss going on a fishing ship with George Bush, Sr. Wow.

01:04:45.000 When Barry Seale was murdered, he had George Bush's phone number in his pocket.

01:04:51.000 Deep.

01:04:52.000 As deep as it gets.

01:04:54.000 Might have been a tracking device in that phone number.

01:04:56.000 We know where you at.

01:04:57.000 And meanwhile, no one goes to jail.

01:05:00.000 No one on that side goes to jail.

01:05:02.000 Oh, yeah.

01:05:02.000 Nothing.

01:05:02.000 No one goes to jail.

01:05:03.000 Why should they?

01:05:04.000 It's amazing.

01:05:05.000 They make the laws. 0.99

01:05:06.000 But how the fuck did they let you out? 0.99

01:05:08.000 Me? 0.98

01:05:08.000 How's that work? 0.98

01:05:08.000 Yeah. 0.98

01:05:09.000 You went in for 20 years?

01:05:11.000 I had a life sentence, man.

01:05:13.000 And how'd you get out early?

01:05:15.000 Learning how to read and write and study the law and found a loophole.

01:05:19.000 What was the loophole?

01:05:21.000 Well, what they did is they charged me under the three-strike law.

01:05:24.000 And what they were saying is that since I had got convicted in all these different states, that those added up to three strikes.

01:05:33.000 But what they didn't see in the law is that in order to get struck out, you have to go to prison, get out, then commit another crime, Go to prison, get out, and then commit the third one.

01:05:48.000 And that's three strikes.

01:05:49.000 So they can't get you on three felonies before you're ever convicted.

01:05:53.000 Right.

01:05:53.000 That's not three strikes.

01:05:54.000 Right.

01:05:55.000 It's not three strikes.

01:05:57.000 Safe ends and what I use is a guy standing out.

01:06:00.000 When I used to stand out on the street, I used to make hundreds of sales a day.

01:06:04.000 Right there on that one block.

01:06:06.000 So I said, now...

01:06:08.000 If somebody wanted to, they could have gave me a hundred convictions.

01:06:12.000 Right.

01:06:13.000 Because I sold to different people every time.

01:06:14.000 Right.

01:06:15.000 So, I didn't believe that the law meant that every sale you made was a separate conviction.

01:06:21.000 I believe that they meant just like I just explained to you.

01:06:25.000 Right, right, right.

01:06:25.000 Because if so, then everybody who ever sold cocaine would have three strikes.

01:06:29.000 And it makes sense because the idea is supposed to be, theoretically, that jail is supposed to be able to rehabilitate you.

01:06:35.000 Exactly. 0.83

01:06:36.000 So, if you are unrehabilitatable, if you've gone through two separate times and you're still out doing the same shit, alright, well this dude's a career criminal, this is his third offense, done. 0.98

01:06:46.000 That makes sense. 0.94

01:06:46.000 And that's how the law was rolled up. 0.94

01:06:48.000 Even though I don't believe you should play baseball with people's lives.

01:06:50.000 Right.

01:06:51.000 Because a person could not be changed at one time and then be changed tomorrow.

01:06:55.000 And then the circumstances change and he may be in a different position.

01:06:58.000 Right.

01:06:58.000 You know, before you can start passing judgment on people, you have to live in their shoes.

01:07:03.000 Right.

01:07:03.000 And, you know, that's why people ask me now, how do I feel about drug dealers?

01:07:07.000 And I'm like, I ain't got nothing against them.

01:07:09.000 Right.

01:07:10.000 And they do what they feel like they got to do or what they know they got to do.

01:07:13.000 So...

01:07:14.000 Before we pass judgment, we have to get all the facts and live in that person's shoes to see if we would do the same thing that they did.

01:07:21.000 And you're a perfect example of that.

01:07:23.000 Absolutely.

01:07:24.000 Now, you went away for 20 years.

01:07:26.000 You find this loophole.

01:07:27.000 How deep into your sentence had you already figured out how to read?

01:07:31.000 How long did it take you?

01:07:32.000 I started reading immediately.

01:07:33.000 Right away?

01:07:34.000 Yeah.

01:07:34.000 You took classes there in prison?

01:07:36.000 No.

01:07:37.000 Me and my Sally taught me how to read.

01:07:38.000 He made me some cue cards with my ABCs on them.

01:07:41.000 Oh, cool.

01:07:41.000 I went from nose to...

01:07:44.000 Reading my indictment, to reading the newspapers, to reading law books.

01:07:48.000 I mean, you know, for the first time what I found out is that I had never wanted to read before in my life.

01:07:53.000 That was the real problem.

01:07:54.000 I never really wanted to read.

01:07:56.000 I mean, I didn't see any reason why Jack and Jill went up the hill and why I should know.

01:08:04.000 You know what I'm saying?

01:08:05.000 They didn't have...

01:08:06.000 They wasn't chasing no money.

01:08:07.000 I was chasing money.

01:08:08.000 Right, right, right.

01:08:09.000 It wasn't interesting to you.

01:08:11.000 It wasn't interesting to me.

01:08:12.000 But then, once you realized, well, there's a lot of information that I don't have access to...

01:08:17.000 I became an advocate reader.

01:08:19.000 I read over 300 books before I left prison.

01:08:21.000 Really?

01:08:21.000 Yeah.

01:08:22.000 Wow.

01:08:22.000 You've read more books than I have in my lifetime.

01:08:25.000 So you're in prison.

01:08:27.000 You're learning how to read.

01:08:28.000 At what point in time did you start devising a plan to try to figure out a way to get out of there?

01:08:36.000 Immediately I was trying to get out.

01:08:38.000 I knew that the guys that were going home Was the guys that was going to the law library learning how to become lawyers.

01:08:45.000 You know, they knew how to fight the system.

01:08:47.000 And then they had, like, guys that all they did all day was sit there and study the law.

01:08:50.000 You know, they would sit at a table while other people were playing cards and chess and dominoes.

01:08:56.000 They would be studying the law.

01:08:57.000 So I got in with those guys.

01:08:59.000 That's got to be kind of a crazy feeling, man. 1.00

01:09:01.000 Everybody's just hoping you can crack this fucking system that's got you locked up. 0.99

01:09:05.000 Woo-wee, it's tough. 1.00

01:09:06.000 I mean, your head starts to hurt daily.

01:09:09.000 You got, like, migraine headaches.

01:09:11.000 And you're sitting in this concrete building.

01:09:13.000 I'm going to try to draw a picture for you.

01:09:16.000 You're sitting in this concrete building.

01:09:17.000 It's 28 stories high.

01:09:20.000 Nothing but concrete and steel.

01:09:22.000 The windows are about 3 inches wide, open, and about 6 feet long.

01:09:30.000 Escape looks almost impossible.

01:09:34.000 But, you know, you think about that too.

01:09:35.000 Like, if I had a long rope, I could scale the side of the building.

01:09:39.000 So, uh...

01:09:40.000 It's like a desperation, you know, and you say, man, it gotta be one loophole in these books because you know that if you can show them in the book where they made a mistake or where the book says that they should have did this when they did that, then you know you got action.

01:09:57.000 So you're getting headaches just from thinking and reading too much?

01:10:00.000 Yeah, that's all you want to do.

01:10:01.000 You just want to stay in them books.

01:10:03.000 I got a life sentence.

01:10:05.000 When you got a life sentence, it's like, this is forever.

01:10:08.000 This is all you're going to see for the rest of your life.

01:10:13.000 I didn't think that was fitting for me.

01:10:15.000 It's amazing that they convicted you for life on that three strikes law.

01:10:18.000 It seems like you should be able to go after them for abusing the law, which should be criminal.

01:10:23.000 Well, you can't go after a federal prosecutor.

01:10:25.000 He's immune from prosecution because he's not working as an individual.

01:10:32.000 Even if it's been proven that he's corrupt?

01:10:34.000 Well, maybe if you can prove he's corrupt, but not because he's unjustly incompetent in your case.

01:10:42.000 You know, if he does something to you, you know, he could charge you with a thousand keys even though you only have one.

01:10:49.000 And if you got a thousand keys, that gives you a life sentence.

01:10:51.000 If you got one, you can get probation.

01:10:54.000 But if it's powder.

01:10:57.000 That's a thing people don't know about.

01:10:59.000 That's another good point.

01:11:00.000 Not crack.

01:11:01.000 Because crack was in the ghetto and powder was all these other people, these people that had money, were using the powder.

01:11:09.000 Crack is way more illegal.

01:11:11.000 Yeah, it was 100 to 1. 100 to 1. Wow.

01:11:15.000 That's incredible.

01:11:16.000 Is that racist?

01:11:18.000 Very racist.

01:11:18.000 It has to be, right?

01:11:19.000 And I think...

01:11:20.000 I mean, and even though they just changed it 18 to 1, I think that was still...

01:11:25.000 Why isn't it one-to-one?

01:11:26.000 And that's what I said, because they already proved...

01:11:29.000 You know, I sat down on the couch with the guy who invented the law.

01:11:32.000 Really?

01:11:32.000 Yeah, it's going to be in the documentary.

01:11:34.000 Sick, sick, sick documentary.

01:11:36.000 After you're out, you sat down with them? 0.97

01:11:37.000 Yeah, I've been doing that since I've been out.

01:11:39.000 I've been doing a documentary since I've been out.

01:11:42.000 And one of the things that I got mad about, even with Obama and his administration, is that they didn't make it one-to-one.

01:11:48.000 And then even after they made it 18-to-one, they left it for guys that have been in 20 years, 25 years.

01:11:54.000 They didn't make it retroactive.

01:11:56.000 Meaning that they don't get out.

01:11:57.000 They don't get no benefit from the 18 to 1. These guys right now, if they had the 18 to 1, they would walk out of prison today.

01:12:05.000 Wow.

01:12:06.000 So I'm saying if it's wrong today, And you did it 20 years ago was wronged in.

01:12:11.000 Right.

01:12:11.000 But they saying, oh, well, they lost their...

01:12:15.000 Because, you know, Clinton signed a bill where you're 2255, you got one year after you're convicted to come up with newly discovered evidence.

01:12:22.000 And the law is crazy, man.

01:12:23.000 Like right now, say if you go to prison unjustly and you do all your appeals and everything, one year, you got one year to prove yourself innocent.

01:12:34.000 Now, after that one year...

01:12:37.000 If you don't find it, and then a day after that one, you find this newly discovered evidence, you can't even submit it to the court.

01:12:44.000 That's got to be maddening.

01:12:46.000 It's maddening.

01:12:47.000 They got guys in there that found newly discovered evidence that they can't even submit it for anybody to hear it.

01:12:53.000 So when you went to jail for this and when you finally in prison, was this the first time you had ever been in prison other than the one time you got arrested and you stayed in there for a while?

01:13:02.000 No, no.

01:13:03.000 That was my second time when I got the life sentence.

01:13:05.000 I've been in jail twice.

01:13:06.000 So you had two strikes.

01:13:07.000 You had one strike already.

01:13:08.000 I had one strike already.

01:13:09.000 And how long did you go away for the first time?

01:13:11.000 Five and a half years.

01:13:12.000 Wow.

01:13:13.000 And the second time I was entrapped.

01:13:15.000 I didn't even go into that part with you.

01:13:17.000 I was entrapped because I wasn't selling drugs.

01:13:19.000 I was building a youth center because what I did is I figured out what kids in the ghetto need.

01:13:27.000 To get them out of gangs and drugs.

01:13:28.000 I know what they need.

01:13:30.000 What do they need?

01:13:32.000 I bought a theater.

01:13:33.000 They need some instructions.

01:13:35.000 They need somebody to come and walk them through it.

01:13:38.000 Somebody they can go and talk to when they need to talk to them.

01:13:42.000 Not talk to them once they've already been corrupted and their heads are already in the game.

01:13:46.000 They don't want to hear you then.

01:13:47.000 I already got my mind made up.

01:13:49.000 I know what I'm doing.

01:13:49.000 I'm my own man.

01:13:51.000 But before they get like that, they need somebody, a place that they can go and they could talk to Joe Rogan or Rick Ross or Magic Johnson or Oprah Winfrey or some of these other people who could teach them how to make money other ways.

01:14:07.000 You know, because in the ghetto, you know the first business you see in the ghetto, you know what the first business is?

01:14:11.000 What?

01:14:12.000 The drug man.

01:14:13.000 He's going to be the first businessman that you see in South Central Los Angeles. 0.66

01:14:18.000 He's going to be the drug man. 0.94

01:14:19.000 And especially a black man as a business owner because we don't own nothing in South Central. 0.96

01:14:24.000 So you said you got set up.

01:14:29.000 This is the last time?

01:14:30.000 Yeah, yeah, when I got to Life Center.

01:14:32.000 This guy called me.

01:14:33.000 I'm not selling drugs.

01:14:34.000 You weren't selling drugs at all?

01:14:35.000 No, no.

01:14:36.000 How did you stop?

01:14:36.000 I hadn't sold drugs in...

01:14:39.000 Six years, seven years.

01:14:40.000 What?

01:14:41.000 How did you stop?

01:14:42.000 I just quit.

01:14:43.000 Did you quit after you got arrested the first time?

01:14:45.000 No, no, no.

01:14:46.000 I quit a year and a half before I went to prison.

01:14:48.000 I was like, man, I'm through with this.

01:14:50.000 I got $800,000, $900,000 cash.

01:14:53.000 I got property all over the place.

01:14:55.000 All I got to do now is make this property and stuff work for me.

01:14:58.000 And, you know, I got enough money to hold me off for a while.

01:15:01.000 I'm through with it.

01:15:02.000 So I walked away from the game.

01:15:04.000 So I'm confused on your timeline here, because when you were 20 years old, that's when you started, and then when you were 28, you got arrested.

01:15:11.000 Right.

01:15:12.000 But you did five years in jail.

01:15:14.000 Right.

01:15:15.000 Where's the five years?

01:15:16.000 I did the five years in 89 I went to prison.

01:15:20.000 How old were you then?

01:15:22.000 28. Like 28 and a half.

01:15:23.000 Okay, so 28 and a half.

01:15:24.000 You go to jail for five years, and then you get out for how long?

01:15:27.000 I got out for six months.

01:15:29.000 For six months, and then they give you the life sentence.

01:15:31.000 Right.

01:15:32.000 Whoa. 1.00

01:15:33.000 Goddamn. 1.00

01:15:34.000 So the life sentence is a total setup. 0.99

01:15:37.000 Total setup.

01:15:38.000 Total entrapment.

01:15:39.000 I was not selling drugs.

01:15:41.000 Danilo called me.

01:15:42.000 Matter of fact, he called me the day I got out of prison.

01:15:45.000 Whoa.

01:15:46.000 He was like, man, I need to see you.

01:15:48.000 I was like, man, I'm kicking it with my mom.

01:15:49.000 You know, my mom came and seen me and stuff like that.

01:15:52.000 So I'm like, I'm kicking it with my mom.

01:15:53.000 I'm cool.

01:15:54.000 I'll holler at you in a couple days.

01:15:56.000 When I finally go and holler at him, he's telling me, oh, man, I got it at this price, I got it at that price.

01:16:01.000 I was like, what?

01:16:01.000 That's a good price.

01:16:05.000 And all this is recorded, too, so, you know, that didn't help.

01:16:08.000 You know, they was like, oh, you were interested.

01:16:11.000 Wow.

01:16:11.000 So this went on for six months that he courted me, you know, caught on me, dropping the price, dropping the price.

01:16:18.000 Motherfucker. 0.99

01:16:19.000 And then one day he caught me, and I was riding with one of my little homies, Chico Brown. 1.00

01:16:26.000 I said, man, this dude just told me, woo woo woo, but Chico's like, man, I can sell all that.

01:16:33.000 And that's how I got started.

01:16:35.000 So I wind up making an introduction to the two of them, Chico handing the money, and police come from everywhere.

01:16:41.000 So you never even got to sell?

01:16:43.000 No, I never sold it.

01:16:44.000 So this guy, where is he now, Danilo?

01:16:48.000 He's in Nicaragua.

01:16:49.000 Just chilling.

01:16:50.000 He's supposed to be in the documentary too.

01:16:52.000 Really?

01:16:53.000 Yeah.

01:16:54.000 Y'all better check that documentary out.

01:16:55.000 It's going to be dope.

01:16:56.000 Wow, that sounds awesome.

01:16:57.000 And we're going to have a cop that planted drugs.

01:17:02.000 Whoa.

01:17:03.000 Do you have proof that he planted the drugs?

01:17:06.000 I know he planned the drugs.

01:17:08.000 He went to jail.

01:17:09.000 No, I don't think he's going to admit he planned the drugs, but he went to jail for it.

01:17:12.000 He went to jail for planting those drugs?

01:17:14.000 For corruption, you know, beating people, planting drugs, lying on police reports.

01:17:18.000 It was a habit.

01:17:20.000 That's how he was doing it.

01:17:21.000 Well, I mean, he made money, man.

01:17:23.000 Yeah, well, that's where the Rampart comes in.

01:17:24.000 I mean, for people who don't know, most police officers at this point in time believe that Suge Knight hired cops to kill Biggie Smalls.

01:17:33.000 And that they also, he probably also had Tupac killed.

01:17:37.000 And that he did it all under this Rampart division.

01:17:42.000 This Rampart division was working for him.

01:17:44.000 I mean, there's a huge Rolling Stone article about it. 0.99

01:17:46.000 It's fascinating, fascinating shit that the cops were so dirty That the cops were working with gang members. 0.99

01:17:53.000 They were working with murderers, working with criminals, and making money, clearly, profiting. 0.99

01:17:58.000 Well, you know, cops, man, they're just like everybody else, you know?

01:18:02.000 They lie, cheat, and all other things that the normal person go through in life.

01:18:07.000 So, I don't put nothing past them.

01:18:09.000 Especially when you start putting all that money on the table.

01:18:11.000 You know, I remember my first young guy who got arrested by him.

01:18:14.000 And they stole his money.

01:18:16.000 He was like 16 years old.

01:18:18.000 And he called me.

01:18:19.000 He was like, Rick, man, the cops just raided my house.

01:18:22.000 I was like, yeah, you alright?

01:18:23.000 And he was like, yeah, I'm cool.

01:18:25.000 I was like, what you have?

01:18:26.000 He's like, man, I had like $40,000.

01:18:28.000 I said, what happened?

01:18:30.000 He said, man, they asked me who money was, and I told him it wasn't mine.

01:18:33.000 They told me to go.

01:18:35.000 Wow.

01:18:37.000 So when he got out, when I got with him, you know, we called the lawyer and told the lawyer, hey, man, it was $40,000 at that house, but wasn't no drug.

01:18:44.000 So he called, and they said, man, wasn't no money at that house.

01:18:48.000 Wow.

01:18:49.000 That's super common, right?

01:18:51.000 Yeah, yeah.

01:18:51.000 That happens all the time.

01:18:52.000 There's no one policing the police.

01:18:55.000 There's no one governing the government.

01:18:57.000 It's tough.

01:18:58.000 You know, that's the real issue.

01:19:00.000 They got the guns.

01:19:01.000 Yeah.

01:19:02.000 Well, not only that, they can change the laws. 0.99

01:19:04.000 I mean, we see what the fuck is going on now with this country. 0.51

01:19:06.000 It's like every week they come up with some new, even more restrictive, even more Orwellian law that gets through that allows them to tap your phones with no wire, with no warrants, rather. 0.99

01:19:17.000 You know, listening in on your phone calls, tap your fucking GPS systems, they can follow everywhere you go, and they can do all this shit without warrants now. 0.97

01:19:26.000 Yeah. 0.99

01:19:26.000 I mean, and they do it supposedly under the guise of terrorism, but it's really under the guise of making it easier for them to prosecute you for whatever the fuck they want to, because there's a goddamn business in locking people up in cages. 0.99

01:19:38.000 Exactly, exactly. 0.96

01:19:39.000 So that's what they're into.

01:19:41.000 So you find your loophole and then you chase after it.

01:19:44.000 You're in jail, right?

01:19:45.000 And then once you find this loophole...

01:19:47.000 I remember that day when I read it in the book, you know, it was like, man, it just like popped out at me.

01:19:52.000 Boom! 0.99

01:19:53.000 Go to jail, commit a crime, and get released.

01:19:58.000 I shot to the phone and I called my lawyer.

01:20:00.000 I said, man, I found it.

01:20:01.000 Wow.

01:20:02.000 So what happens then?

01:20:04.000 Well, it was discouraging what he said after he read it.

01:20:06.000 He didn't see it the same way I did. 1.00

01:20:09.000 Damn, you're a better lawyer than your fucking lawyer. 1.00

01:20:11.000 He graduated from Harvard. 1.00

01:20:14.000 That's hilarious.

01:20:15.000 Wow.

01:20:16.000 I should get an honorary degree from Harvard or something.

01:20:18.000 Yeah, you should get a little something.

01:20:19.000 Yeah, so I just told him, or put it on the books, you know, then the judge went through her thing.

01:20:24.000 Oh, no, Mr. Ross, it's not the way you say it is.

01:20:27.000 I was like, she must can't read.

01:20:30.000 If she can't read that, she can't read.

01:20:32.000 So then the prosecutor went through his whole thing, but then I went to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, and they agreed with me totally, you know, said that if they did it the way they were saying do it, that they would lock up everybody would be career criminals on their first arrest.

01:20:47.000 Yeah, literally, everybody would be in life.

01:20:50.000 Here I am.

01:20:51.000 Here I am.

01:20:52.000 A free man.

01:20:53.000 So, Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, they agree with you.

01:20:58.000 They side with you.

01:20:59.000 You released immediately?

01:21:00.000 No, I had nine more years to do.

01:21:02.000 Jesus Christ!

01:21:04.000 Why nine more years?

01:21:06.000 Uh, that's just where it was.

01:21:08.000 You know, that's how much time I had left.

01:21:09.000 Okay, so you had 20 to life?

01:21:12.000 Because they cut me down.

01:21:12.000 No, no, I had a life, but they cut me down to 20. So the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals cut you down to 20?

01:21:18.000 Mm-hmm.

01:21:19.000 Okay, so at least you knew there was a light at the end of the tunnel then.

01:21:22.000 Right, right.

01:21:23.000 Oh, I was happy with that.

01:21:25.000 You were happy with that?

01:21:26.000 Yeah, I was going to lead a penitentiary because I was up at Lompoc Penitentiary, you know, USP Lompoc.

01:21:30.000 And what is that place like?

01:21:32.000 Oh, man, that's a dungeon, you know?

01:21:33.000 Everybody in there got 40 years or better.

01:21:36.000 You know, they mad at you up there if you got 20. You know, they got to get you out of there with 20 years.

01:21:40.000 You know, something might happen to you.

01:21:42.000 Really?

01:21:42.000 Man, yeah.

01:21:43.000 Those guys got 40 years.

01:21:45.000 20 years is freedom.

01:21:45.000 20 years is you're almost free.

01:21:47.000 Yeah, you got to walk on eggshells around here.

01:21:50.000 If you have 20 years.

01:21:51.000 Man, you ain't got for 20 years.

01:21:53.000 You better go away from here.

01:21:54.000 Wow.

01:21:55.000 That's how they talk to you.

01:21:56.000 They were like mad at you.

01:21:57.000 Oh, they'd be mad at you.

01:21:58.000 They're mad at you if you only got 20 years.

01:22:00.000 Yeah.

01:22:01.000 If you got 30 years, they might be mad. 0.99

01:22:03.000 Goddamn, that's hilarious. 0.99

01:22:05.000 Yeah. 0.99

01:22:05.000 Hilarious and dark. 0.99

01:22:06.000 I mean, you can get hurt.

01:22:06.000 You can get hurt there just because you got 20 years.

01:22:10.000 How did you stay out of danger?

01:22:12.000 Well, like I said, when I got my time cut, I only had to stay there like three more months, and I was out of there.

01:22:17.000 So it was easy for me, and, you know, I'm a well-liked guy, too.

01:22:22.000 You were in jail?

01:22:23.000 Yeah, yeah, they liked me.

01:22:24.000 How dangerous was the prison that you were in initially, the first prison before they moved you out?

01:22:29.000 Oh, man, I saw guys get hit in the head with iron mop ringers. 0.87

01:22:33.000 Iron what?

01:22:34.000 Mop ringers.

01:22:35.000 A mop ringer?

01:22:35.000 Which you ring the mop out with.

01:22:36.000 It's this great big old thing might weigh about 15, 20 pounds.

01:22:39.000 Yeah.

01:22:40.000 You know, a guy sitting in his chair and a guy walks up behind him and just smashes his skull with it.

01:22:45.000 I mean, brutal, brutal, brutal, brutal sight.

01:22:48.000 I seen a guy get beat with a baseball bat, aluminum baseball bat, until his head was like mush.

01:22:54.000 They had to helicopter him out on the helicopter.

01:22:58.000 I think he had brain damage, though.

01:23:00.000 He didn't, you know, was a vegetable.

01:23:02.000 I've seen guys get stabbed, you know, while I'm taking a shower, you know, you hear this loud noise, like, just keep bumping up against the wall.

01:23:09.000 Boom, boom, boom, really violently, you know, and you know this is somebody's body, you know, like, why would somebody be hitting the wall this hard, you know?

01:23:17.000 And, uh, So I wrap my towel up and I look my head out at the shower and I see this guy and this guy stabbing him.

01:23:24.000 And so to get off the knife, he's just throwing his back and head and everything up against the wall trying to get away from the knife.

01:23:31.000 So it's really violent.

01:23:32.000 I mean, prison is really violent.

01:23:34.000 You know, you have to be careful, especially in the USPs.

01:23:37.000 You know, the USPs are dangerous too, but not as dangerous as USP because these guys don't have nothing to do.

01:23:43.000 What is a USP? US Penitentiary?

01:23:45.000 Yeah, US Penitentiary.

01:23:46.000 What is the difference?

01:23:48.000 Well, say for instance, an FCI, you can't have more than 20 years and be at an FCI. If you have more than 20 years- FCI stands for?

01:23:58.000 Federal Correctional Institution.

01:24:00.000 That's like a medium.

01:24:01.000 Okay.

01:24:02.000 So if you have more than 20 years, you're going to go to a USP. Now, if you go to an FCI and you've got 20 years, but you keep getting into trouble, fights, and You know, something, maybe you stab somebody, then they're going to send you to a USP because they're like, okay, you go up here, these guys can handle stabbings.

01:24:19.000 So they'll boost you up.

01:24:22.000 Then they got what they call a low, it's for the guys who got like five years, six years, then you go to a low.

01:24:27.000 So they kind of keep it separated like that by your violence, by how much you get in trouble, things like that.

01:24:33.000 So the USP is the most dangerous.

01:24:37.000 That's the most.

01:24:38.000 Absolutely.

01:24:39.000 Murderers, life sentences.

01:24:41.000 And then they have guys from all over the country.

01:24:43.000 Say for you in Washington, D.C. and you've been getting in trouble in Washington, D.C. Then they ship you down to California to keep you out of trouble.

01:24:52.000 You know, some of those guys from D.C. are really, really violent.

01:24:55.000 And what they do is they take all the baddest guys from all over the country and they put them in USPS. So you may have a thing where guys are fighting over territory, like the TV. You know, like the DC guys or the Philadelphia guys might say, man, we want to watch this program tonight.

01:25:12.000 The Philadelphia 76ers are playing, so we want to watch Philadelphia 76ers tonight because you're always watching the Lakers.

01:25:17.000 So that could cause a fight.

01:25:19.000 You know, it's kind of like territorial, you know, the way it works.

01:25:23.000 Right.

01:25:23.000 Did you get into any violent interactions in prison?

01:25:25.000 Oh, absolutely not.

01:25:26.000 Absolutely not.

01:25:27.000 I stayed in the law library.

01:25:28.000 Really?

01:25:29.000 They don't come into law library and fight.

01:25:31.000 So that's how you avoided everything?

01:25:33.000 Most of the time.

01:25:34.000 The only time I really would put myself in Harm's way is when football season, you know, I played flag football with the guys, I played basketball with them, but I always had a mentality to defuse anything that ever happened.

01:25:52.000 I wouldn't fight, you know, if If somebody filed me hard on the basketball court, it was my fault because I put myself on the basketball court.

01:26:01.000 If I filed somebody hard on the basketball court, it was my fault because I filed him hard.

01:26:06.000 So I would always apologize to guys when I filed them hard.

01:26:10.000 But that's just the type of person I am.

01:26:11.000 When I play basketball, I don't mean to hurt anybody, but sometimes I do.

01:26:15.000 I filed a lot.

01:26:17.000 But, you know, I got along well.

01:26:19.000 You know, people respected me and I showed the utmost respect for everybody.

01:26:22.000 Did you have to align yourself with any groups in prison?

01:26:26.000 I didn't.

01:26:27.000 No, I didn't.

01:26:28.000 Even though I am adopted by most groups.

01:26:33.000 You know, they adopt me.

01:26:35.000 Most groups?

01:26:35.000 Yeah, most of the groups in jail adopt me.

01:26:39.000 I mean, everybody.

01:26:40.000 You know, the Philadelphia guys, the Crips, the Bloods, the DCs.

01:26:46.000 I mean, I'm just cool with all of them, you know.

01:26:49.000 The only one probably is not is...

01:26:51.000 What's that?

01:26:55.000 The Serenios and the Aaron Brothers are probably the only two groups that... 0.76

01:26:59.000 But it's the Serenio's Mexicans? 0.98

01:27:01.000 Yeah.

01:27:02.000 And then the Aryan brothers, obviously, KKK dudes. 0.91

01:27:04.000 Other than that, I got along.

01:27:06.000 And even they got along, you know, they would speak to me, you know.

01:27:08.000 Hey, Rick, what's happening?

01:27:10.000 But, you know, we don't hang out. 0.90

01:27:11.000 But they don't hang out with blacks. 1.00

01:27:14.000 Now, the day you got out of jail, man, what the fuck was that like? 0.99

01:27:18.000 The day you get out of 20 years and knowing that you got out, you know, on your own. 0.99

01:27:23.000 By the hair.

01:27:24.000 You know, it was luck.

01:27:26.000 When I was in prison, it was guys who had the same issue I had.

01:27:30.000 That didn't get out.

01:27:32.000 Wow.

01:27:33.000 That argued it almost the same way, you know.

01:27:35.000 Matter of fact, we're trying to get the guy who was the first guy to get a life sentence for selling crack.

01:27:40.000 We're trying to get his interview and his issue was almost identical to mine.

01:27:44.000 Just a little different though, but close.

01:27:47.000 And he's in for life?

01:27:48.000 He's in for life and he was only like 20 years old, 19 years old.

01:27:53.000 And it was the same situation?

01:27:54.000 They used the three strike rule on him?

01:27:56.000 They used the three strike rule on him, yeah.

01:27:57.000 But he didn't have three convictions?

01:28:00.000 His conviction is a little different, right?

01:28:02.000 He did have convictions.

01:28:06.000 His was he went to jail when he was 18 years old.

01:28:10.000 He got out.

01:28:11.000 And the same day he got out, he went right back on the block and started selling dope again.

01:28:15.000 And he got arrested that day.

01:28:17.000 So he wasn't convicted.

01:28:20.000 He wasn't convicted of the first one when he caught the second one, but they said it don't matter if you was convicted.

01:28:26.000 You had been to jail, so you should have learned your lesson, and you went back out and you did it again.

01:28:32.000 There's got to be a lot of that.

01:28:33.000 He was mad at me when I won.

01:28:35.000 Really?

01:28:35.000 Yeah, and he's supposed to be my man, too.

01:28:37.000 He was mad.

01:28:38.000 Man, how you win?

01:28:40.000 I had the same issue.

01:28:41.000 I said, no, yours is a little different.

01:28:43.000 See, I never got out on mine.

01:28:44.000 See, on mine, they took me from LA, they took me to Texas, they took me to Ohio, took me to St. Louis, all before I ever got released.

01:28:55.000 I never got released. 0.99

01:28:57.000 Now, when you got out, what's the first shit you did? 1.00

01:29:03.000 You already know, man. 0.99

01:29:05.000 It's been a long time.

01:29:08.000 I went and got me some, man.

01:29:10.000 Old girlfriends?

01:29:11.000 Yeah, no, no, a new girlfriend. 0.91

01:29:13.000 New girl?

01:29:13.000 Yeah, a new girl.

01:29:14.000 Did you know this girl?

01:29:16.000 Did girls contact you while you were in prison?

01:29:18.000 Yeah, yeah, I got a lot of letters.

01:29:20.000 Because you were famous.

01:29:20.000 I was famous.

01:29:21.000 American Gangster, magazines.

01:29:24.000 And they knew you were coming out too.

01:29:26.000 As Is magazine, yeah.

01:29:28.000 They knew I was coming home.

01:29:29.000 They started to publicize that I had got a date.

01:29:32.000 Wow.

01:29:32.000 Weren't you one of the first guys to use a social marketing website?

01:29:37.000 Yeah, yeah.

01:29:37.000 I'm the first prisoner to start a social network, freewayenterprise.com.

01:29:41.000 Y'all check it out too.

01:29:42.000 Right now I'm ranked like 100,000 in the U.S. Sometimes I go as low as 70,000.

01:29:48.000 I'm trying to break down to like 30,000 in the U.S. And it's called freewayenterprises.com?

01:29:54.000 Freewayenterprise.com.

01:29:55.000 And what is involved in this social network?

01:29:58.000 Well, what I do is I give people an outlet for their music, for their videos.

01:30:03.000 You know, like a lot of the sites now, they're charging to put their videos up.

01:30:06.000 And I don't.

01:30:07.000 They can put their pictures up.

01:30:08.000 They can meet friends and share music and share pictures and just different things, you know, that they do on social networks.

01:30:17.000 So I offer those services for them.

01:30:19.000 Do you have any inside scoop on who killed Biggie?

01:30:23.000 Man, somebody else asked me that.

01:30:26.000 The Rolling Stone article, they said the Rampart cops did it.

01:30:30.000 I don't have a clue.

01:30:32.000 I was at USP Lompoc when Biggie got killed.

01:30:35.000 I was disappointed that he came back to California.

01:30:38.000 I thought that was a little crazy with what had happened to Pac.

01:30:42.000 I knew that it wasn't safe for him to be out here in California because guys in California are very vengeful.

01:30:49.000 And when I heard that he was in California, I was like, what was he thinking about?

01:30:53.000 It's kind of crazy that musicians started killing each other.

01:30:56.000 Isn't that amazing?

01:30:58.000 Yeah.

01:30:58.000 I mean, that had never existed.

01:30:59.000 We were just talking about this when we were in Atlanta this weekend.

01:31:02.000 They were the first musicians and artists, basically, that would start killing each other.

01:31:08.000 Wow.

01:31:09.000 Has Tupac contacted you at all?

01:31:11.000 Uh, nah.

01:31:13.000 Not recently.

01:31:14.000 What are you asking?

01:31:15.000 Did Tupac contact him yet?

01:31:17.000 No, he hasn't.

01:31:18.000 What do you mean?

01:31:19.000 Tupac?

01:31:19.000 You mean the new hologram Tupac?

01:31:21.000 No, no.

01:31:21.000 People say Tupac's not dead.

01:31:23.000 Nobody says that. 0.98

01:31:24.000 That's not an idiot. 1.00

01:31:24.000 A lot of people do it. 1.00

01:31:25.000 Like, What's-His-Face just said it the other day.

01:31:27.000 That big music executive.

01:31:30.000 I'll tell you.

01:31:30.000 One second.

01:31:31.000 Hold on.

01:31:31.000 Yo, there's a photo of him on the autopsy table.

01:31:34.000 It's real simple.

01:31:35.000 Back in the days before they had Photoshop.

01:31:36.000 Tupac's dead.

01:31:37.000 JFK. Yeah.

01:31:38.000 There's no doubt about it.

01:31:40.000 They killed that dude.

01:31:41.000 So how many people are a part of your freewayenterprise.com social media?

01:31:45.000 I think I got right around 16 to 20,000 members right now.

01:31:49.000 Oh, that's pretty cool.

01:31:50.000 Well, I'll guarantee you have more today.

01:31:52.000 I hope so.

01:31:52.000 I need them.

01:31:53.000 I need them.

01:31:53.000 Y'all sign up.

01:31:54.000 Help your boy out.

01:31:55.000 Yeah, sign up and also follow him on Twitter.

01:31:57.000 It's FreewayRicky on Twitter and check that out.

01:32:02.000 I got 40,000 followers on Twitter.

01:32:03.000 I'm doing pretty good.

01:32:04.000 That's beautiful, man.

01:32:04.000 I'm doing pretty good.

01:32:05.000 Yeah, you messaged me when you only had like eight.

01:32:07.000 I remember you messaged me like, how do I get more followers, man?

01:32:11.000 I'm like, I can't help you.

01:32:12.000 I'm trying man.

01:32:13.000 I'm learning all the social stuff, all the social media.

01:32:16.000 But I know they pay so much attention to...

01:32:18.000 Hold your boy in the background.

01:32:19.000 What are you asking me?

01:32:22.000 What's that?

01:32:23.000 His car.

01:32:24.000 What did you say?

01:32:25.000 His car is parked right there.

01:32:27.000 Oh, that's fine.

01:32:28.000 It's fine.

01:32:28.000 Oh, don't worry about it, man.

01:32:29.000 They don't do anything.

01:32:30.000 This is Pasadena, dude.

01:32:32.000 Nobody's ever put out more music after they're dead than Tupac, right?

01:32:36.000 Yeah.

01:32:38.000 Hologram.

01:32:38.000 Yeah, that hologram was creepy.

01:32:40.000 You see that shit from Coachella? 1.00

01:32:41.000 Yeah, I heard about it. 1.00

01:32:42.000 I didn't see it, but I heard about it.

01:32:44.000 It looked like Tupac had been lifting weights.

01:32:46.000 Is that right?

01:32:47.000 Yeah, they had him all MMA'd out.

01:32:49.000 He was yoked.

01:32:49.000 He looked like George St. Pierre.

01:32:50.000 It was ridiculous. 0.98

01:32:52.000 Seriously, he had a six-pack. 0.97

01:32:53.000 It was way more muscular than the regular Tupac.

01:32:56.000 It was weird. 0.99

01:32:57.000 It was like Tupac had just been doing kettlebells and CrossFit and shit. 0.99

01:33:01.000 These record labels are getting away with... 0.99

01:33:04.000 They don't care who wins the war.

01:33:07.000 They got both of them covered, Biggie and Pac. 1.00

01:33:10.000 Now, record labels nowadays, they're fucked. 0.97

01:33:14.000 They have to make a percentage of the artists that are out there performing live, right? 0.97

01:33:19.000 How do they make money now?

01:33:21.000 Yeah, they do the 360 deals. 0.90

01:33:24.000 What does that mean?

01:33:25.000 Well, they get a percentage of everything you do.

01:33:27.000 If you do a commercial on TV, they get a piece of it.

01:33:29.000 If you do a concert, they get a piece of it.

01:33:32.000 If you get a tennis shoe endorsement, they want a piece of it.

01:33:34.000 They didn't used to do that?

01:33:35.000 No, they didn't.

01:33:36.000 They used to just be strictly music.

01:33:39.000 And did they always get a piece of the live performance?

01:33:43.000 Now they do.

01:33:43.000 But they didn't always?

01:33:44.000 No, uh-uh.

01:33:45.000 Really?

01:33:46.000 So this is all post-MP3 world?

01:33:47.000 Right, right.

01:33:49.000 The performance used to be all artists' money.

01:33:51.000 What is the benefit of having a music company?

01:33:54.000 Now, it seems like with the internet, it would almost be a hindrance to be involved.

01:33:57.000 Well, marketing.

01:33:57.000 Marketing.

01:33:58.000 Marketing dollars.

01:33:59.000 Because, you know, people believe what they see and hear.

01:34:01.000 But once you get to a point like a Jay-Z or somewhere...

01:34:04.000 But he's already in the contract, so he can't get out.

01:34:06.000 Oh. 0.99

01:34:07.000 But what I was saying is, if he started his own shit and started helping people... 1.00

01:34:11.000 Promote themselves. 0.99

01:34:12.000 Like, he starts promoting people.

01:34:13.000 You could enable people to become famous on their own.

01:34:16.000 Yeah, you think Jay-Z wants to help people?

01:34:18.000 Why not?

01:34:19.000 I mean, I don't know.

01:34:20.000 I mean, I think that it sounds logical.

01:34:23.000 If someone explained to him how much better his own life would be if he helped other people's lives and it makes you actually feel better, yeah, he'd probably try it.

01:34:32.000 But it's hard to sink that into people's heads. 0.97

01:34:34.000 Everybody's so fucking competitive. 0.99

01:34:36.000 Yeah, everybody wants to just get all the money and hog it for themselves. 0.98

01:34:39.000 And they don't understand that someone else's success does not equal a failure for you.

01:34:44.000 It's not like success that was yours and you didn't get it.

01:34:46.000 This guy got it. 0.99

01:34:47.000 It's not like there's only a certain amount of gold out there and you're telling people where the gold's at and they're like, damn, that could have been my fucking gold. 0.98

01:34:54.000 No, I mean, someone else's success has nothing to do with you. 0.98

01:34:56.000 That's a whole new human being.

01:34:58.000 Yeah, it's crazy.

The Joe Rogan Experience - April 24, 2012

Joe Rogan Experience #208 - Freeway Rick Ross

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Summary

Transcript