Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, it's spilled Courtney with an army of normal folks,
Speaker 1: and we continue with part two of our conversation with
Speaker 1: Melvyn Cole right after these brief messages from our generous sponsors.
Speaker 1: You're running back. Yeah, so running your junior year.
Speaker 2: So junior year, we go to the state championship. We
Speaker 2: play against bg an Academy and if everybody no freeze,
Speaker 2: he got all these fancy players. I mean, listen, he
Speaker 2: was the same guy back then, and he trying all
Speaker 2: this ship and we lose, and we on the bush
Speaker 2: and I'm sitting I'm like, look, dude, I'm going back
Speaker 2: to the hood, like.
Speaker 1: Like, oh, you weren't going to go back to bar
Speaker 1: crush your senior year?
Speaker 2: No way? Why not? Why it wasn't beneficial to me?
Speaker 1: Okay once you get recruited.
Speaker 2: I came over there for one reason. That was the
Speaker 2: Hipen Winnestate Championship.
Speaker 1: Okay, So in my mind, we.
Speaker 2: Didn't get it done. And I mean, so what I'm sitting.
Speaker 1: Like, no, but I got to ask you something. You
Speaker 1: still have to meet the at least the medial academic
Speaker 1: standards at Briarcrest. How were you doing that?
Speaker 2: I'm not stupid.
Speaker 1: I didn't say you were stupid. So you were doing
Speaker 1: the work. Yeah, yeah, don't you think you were getting
Speaker 1: some value for that?
Speaker 2: No? Why where was it gonna take at the time?
Speaker 2: Where was it gonna take me?
Speaker 1: I see? Because see here's the thing. There's this thought
Speaker 1: about kids coming from urban areas and getting scholarships to
Speaker 1: private schools. It happens all over our country, it does.
Speaker 1: I am g is a huge one. But I mean
Speaker 1: when you look at a Catholic school like Bishop Gorman
Speaker 1: and they got these studs playing for them, you know,
Speaker 1: their moms and daddies ain't paying for them to go
Speaker 1: to school. But the trade off is now, in a
Speaker 1: perfect world, the idealistic trade off is you're gonna go
Speaker 1: play sports for the school and help them win games,
Speaker 1: and they get to expand their profiles a school as
Speaker 1: a result of that. But what you get is instead
Speaker 1: of getting this a for attendance lack of education, you're
Speaker 1: actually gonna get taught and get an education.
Speaker 2: That's not how it's explained to you.
Speaker 1: Fuck no, I'm holding I'm telling you that is the idealistic.
Speaker 2: No no, no medical conversation, no no, no, listen, that's great
Speaker 2: and those are the conversations that's being high had by adults.
Speaker 1: What are the conversations you're having with you.
Speaker 2: With the keys? Yeah, man, come over and play football
Speaker 2: because at the end of it, because you gotta look
Speaker 2: at it at the end of the day. Why are
Speaker 2: you talking to me now because I'm fucking a great student?
Speaker 1: Why are you talking to me because you play ball?
Speaker 2: Because I play ball and your ass couldn't be easies.
Speaker 2: That's why you're talking to me now because I'm some
Speaker 2: great guy. You're not talking me because because.
Speaker 1: Let's be honest, you're a drug dealer with a kid
Speaker 1: at fourteen. You don't fit the.
Speaker 2: Profile said when my kid was older than a huge
Speaker 2: kid when we were got to school, That's what I
Speaker 2: was goind of confused about. But I got kicked out
Speaker 2: for pre member.
Speaker 1: Ain't talking about that. We got to get to that.
Speaker 1: I'm sitting there like this, all right, So after after
Speaker 1: junior year, you're out.
Speaker 2: I'm done.
Speaker 1: But somebody says, no, come on back. We're gonna freeze
Speaker 1: freeze man, So then you know, all right, coach, I'll
Speaker 1: come back. How was your relationship with them? Were you
Speaker 1: all right with them?
Speaker 2: Now I'm gonna tell you this. This is what I'll
Speaker 2: tell you. Man. I love Hugh Freeze to this day.
Speaker 2: Like when I tell you because you know what you're
Speaker 2: gonna get with him, like he he ain't gonna bullshit
Speaker 2: you now, he gonna he gonna, he gonna lay it
Speaker 2: out on it all you can ask. Yeah, that's and
Speaker 2: I'm cool with that. I'm cool with that. I mean,
Speaker 2: I'm great. Yeah, man, I don't have it.
Speaker 1: So because he came to and you were cool with him,
Speaker 1: he said, all right, I'll roll up back. Let's go
Speaker 1: try to win a state.
Speaker 2: Man. Because he came to me, he he told me, man,
Speaker 2: I know I should have ran you more. He said
Speaker 2: that we was on the bus, Man, I know I
Speaker 2: should have ran you more. Have you come back. We're gonna,
Speaker 2: I'm I'm gonna do this. We're gonna we're gonna win.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna help you go off to.
Speaker 1: College and so and so your senior year. This can so.
Speaker 2: I So I trained all that year going through the summer.
Speaker 2: Senior year came around and and I got to be
Speaker 2: honest with you, Freeze did his part. I mean that
Speaker 2: was that was college coaches at the game. I mean
Speaker 2: I was getting recruited like I didn't. My recruitment wasn't
Speaker 2: short by any by any sketch of imagination, you know,
Speaker 2: old miss Mississippi State, Louisville Bowling Green. I mean, I
Speaker 2: was actually gonna go to Misssippi State before Jackie Sheriff
Speaker 2: fired his whole coaching staff if we had the Memphis
Speaker 2: Maniacs during that time. So Kippy Brown was great friends
Speaker 2: with Hugh So, I mean he held his end of
Speaker 2: the bar.
Speaker 1: Again.
Speaker 2: I mean, that's one thing I would openly say that.
Speaker 2: I mean, that's why to this day, if I got
Speaker 2: a player that he wants and the player wants him,
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm endorset, you know what I mean. But
Speaker 2: so that was the whole thing, like all right, I mean,
Speaker 2: but for me, it was the fact that I was
Speaker 2: wanted and I was needed Because walking through the school
Speaker 2: and dealing with them kids, Man, you you ain't really
Speaker 2: wanted and needed.
Speaker 1: I mean, but you're still dealing drugs, yeah, because you
Speaker 1: got to feed your back. You're going to this high end,
Speaker 1: wealthy kids all around you. Man, I'm getting kids showing
Speaker 1: up in the parking lot having cars nicer than you've
Speaker 1: ever seen.
Speaker 2: Man, I'm getting picked up from White Haven and I'm
Speaker 2: going to Briar Chris and I'm looking. I'm like, damn,
Speaker 2: these kids got this, this and this, and in my
Speaker 2: mind I just will figure like all right, well I'm
Speaker 2: gonna get this one day doing what I do. But yeah,
Speaker 2: like that shit.
Speaker 1: Was haf but and you're doing that. But this other
Speaker 1: life is you're dealing drugs take care of everything. So
Speaker 1: you're still in in that life. You're living a double life.
Speaker 2: I've deal living double life my whole life.
Speaker 1: This is an extreme. This is an extreme in terms
Speaker 1: of the culture you're going to school in versus the
Speaker 1: culture you live.
Speaker 3: Yeah, not and day and you win a state championship
Speaker 3: and we win to stay championship and then there's a party.
Speaker 2: There's a big time party. Tell me about that. Man.
Speaker 2: To me, I thought it. So here's the thing about it.
Speaker 2: I've never went to any All Canvas parties or anything
Speaker 2: like that. I've never been associated with.
Speaker 1: Well, you're going back to the hood because I'm going
Speaker 1: back every day right that you ain't staying out near Briarcrosh.
Speaker 2: That was my It was just like work. To me. Hey,
Speaker 2: I get picked up, I get dropped off, I get
Speaker 2: picked up I get dropped off. Listen, I know I
Speaker 2: ain't these people kind.
Speaker 1: Hey, I got to ask you about that. Real talk here, bro,
Speaker 1: The people that are picking you up and taking you
Speaker 1: out there are white, right, Nah?
Speaker 2: I had a black guy.
Speaker 1: What they hire a black guy to ride you around?
Speaker 2: Now you want to hear the crazy part about it.
Speaker 2: It was another black kid that was on broad crist
Speaker 2: team too, that lives where I lived it but they fit.
Speaker 2: But those kids couldn't get it freeze over the edge.
Speaker 2: So this kid, he would come and pick me up
Speaker 2: and then we'll ride to the school together and then he'll
Speaker 2: drop me off.
Speaker 1: All right, Well, then my question, I asked it wrong.
Speaker 1: This is my question. You got to school and you're
Speaker 1: surrounded by white teachers, white administration, white everything, right, the
Speaker 1: exact opposite of what I was when I went to
Speaker 1: an assist. My question is to you, I know what
Speaker 1: you said earlier about the reality of your life and
Speaker 1: what's right first wrong when you're in that environment, but
Speaker 1: you certainly know there's a different set of rules and
Speaker 1: standards and briercusts because, like you said, you ain't stupid,
Speaker 1: and you know you're dealing drugs when you're at home.
Speaker 1: But you know that doesn't go down. I mean, you
Speaker 1: can't be down with that at Briarcrest, So you can't.
Speaker 2: Huh, White can't because those kids get high too.
Speaker 1: I'm getting there. Don't get that question is did you
Speaker 1: work your hustle with Briercrests?
Speaker 2: No? I wish I could have.
Speaker 1: But weren't you working a hustle? By not working the hustle?
Speaker 1: You feel what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: The second, the second part of it, because see you
Speaker 2: got to understand is being a drug dealer wasn't the
Speaker 2: ultimate goal. The ultimate gold was the National Football League.
Speaker 2: Drug dealing was second.
Speaker 1: What's helping you get there?
Speaker 2: That's all it was. I said, it wasn't. It wasn't
Speaker 2: who I was. It was just a means to an end,
Speaker 2: to get me down the road to the next stop sign.
Speaker 2: That's all I was looking.
Speaker 1: You look back on that and you don't now how
Speaker 1: just pervertedly wrong all of that is.
Speaker 2: But that's all you had. Why is it wrong? Considering
Speaker 2: pharmaceuticals is the number one industry in America right now? No,
Speaker 2: hurt I got appeal your arm. Hurt I got appeal.
Speaker 2: You're told hurt I got appeal. You coughing, I got appeal.
Speaker 1: It's wrong, is because or in jail.
Speaker 2: No tax invasion.
Speaker 1: Okay, tax evasion too. My point is this is not
Speaker 1: what you're teaching kids today, correct because okay, let me
Speaker 1: say it a different way. It is so common in
Speaker 1: your life, fit in the lives of people that grew
Speaker 1: up in places like you and still do today this
Speaker 1: very minute, this is happening. Do you ever hear yourself
Speaker 1: talk about it now and think, you know.
Speaker 2: Wow, not while uh, it's an inner struggle.
Speaker 3: Tell me about that, because just like you said, now
Speaker 3: I realize in the sense of what I what I
Speaker 3: deem is wrong, not about going to jail or that
Speaker 3: part in terms of man, we're tearing down communities, we're tearing.
Speaker 2: Down families, like that's what I'm talking We're tearing it down.
Speaker 2: So to be a part of that for so long
Speaker 2: and then be a part of bringing it back when
Speaker 2: you have your struggles, because then you have those people
Speaker 2: that say, man, how you gonna say this and do this?
Speaker 2: You was a part of this for so many years.
Speaker 2: Look what you and your family did to the city.
Speaker 2: So that's the struggle that you go back and forth
Speaker 2: because you know what I once was the problem we
Speaker 2: once rule. I mean it's no secret with my family,
Speaker 2: with Bobby and Craig, we arguably had the largest roughest
Speaker 2: cocaine run out West Tennessee history. I mean, our organization
Speaker 2: operated in twenty nine states.
Speaker 1: We'll be right back. The party at Broadcress.
Speaker 2: Life changing. It was a house party, which you don't
Speaker 2: normally go to. I don't want to go to. Kids
Speaker 2: will drink.
Speaker 1: Hey, we gotta state championship.
Speaker 2: We gotta stay championship. Let's have some fun. The team.
Speaker 2: The teammates didn't convince me. Come on, come on, Melvin,
Speaker 2: come on, you never hang out with us, which is
Speaker 2: kind of cool and listen. And it was so I thought, So,
Speaker 2: I mean, we're having this party.
Speaker 1: I mean, did you ever think you'd be hanging out
Speaker 1: having a party a bunch of white kids from suburban Memphis.
Speaker 2: No, I never crossed my mind. Yeah, because the whole
Speaker 2: thing was teammates and teammates. I went home every day.
Speaker 2: So we went and state we want to stay championship.
Speaker 2: I got the guys on the team because now what
Speaker 2: I will say is those guys that played on the
Speaker 2: team with me and brid Christ, they didn't see white
Speaker 2: and black like those I can genually say those were
Speaker 2: some of my dudes, like like I still talk to
Speaker 2: some of them to this day, like like those are
Speaker 2: my dudes, white and black. So we never the football
Speaker 2: aspect of We never looked at it like that.
Speaker 1: It's weird how football breaks down that barrier.
Speaker 2: And that's one thing.
Speaker 1: When you hurt and bleed together.
Speaker 2: It's totally different. It just doesn't matter. And Freeze was
Speaker 2: good at that. He was good at blending everybody together.
Speaker 2: So in my mind, all right, teammates want.
Speaker 1: So the party was safe, That's what I'm trying to say.
Speaker 2: In my mind, it was. It was safe. It was
Speaker 2: it was sanction I mean, you gotta think about you
Speaker 2: got a bunch of kids with alcohol. Shit we didn't buy,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so it was sanctioned.
Speaker 2: So you know, girls, she won't have sex. I mean,
Speaker 2: she was hot, she looked good to me. I'm like,
Speaker 2: all right, cool, you know what I mean. It wasn't
Speaker 2: out of us. It wasn't like I was the only
Speaker 2: guy in the house having sex, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: It was it was a few of us, you know
Speaker 2: what I mean.
Speaker 1: A high school party full of seventeen eighteen year old
Speaker 1: teenagers and alcohol feeling good about themselves after state championship.
Speaker 2: The state championship, well, I mean we didn't gonna.
Speaker 1: Have especially for a guy with a two year old
Speaker 1: at home.
Speaker 2: So this particular room, me and the girl was in,
Speaker 2: some guys bust opening the door. You know, we were
Speaker 2: young or shit, we don't stop. We just seventeen years old.
Speaker 2: What you're gonna stop for? Y'all know how to? I
Speaker 2: mean everybody's and man, I didn't think anything of it.
Speaker 2: And what I didn't think anything of it?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Man, it was it was fun. I mean she was
Speaker 2: cool with it. I was cool with it. It was fun.
Speaker 2: So we get back to school and I'm coming out
Speaker 2: to cafeteria and all the guys started clapping. I don't know,
Speaker 2: so I'm like, I'm like all right, So you know,
Speaker 2: at the time, principal and everybody wanted to know, like
Speaker 2: where is everybody clapping around? So I tell the story
Speaker 2: of what happened?
Speaker 1: So you tell who?
Speaker 2: So I tell the principal, I tell Freeze. You tell
Speaker 2: them what I'm lying about? Like what am I lying about?
Speaker 2: The girl didn't scream rape? Like what am I lying about?
Speaker 2: It was, it was nothing to lie about.
Speaker 1: I mean, you do you realize.
Speaker 2: I got a two year old?
Speaker 1: You know what, I'm fucking do you realize the the
Speaker 1: profundity of that blatant honesty about what am I gonna
Speaker 1: lie about? But also the naivet tell you of it.
Speaker 2: How naive at that.
Speaker 1: Time for you to not recognize the danger and that
Speaker 1: story profoundly honest, but equally naive. And the reason I'm
Speaker 1: saying that is without mentorship, up, without coaches, without somebody
Speaker 1: who truly cares about you. When you're in an environment
Speaker 1: like that to win football games, but you don't have
Speaker 1: the full proper support, you're bound to fall into a
Speaker 1: football yep. So in my mind, you really didn't do
Speaker 1: anything wrong. But at Briarcrest Christian School, so and.
Speaker 2: That was the thing. So they says, well, you know
Speaker 2: that's pre matter sex.
Speaker 1: I said, I got a two year old.
Speaker 2: I said, dude, y'all knew I had a fucking two
Speaker 2: year old? Like what what? Huh? And he looks at
Speaker 2: me and says, you know, hey, it's some things you
Speaker 2: just don't do. And right then I knew black boys
Speaker 2: ain't sposed to as white girls. I learned that lesson
Speaker 2: that day, and I was kicked out, and I got
Speaker 2: that very clear.
Speaker 1: All right, So let's talk about that for a second.
Speaker 1: I've heard you say that before. First, I want to
Speaker 1: make it really clear, Lisa and I raised our children
Speaker 1: based on our faith and based on my steadfast belief
Speaker 1: as a father that you need to wait to have children,
Speaker 1: you need to preserve yourself. And I want to be
Speaker 1: careful not to sound like a prude, because I didn't
Speaker 1: do that when I was in high school. I was
Speaker 1: just like you. I didn't have a kid. But I
Speaker 1: guess what I'm saying is, I don't want anybody to
Speaker 1: think I condone having children out of wedlock at fifteen
Speaker 1: and all of that. I think that's dangerous and bad
Speaker 1: and destructive in most cases, and I don't want to
Speaker 1: condone it. However, hearing your story, you certainly understand it.
Speaker 1: But to hear you say that's when I learned black
Speaker 1: folks ain't supposed to have sex with white girls. Are
Speaker 1: you saying that if a white kid had not admitted
Speaker 1: to having sex at that party, that they also would
Speaker 1: not have been kicked out.
Speaker 2: This is what I'm gonna say. They knew I was.
Speaker 2: I wouldn't only one having six at that party.
Speaker 1: You were the only one that admitted it.
Speaker 2: The kids were mad. Matter of fact, one of the
Speaker 2: teachers told me, ma'am, I wish you had a lie.
Speaker 1: There's the nave at tea part.
Speaker 2: That's what one of because at the end of the day,
Speaker 2: I was never a bad person. I did bad shit,
Speaker 2: but I was never a bad person. So I never lived.
Speaker 1: Were causing trouble to school?
Speaker 2: No, that's not who I am. I've never been that guy.
Speaker 1: But it is a horrible thing that from that experience
Speaker 1: you took from it. Well, that's what happens to black
Speaker 1: guys that have sex with white girls.
Speaker 2: I mean, twenty years ago, there was the case.
Speaker 1: Look, man, I get it. I just want our listeners
Speaker 1: to get it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, twenty two years twenty five years ago, that was
Speaker 2: that was the case here in Missis, Tennessee. Now you
Speaker 2: guys still think about where we're at. We still got
Speaker 2: a street downtown called Auction.
Speaker 1: No, they changed it two years ago. Oh well great, yeah,
Speaker 1: you talk about the bridge. Yeah, but when I was
Speaker 1: in school, what it was called Auction. When I grew up,
Speaker 1: it was Auction, and for everybody to listen. The Auction
Speaker 1: Street Bridge connects Front Street with what is Mudd Island
Speaker 1: and it goes over what's called the Marble Bayou right
Speaker 1: next to the Mississippi River. And the reason it's called
Speaker 1: Auction Street Bridge is because that's where the barges rolled
Speaker 1: up to the backside of Front Street and unloaded the slaves,
Speaker 1: and that's where they had their slave auction. And until
Speaker 1: four or five years ago, we still had that street
Speaker 1: called Auction Street and that was Auction Street Bridge because
Speaker 1: that's where black human beings were sold.
Speaker 2: So you got that to just change four five years ago.
Speaker 2: And my experience was over twenty years ago. So let'sen talk.
Speaker 2: Let's and learn.
Speaker 1: So you get by hook or crook, you get back
Speaker 1: into Whitehaven, you're able to graduate, and now you've got
Speaker 1: your scholarship and you go play college ball. Yeah so
Speaker 1: I was, but you still got that kid and that
Speaker 1: baby mama. So you still dealing drugs, still hustling. So
Speaker 1: tell me how the hustle went.
Speaker 2: It was simple. When I wasn't playing football, I was hustling.
Speaker 2: When I wasn't working out, I was hustling.
Speaker 1: Where did it lead?
Speaker 2: Just started thinking.
Speaker 1: There was a night you were in a car and
Speaker 1: things got bad.
Speaker 2: I was in college, so I was dealing out of Chicago.
Speaker 2: And I originally met these two brothers when we first
Speaker 2: set up the deal, and I had gave him about
Speaker 2: three four pounds a week and I was going to
Speaker 2: swap it out again, give him more, get the money,
Speaker 2: swap it out. And I'm in the car with the
Speaker 2: brother and he says, my brother be on the way.
Speaker 2: You know we did. So we're doing small talk and
Speaker 2: he changed the conversations to crack. So I'm thinking to.
Speaker 1: Myself, oh shit, you think he's law.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think he's face all day long. Right, So
Speaker 2: I'm thinking I'm trying to figure out how I'm gonna
Speaker 2: kill him, kick him out my car, and get back
Speaker 2: out of here.
Speaker 1: Now, let's speak clear. You ain't never shot or killed
Speaker 1: nobody before this before what before this night?
Speaker 2: Now that's part of the game.
Speaker 1: No, But you're thinking I'm gonna have to kill this
Speaker 1: guy and dumping by my car so I can get
Speaker 1: out of here. Correct, But up until this point, I mean,
Speaker 1: you ain't never killed nobody. Okay, maybe I'm wrong.
Speaker 2: Part of the game. Let me ask you. So, let's
Speaker 2: say when you go to work, you grab your briefcase.
Speaker 1: Right, yeah, yeah, it's just all the.
Speaker 2: Shit that comes with the game. You don't like. You
Speaker 2: don't pick and choose what you do in a drug game,
Speaker 2: because that shit come os.
Speaker 1: So you're literally just making a value determination that this
Speaker 1: guy's got.
Speaker 2: To go because he's the face. It's me and him, okay,
Speaker 2: because if you don't go, I'm jammed up. I'm selling
Speaker 2: to an undercover.
Speaker 1: We'll be right back. Turns out he's not the Fens,
Speaker 1: it's not the Fax.
Speaker 2: So as I'm hesitating on the decision to kill him,
Speaker 2: all I hear is so once I turn around, now
Speaker 2: his partner got the barrel of the gun in my face.
Speaker 2: So I reached for my gun and he hits me twice,
Speaker 2: once in the shoulder and once in the back of
Speaker 2: the head. They take the money, they take the gun,
Speaker 2: take the weed. They take off, and I remember I'm
Speaker 2: sitting in the car and I go, damn. I thought
Speaker 2: I was gonna go out and the shootout. So I
Speaker 2: crossed my arms across my legs and I laid there
Speaker 2: and I'll never forget. The police and the ammulams come
Speaker 2: and everybody and this is this lady and I tell her, says,
Speaker 2: where's my phone, reach and grab my phone. So she
Speaker 2: gives my phone and she puts it right here, And
Speaker 2: during the whole ride to Cook County Hospital, she's like, baby,
Speaker 2: fight for your life, Fight for your life. And I'm like, nah,
Speaker 2: she's let me die.
Speaker 1: I'm tired.
Speaker 2: I've been doing this shit for so long. I'm tired.
Speaker 2: So she's like, nah, baby, nah, baby, fight for your life.
Speaker 2: Fight for your life. And the whole way, I'm trying
Speaker 2: to convince this lady that I'm tired, and she's convincing
Speaker 2: me to keep fighting for my life. So we make
Speaker 2: it in Cook County Hospital and I'm covered in blood
Speaker 2: and all that, and the doctors come in and then
Speaker 2: after my vitals and everything is stable, they come back
Speaker 2: and say, your cousin is here to see.
Speaker 1: You us in Chicago. You ain't got no cousin in Chicago.
Speaker 2: I said, no way. I said, hey, don't let anybody
Speaker 2: come back here. I don't have a fucking cousin.
Speaker 1: So I called my friend. Do you think they're coming
Speaker 1: to finish?
Speaker 2: Yeah, because they know the consequences if I'm alive.
Speaker 1: Because they feel like you're gonna talk. No, no, no,
Speaker 1: My band. You ain't gonna talk. I'm gonna get my
Speaker 1: getting back. I'm gonna get my lick back. I get it.
Speaker 2: You hit me, I'm gonna hit you.
Speaker 1: I understand that's football, but that's also apparently the gang world.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean that's I mean, it's not even the
Speaker 2: gang world. That's life.
Speaker 1: I get it.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna get my lick back if you If you're
Speaker 2: a lawyer and you lose a case, guess what, I'm
Speaker 2: gonna get my link back when I see that attorney again.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they ain't worried about your talking. You know what.
Speaker 1: I never even got that until sitting there looking at you.
Speaker 1: The law was not the problem. You probably the problem.
Speaker 2: Me and my family was the problem. I see, if anything,
Speaker 2: you want the law to come gonna help you out.
Speaker 2: So from there, I took off and my friend picked
Speaker 2: me up, and he came out.
Speaker 1: They didn't operate.
Speaker 2: No, I left.
Speaker 1: You're still bleeding. You got bullets in here, and you
Speaker 1: get up and roll.
Speaker 2: I leave shoot out. My friend picks me up. He
Speaker 2: tied me in his girlfriend's apartment. I called my mom.
Speaker 2: I say, mom, the drug deal went wrong. I need
Speaker 2: a flight out of Chicago. My mom books the flight
Speaker 2: for me the next day, and this is where my
Speaker 2: body starts to shut down as I'm getting back to Memphis.
Speaker 2: So at this time I had a connecting flight from
Speaker 2: Chicago to Atlanta, Atlanta to Memphis. Well, they end up
Speaker 2: having some weather and some other so so get we
Speaker 2: get stuck in Atlanta and my body's still shutting down.
Speaker 2: They put us in this hotel. So I go to
Speaker 2: the front desk and I tell the lady, I said,
Speaker 2: it is that anyway I can charge my phone. I'm
Speaker 2: about to die and I just want my mom to
Speaker 2: know where she can come pick up my body. So
Speaker 2: they let me use the phone. I call my mom.
Speaker 2: I told hers say hey, I said, I'm stuck here.
Speaker 2: They say the plane supposed to come at this time.
Speaker 2: I said, but I'm not sure if I'm gonna make it,
Speaker 2: and I just want you to know where to come
Speaker 2: and get me from. So made it through the night,
Speaker 2: the whole the hotel. They shut us back to the airport.
Speaker 2: I'm in a wheelchair. They are you bleeding? I'm still
Speaker 2: covered in blood, so the blood is dropped by there.
Speaker 1: They're putting you on an airplane with us on or
Speaker 1: are you hiding it.
Speaker 2: No, I'm just like it.
Speaker 1: My mom.
Speaker 2: My mom bathed the blood off of me when I
Speaker 2: got home.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so my mom bathed when I get When I
Speaker 2: get to Memphis, my brother picks me up. And if
Speaker 2: anybody knows my brother, he's the ultimate hard ass talking
Speaker 2: about I've seen him one cry one time in my
Speaker 2: whole life, and that's when he was picking me up
Speaker 2: from the airport, and I knew I was fucked up
Speaker 2: because he don't cry. We got home, my mom bathed me.
Speaker 2: All my gang members and family that they came over
Speaker 2: and we talked, but it was my father that night.
Speaker 2: My father's arguing with my mom. He said, Roberta, I'm
Speaker 2: telling you something else wrong with that boy. He too tough.
Speaker 2: There's no way he'll be acting like this if he
Speaker 2: got shot on the shoulder. Some else is wrong with
Speaker 2: that boy. I'm telling you something else is wrong with him.
Speaker 2: He's too tough. The next morning, you have seen those
Speaker 2: little pocket flashlights. Yeah, he shines, He said, boy, the
Speaker 2: same holes in your head as in your back that
Speaker 2: you get shot in the head. I said, man, I
Speaker 2: don't fucking know. I reached down for my hammer and
Speaker 2: the motherfucker wasn't dumping. I said, I don't know. They
Speaker 2: took me to the hospital, fractored skull, bullet and the
Speaker 2: opsipital load. That's when I was rushed to the med
Speaker 2: and I stayed in the mid about fourteen days. I
Speaker 2: lost the ability to read write a lot of that
Speaker 2: because so the opposit, the load, it's the most sensant
Speaker 2: part of the brain. It's where your memory center is,
Speaker 2: it's your vision, it's your everything, and that's where the
Speaker 2: bullet was lodged. And I grew pitched.
Speaker 1: Man.
Speaker 2: I had a conversation with my uncle and he was like, man,
Speaker 2: look at the dope game that did to you, like
Speaker 2: it done took any fucking thing from you. So and
Speaker 2: from that day forward, I made avengance to get back
Speaker 2: on the dope game from everything it took from me,
Speaker 2: from my grandma to my family, to my football career,
Speaker 2: my hope, and I just raised war on the drug
Speaker 2: bas is it. After that, I said, I'm gonna put
Speaker 2: the game down so hard that they even gonna have
Speaker 2: to kill me. I'm gonna do life in prison.
Speaker 1: For those of you listen, there may be some background noise.
Speaker 1: It is a absolute dropout thunder rain. Behind me, which
Speaker 1: the irony of ironies is the skies opened up and
Speaker 1: dumped while Melvin told that story. You survive it about
Speaker 1: a grace of God and then you get you finally
Speaker 1: get arrested. And what you've said is drug Dane leads
Speaker 1: two things, death or jail.
Speaker 2: I tell kids all the time, you cheated death. That's
Speaker 2: the ultimate reward.
Speaker 1: That you cheated one of them, but you couldn't cheat
Speaker 1: the other.
Speaker 2: Cup lack a discipline.
Speaker 1: Lack of discipline and.
Speaker 2: For people to that know me, that's that's not who
Speaker 2: I am.
Speaker 1: We had a weak moment one day.
Speaker 2: I did what happened. We was running drugs back and
Speaker 2: forth through the Greyhounds. I had created a found out
Speaker 2: a system how you can run from Dallas to Memphis
Speaker 2: to Memphis to Ohio through Louis Villa, and if you
Speaker 2: did it at certain parts of the night, the Greyhound
Speaker 2: was closed, so it was no security, just basically busses
Speaker 2: transferring people. And that was our route. And for years
Speaker 2: I never got off that route. And at this particular time,
Speaker 2: I was dating this girl who I had kind of
Speaker 2: got sought for and I hadn't seen her in probably
Speaker 2: about two weeks. As we was hustling and kind of
Speaker 2: getting to going and I and at this time, I
Speaker 2: was supposed to just make a quick trip and go
Speaker 2: back because the load was like and she begged me.
Speaker 2: She's like, just see me, baby, just see me, Just
Speaker 2: see me, just see me. And I fell weak and
Speaker 2: I opted to get off the bus in Cincinnati and
Speaker 2: have her drive the rest of the ways, and I
Speaker 2: call one of my homeboys. I said, put your cruise
Speaker 2: control on sixty five and I'm gonna call you in
Speaker 2: an hour. Wherever you are.
Speaker 1: That's where I'm That's how you could track him.
Speaker 2: No, No, that's how I knew. He could never set
Speaker 2: me up at this That's.
Speaker 1: What I'm talking about. You tracked his time in this miles.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so you don't know where exit. I'm gonna say, hey, Bill,
Speaker 2: this is where I'm at. So you just drive and
Speaker 2: I'll call you an hour.
Speaker 1: I got it.
Speaker 2: In between that time, I'm hanging out with her. We
Speaker 2: in the car, we're getting jiggy. I'm doing all the
Speaker 2: shit I'm not supposed to do. I call him. He
Speaker 2: finally pull up well shortly after the police pulled up too.
Speaker 2: Police said, we got to call two suspicious cars back
Speaker 2: her dumping trash, said man, trash, fucking trash on the ground.
Speaker 2: So then the police asks for everybody's license and identification.
Speaker 2: He said, can I search the car? Said nah? He
Speaker 2: said if you ain't got none of high, I can't
Speaker 2: search the car. Said I'm kind of a rush. I
Speaker 2: got somewhere to be. He said, oh, he won't take long.
Speaker 2: Then my partner said, man, it's a fucking tahoe. I
Speaker 2: won't take that long. Please step out of the car.
Speaker 2: I knew it then, so I thought. I said if
Speaker 2: I run, I'm leaving them and all they gonna do
Speaker 2: is snitch on me. I said, might as well eat it.
Speaker 2: And I told him don't search the car. So I
Speaker 2: got a chance in court. So we step out. He
Speaker 2: found the first brick that was wrapped up in clothes.
Speaker 2: What's this, man, I don't know shit. You put it there?
Speaker 2: He plew the second brick out. I said, all right, man,
Speaker 2: those are myn He don't know nothing. She don't know nothing.
Speaker 2: Go ahead and take me down so I can make bond.
Speaker 2: Because in my mind it was a small order. The
Speaker 2: police had violated my rights, and I thought I was good.
Speaker 2: I mean, that's partially why I'm smiling on my mugshot
Speaker 2: and boy kind of took a turn from there, so
Speaker 2: I mean, I was. I get in there and they
Speaker 2: move in in the middle of the night and they
Speaker 2: think they got this big fish because it's this small
Speaker 2: town Sydney, Ohio, and they thinking they got this big fish.
Speaker 2: And I'm thinking, like, man, my lawyer is gonna beat
Speaker 2: this like and I remember, we get ready for breakfast.
Speaker 2: The next morning, I'm on the news and the guy says,
Speaker 2: that's him right there, and I tell him, I said, y'all,
Speaker 2: I'm not gonna eat lunch with y'all. I said, whatever
Speaker 2: bun he give me, I'm gonna make it. I'm'a be
Speaker 2: out of here. Said this same one I do. I said,
Speaker 2: I'm I'm feed. I ain't no state guy fed. And
Speaker 2: as I'm walking back to my cell, that was this
Speaker 2: old guy and he said, young blood, come here. He said,
Speaker 2: you really got that money like that said, my money
Speaker 2: long longer than train smoke. So he slid me this number.
Speaker 2: He said, well, if you really got the number, called
Speaker 2: this guy and he'll help you out. So that's when
Speaker 2: he gave me. My lawyer, Patrick mull against super lawyer
Speaker 2: of the year.
Speaker 1: That's how you got it.
Speaker 2: That's how I got pack. So we went to court.
Speaker 2: They gave me. They gave me the hundred thousand cash,
Speaker 2: and sure, bun. My my family has a Bill's bum here.
Speaker 2: Willie Harper, that's how Bell's bun. He beils everybody out.
Speaker 2: He belt shaw out. He was the first guy to
Speaker 2: bill a million dollar. He came and got shot for
Speaker 2: a million dollar bun off of murder in Atlanta. So
Speaker 2: we bonded out and I told him. I told the
Speaker 2: guys in there, I said, hey, listen, this what's gonna happen.
Speaker 2: I said, they gonna call my name, and y'all can
Speaker 2: look out that wonder and you're gonna see a blue truck.
Speaker 2: And I said, when I get in there, she's already
Speaker 2: gonna have my blunt rolled up and I'm gonna blow
Speaker 2: the smoke cap. That's exactly what I did. So when
Speaker 2: I got out, I called Pat. He said, ma'am, when
Speaker 2: I was expecting your call, how soon can you get here?
Speaker 2: I said, how far are you away from? He said
Speaker 2: about ninety minutes. I said, I'll beat here. I went
Speaker 2: in with Pat and told him what happened. He chopped
Speaker 2: it all up and he said, all right. Well, during
Speaker 2: that time, we was just thinking it was one case.
Speaker 2: So while I'm out on bond fighting this case, I'm
Speaker 2: sitting at home and man it, it probably was a
Speaker 2: million fucking police there was. I thought they was crawling
Speaker 2: out the ground or so many. I'm like roaches. Who's
Speaker 2: they about to come pick up? Like it? Yeah, they
Speaker 2: busted in. They wanted no mailvine and I'm all right,
Speaker 2: that's me and they snatched me up and I'm trying
Speaker 2: to figure it out. And there was a secret indictment.
Speaker 2: So one of the guys that I moved from Memphis
Speaker 2: to Ohio to help me run the cocaine ra and
Speaker 2: he spoke for eight minutes and thirty eight seconds on
Speaker 2: a none of them is called launched the investigation. So
Speaker 2: now here I was sitting without a bond on this case.
Speaker 2: So what a lot of people. What I learned was
Speaker 2: so the fish created what they called the Rico Act
Speaker 2: to break up the mafia.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the Rico Act was all about the Bob, all.
Speaker 2: About the mob. So every state set up their own
Speaker 2: version of the Rico Act to break up inner city organized.
Speaker 1: Crime, which is a lot of gangs and drug dealer.
Speaker 2: And the crazy part about it, so the way they
Speaker 2: consider a criminal enterprise is four more people doing the
Speaker 2: same thing, and you're creating over five thousand dollars. So
Speaker 2: there I was facing conspiracy to corrupt activity and five
Speaker 2: cocaine chargers. I was facing more years than I've been living.
Speaker 2: But at that time it didn't matter to me because
Speaker 2: I knew I was in my early twenties. If I
Speaker 2: did twenty years, i'd come home at forty. I still
Speaker 2: be king. If I did forty years, I come home
Speaker 2: in sixty and I still had the rest of my life.
Speaker 2: So I was cool with it.
Speaker 1: And did they senence you or you took a play?
Speaker 1: So I took a play. That was god fifty eight months.
Speaker 2: I got sixty eight months, and that was.
Speaker 1: Just under six years, right.
Speaker 2: And the crazy thing about it is if we wasn't
Speaker 2: so scared, we could have we probably could have beat it.
Speaker 2: So Pat ended up filing a motion to suppress the
Speaker 2: evidence because if police found it the wrong way and
Speaker 2: blocking the car and it was an unlawful detainment. But
Speaker 2: my co offender, he wasn't scrown, and Pat says, and
Speaker 2: mayver we put him on the stand, and.
Speaker 1: You lose, you're doing twenty or forty, you out of here.
Speaker 2: So going through that, the first case, they gave me
Speaker 2: twenty four months. Pat talked to the prosecutor. On the
Speaker 2: other case, he got the big charge to corrupt activity
Speaker 2: thrown out completely. So I end up eating four charges
Speaker 2: of trafficking cocaine. So they gave me a total of
Speaker 2: forty four months from this case, twenty four months from
Speaker 2: the other case where we got ranted together with a
Speaker 2: total sixty eight months.
Speaker 1: So and the.
Speaker 2: Agreement was I paid the drug firm, I stayed out
Speaker 2: of trouble, and I agreed to do all the classes.
Speaker 2: And they wanted me to do the search program because
Speaker 2: I was adamant about not having a job.
Speaker 1: So and what do you do your time?
Speaker 2: Dating correction institution that's Ohio in Ohio.
Speaker 1: So for our listeners, they're like, where's the redemption? Because
Speaker 1: this is a wild story. Your life is wild, but
Speaker 1: the redemption's coming. But all of this was important to
Speaker 1: lead up to prison and what changed your life?
Speaker 2: And why tell us? One night it was normal getting
Speaker 2: ready for lockdown, you know, just nothing different. As I'm
Speaker 2: walking back to my cell, I'm witnessing this young boy
Speaker 2: get brutally raped. I'm telling how he yelling, he's screaming,
Speaker 2: he got blood skating out his ass. I mean, is
Speaker 2: it's something I've never been I've never even seen.
Speaker 1: Your You witness a guy getting raped in the jail
Speaker 1: six someone. I have a question. Where are the I
Speaker 1: hear this. I have been told by numerous guests and
Speaker 1: stuff I've read. I mean, the gangs and the drug trade,
Speaker 1: and there's as much happening in the jail is out.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the jail run the streets.
Speaker 1: I get it. Where are the guards?
Speaker 2: Whatever?
Speaker 1: Do the guards? Are they aware and turning their back
Speaker 1: or they're just so few of them they don't even
Speaker 1: know both. And so there's this inmate getting gang raped. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and you saw this man.
Speaker 2: They were killing that boy. They were killing that boy.
Speaker 1: Was it a was it a gang thing?
Speaker 2: It wasn't my business, That's what it was.
Speaker 1: You just keep your head down and keep walking. Listen,
Speaker 1: don't be part of it.
Speaker 2: I immediately went to my cell and I dropped down and said, God,
Speaker 2: that cannot happen to me. Period. I'm killing all of them,
Speaker 2: and then I'm killing myself that right there. Nah, they
Speaker 2: can't happen to me period.
Speaker 1: Because if it doesna get your look back, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: kill every single one of them. I'm gonna be able
Speaker 1: to face nobody after it happens, and yourself.
Speaker 2: So I told God right there and I said, listen,
Speaker 2: if you can protect me in here when I get out,
Speaker 2: I buried all my money and I commit my life
Speaker 2: to saving young boys that look like I said, but
Speaker 2: that that shit can't happen to me.
Speaker 1: So you're telling me after the trauma of a crackheaded
Speaker 1: and mean drunk grandmother, an absentee father getting shot in
Speaker 1: the head, getting shot in the shoulder, Daridine in Atlanta hotel, uh,
Speaker 1: being in gunfights and the gang and the life and
Speaker 1: seeing everything you saw after all of that, and how
Speaker 1: hard you must have been, there was still something so
Speaker 1: hard it even would have broke you.
Speaker 2: Absolutely. And it was that for you because you're going
Speaker 2: to think about it everything that you see before then,
Speaker 2: And I was prepared for They.
Speaker 1: Told me that, but nobody told you about that.
Speaker 2: Nobody told me about this ship. You know what I mean?
Speaker 2: He ain't coming home, Hey, man, ain't know they fucking
Speaker 2: in prison now that that ain't what they coming home
Speaker 2: saying that ain't what they say in the raps. Now,
Speaker 2: didn't nobody know that shit? I didn't, and.
Speaker 1: So you dropped on your knees and you made a
Speaker 1: de with God.
Speaker 2: Period. Dude, I can't go listen. I'm trying to tell
Speaker 2: you a real man knows his limitations. That shit. I
Speaker 2: ain't no coming back from that. In my mind, I
Speaker 2: ain't no coming back from that.
Speaker 1: We'll be right back. The very second interview I ever
Speaker 1: did was with a guy named John Ponder, who spent
Speaker 1: time in a federal penitentiary for bank robbery. After a
Speaker 1: life of crime, he now is in Vegas and operates
Speaker 1: one of the most successful reentry programs for former felons
Speaker 1: in the country. As you know, I'll let you finish
Speaker 1: my sins. What percent of people that were in jail
Speaker 1: returned to jail? Eighty five percent, That's exactly right. The
Speaker 1: national number I think is eighty seven. Now, the recidivism
Speaker 1: rate of the people that go through his program is
Speaker 1: only eight So instead of eighty five percent going back
Speaker 1: to prison, only eight. So you can imagine his success.
Speaker 1: We're not going to get in telling his story. If
Speaker 1: you want it, pull it up on an army and
Speaker 1: armed folks. John potter phenomenal story. He made his deal
Speaker 1: with God in prison and ask the judge in the
Speaker 1: robe to not be his judge, but for God to
Speaker 1: be his judge and to judge his heart. And he
Speaker 1: swore if he would ever get out and not have
Speaker 1: to spend the rest of his life in jail, he
Speaker 1: would do what he has now successful really done. That's
Speaker 1: John Ponder's story. That's your story.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was scared simple, then you got extra set
Speaker 2: six on one. What can you do? Hope they hear
Speaker 2: you up.
Speaker 1: That's what you can do.
Speaker 2: Hope they hear the fuck up. I don't like them odds.
Speaker 1: So you made the deal, you get out of jail,
Speaker 1: and it never happened to you. But now you on
Speaker 1: a hook because you done made a deal with God. Right,
Speaker 1: Because here's the deal. You make a deal with God
Speaker 1: and he holds up his end of the.
Speaker 2: Bargain, you damn show a hole of yours the park.
Speaker 1: That's right. So what's the first thing you do?
Speaker 2: Honestly, Yeah, go look for the dude who snitched on me. Yeah,
Speaker 2: first thing I did.
Speaker 1: A lot of people make deals with God when they're
Speaker 1: in jail. When they get out, they start thinking.
Speaker 2: But The thing that got me was God immediately showed
Speaker 2: me that same scene back in prison. The only difference
Speaker 2: it was me hm.
Speaker 1: So that was my.
Speaker 2: I mean because I was I've told people I want
Speaker 2: to angel when you first get out, nobody is that's
Speaker 2: the biggest thing. When you're in prison. You lie to
Speaker 2: God to try to get out, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2: So that and that's what I first did. And I
Speaker 2: mean it was quick God showing all right, renig on me.
Speaker 2: And that was when I all right, let's do what
Speaker 2: I said I was gonna do.
Speaker 1: And you started with little league football, right, Yeah.
Speaker 2: So actually before I even started with little league football,
Speaker 2: I just started helping more kids that I knew. So
Speaker 2: I opened up So I opened up a gym because
Speaker 2: my PO, so I started off as a personal training
Speaker 2: because my PO was all about me getting a job.
Speaker 2: Like it was because I had this thing about I
Speaker 2: don't want a job, like I had a bad experience
Speaker 2: at sixteen and it's not gonna happen. So that was
Speaker 2: the whole thing. She's like, you gotta better get a job,
Speaker 2: but I'm gonna violate you. You don't get a job.
Speaker 1: Let's be honest. You've been an entrepreneur since you were nine.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So I'm sitting there like no like, and then
Speaker 2: I tried the nine to five. The shit didn't work.
Speaker 2: I mean it was right when Steak and Shake first
Speaker 2: came on Goodman Road, and you know, I'm in there,
Speaker 2: and if anybody knows Steak in Shake, all the baseball
Speaker 2: teams come in, and then you got the screen jumping
Speaker 2: and I'm trying to keep up with the burgers and
Speaker 2: this damn manager yelling at my glove and got stuck
Speaker 2: to the grill.
Speaker 1: I'm like, you know what, I'm opening the gym.
Speaker 2: I'm going this. This is when I was young. So
Speaker 2: that's that's what pushed me back into the streets. It
Speaker 2: was like nah, so ever since then, I vowed never
Speaker 2: to have a job, and with me being honest, doing
Speaker 2: my whole deal with fight my case with the prosecutor
Speaker 2: and everybody, that's how they was gonna stick it to
Speaker 2: me by making me getting this job. So I take
Speaker 2: a personal training job at the French Riviere and me
Speaker 2: and the other guys we're having like this. I guess
Speaker 2: it's toward toial contests or whatever, and I just like,
Speaker 2: I'm gonna go find my own like this is crazy.
Speaker 2: And so then one day the manager comes in the
Speaker 2: ends with my check. I said, hey, show down. You
Speaker 2: missing some money on here, buddy, I said, if we're
Speaker 2: doing personal training and I get a percentage, I said,
Speaker 2: this is not a this is not enough. I said,
Speaker 2: where's my points on the package? And then the guys
Speaker 2: is what I said. I said, y'all, don't talk like that.
Speaker 2: Where's the rest of my money? So then the guys was, no,
Speaker 2: you top out at this right here. No way, I'm
Speaker 2: going to get my own gin. It's no way. No
Speaker 2: we get points on the package in the streets. He no,
Speaker 2: not doing this, no way. And I wanted to open
Speaker 2: up my own gym, and so I stuck. But then
Speaker 2: from there I wanted to help kids, but they couldn't
Speaker 2: afford the pay, so I said, fuck it, come on in.
Speaker 1: I want the same reason why lots of kids in
Speaker 1: the urban areas can't play little exports. They can't afford
Speaker 1: the cleats, they can't afford the That's why.
Speaker 2: I didn't play right.
Speaker 1: I get it.
Speaker 2: So the first thing, So when I got a chance,
Speaker 2: I said, once I got done helping my small group
Speaker 2: of kids, so I'm start a little League too, And
Speaker 2: that was my whole plan. Even when I was in prison,
Speaker 2: I was telling the guy, I'm gonna give these kids
Speaker 2: to look at experience that I always wanted.
Speaker 1: And never got and never got, and just maybe they'll
Speaker 1: see a way different rug and game banging.
Speaker 2: Maybe. But if I can provide this for them, you
Speaker 2: never know what is gonna change in them. And so
Speaker 2: that's why I started. I got me a Little League team.
Speaker 2: Everything was free. I bought the kids. You covered it,
Speaker 2: showed it past him in jersey cleat socks. I mean,
Speaker 2: we were suited and Booty and I traveled the kids
Speaker 2: we want. We was the first Little League team in
Speaker 2: history to play at and T Stadium in Dallas. It's
Speaker 2: on YouTube. It's the first team to do it. And
Speaker 2: we traveled to kids and I wanted to expose them.
Speaker 2: I wanted to get these kids everything that I didn't have.
Speaker 2: And then it just from there, I'm dropping kids off.
Speaker 2: Someone was going home to know.
Speaker 1: Folks don't understand, Melvin. If you're gonna coach kids in
Speaker 1: the hood, you also are gonna run actual service. Yeah, uber, Yeah.
Speaker 2: If you care about these keids participating and having a future,
Speaker 2: where you got to go pick them up.
Speaker 1: That's right, just like they did for you at Brocrass.
Speaker 1: No difference, same deal, no difference, I know.
Speaker 2: And but from there the man in me, man, I
Speaker 2: can't drop kids off on the porch at foot home projects.
Speaker 1: Come on, talk about that for a second. Like foot
Speaker 1: homes remember to national audience, Foothomes is.
Speaker 2: One of the roughest projects in Memphis right now, is
Speaker 2: currently torn down.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was one of the roughest projects in the
Speaker 1: United States period. Yeah. So with me the third most
Speaker 1: violent zip code in the US.
Speaker 2: So with me knowing that and me being a part
Speaker 2: of that, there's no way I can lead his eleven
Speaker 2: year old boy out.
Speaker 1: Here and literally when you drop them off, they they
Speaker 1: might go curl up in a chair on the porch
Speaker 1: because they ain't got nowhere to go.
Speaker 2: Well, my little guy, Bobby, that's what he was actually doing,
Speaker 2: Like you come home with me. I ain't gonna do that.
Speaker 2: Then when you look up his mama, don college till
Speaker 2: three days like to looking for him. So now your
Speaker 2: mind you think three days. So now your mind you think,
Speaker 2: like damn, if I would have left him on the porch,
Speaker 2: he would have been there for three days. Man, I
Speaker 2: can talk about my grandma all day long, but shit,
Speaker 2: I came in the house. So it was one of
Speaker 2: those things that it took a life of his.
Speaker 1: I want to talk about something real quick, just a
Speaker 1: little off subject. In urban areas, there's all kinds of
Speaker 1: vernacular that's different than suburban areas. There's a whole different language,
Speaker 1: there's a whole different dialog, there's a whole different everything.
Speaker 1: I think we can all agree to that, just the truth.
Speaker 1: And then there's one in Hispanic, heavily Hispanic urbinari as.
Speaker 1: It just is one of the ones that is what
Speaker 1: stood the test of time. Is my kids will ask
Speaker 1: their friends where do you live? Kids in the urban
Speaker 1: area will say where do you stay?
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I always thought that that was really poor grammar until
Speaker 1: I understood it's actually perfect grammar, because any of these
Speaker 1: kids don't live anywhere. It's just where they stay that night.
Speaker 2: Well as what I'm saying is where you stand that night,
Speaker 2: that month, that week.
Speaker 1: Because there ain't nothing permanent.
Speaker 2: I ain't shit permanent. Permanent's change. That's the clicking fan Melvin.
Speaker 1: That seems so foreign to most of the people listening
Speaker 1: to us, but to from the urban areas, of our cities.
Speaker 1: That's just the clicking fan. They don't even see it anymore.
Speaker 1: It's not that they don't know English, they're saying it
Speaker 1: right where you stay. And if you really grasp that,
Speaker 1: how do you expect a kid to learn? How do
Speaker 1: you expect a kid to be loved? How do you
Speaker 1: expect a kid to read on grade level? By third grade?
Speaker 1: He ain't thinking about getting lullabys and being read to.
Speaker 1: He doesn't even know where he's going to stay that night.
Speaker 1: And if he ain't got nowhere to stay, he probably
Speaker 1: ain't eaten. And if you've taken a thirty six hour
Speaker 1: period of time, which is a weekend, if you go
Speaker 1: to school, you get lunch over the weekend, If you
Speaker 1: get one meal over the weekend, you don't think you
Speaker 1: upset and angry and irritable, and you can't sleep, and
Speaker 1: your stomach growling and you're hungry and you're hurting. How's
Speaker 1: that kid supposed to learn? And how does he feel
Speaker 1: cared for, love, nourished, nurtured, any of it. It's not possible.
Speaker 1: It is not possible. And so you weren't dropping the
Speaker 1: skid off on the porch because you know that so
Speaker 1: you take them to your.
Speaker 2: House, because I know what it feels like. Man, I
Speaker 2: ain't crazy.
Speaker 1: You are crazy, but I know you are crazy, Melvin,
Speaker 1: but in the best sense, the best way.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because you know you've seen there, like, okay, you
Speaker 2: lead his kid. He got two options, fight or flight.
Speaker 1: It's almost the same two options that or jail. Neither
Speaker 1: of them are very good, but it's what you got.
Speaker 2: So then you got to ask yourself, man, what type
Speaker 2: of man are you pulling away?
Speaker 1: Knowing that?
Speaker 2: Mm hmm, So that that ain't why God got you out.
Speaker 1: Of the joint, to leave the skid up here on
Speaker 1: the porch.
Speaker 2: Nah. So, man, you look, me and my fiance is
Speaker 2: sharing a downtown two being room an apartment with fifteen
Speaker 2: kids and my daughter. They turning up ship, they turn
Speaker 2: up the apartment pool gates, they turn up the apartment.
Speaker 2: They running her crazy.
Speaker 1: Your fiance deserves a special place in Heaven to even
Speaker 1: live with your crazy self.
Speaker 2: And no, she quit, she's probably gonna burn her hair.
Speaker 1: Well you hear me, good lord. So, but that's going on.
Speaker 1: And so now you're thinking, they ain't got a place stay,
Speaker 1: they ain't got no food, they're not getting an education.
Speaker 2: That's me all over again, even worse, ten times worse.
Speaker 1: So you're looking at fifteen years.
Speaker 2: There's no way, So we move them in. We end
Speaker 2: up getting kicked out of the apartment obviously, end up
Speaker 2: renting the house. So we rented the house for the
Speaker 2: first year when she finally skid outled. So now I
Speaker 2: let her keep re orchestrated where she keeps the name
Speaker 2: on the leaves, because as a convicted villain, you can't rent.
Speaker 2: You can't, you can't rent.
Speaker 1: In a good area. Yeah, you're still on parole.
Speaker 2: This time you screwed. And so it was one of
Speaker 2: those things where I did what I was supposed to do,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean. I knew, I knew what
Speaker 2: these kids was going through. Every kid that I deal
Speaker 2: with is either like me or in.
Speaker 1: A worser situation. But it is amazing that fifteen kids
Speaker 1: piled into a two bedroom apartment with you, a convicted fella,
Speaker 1: trying to do right by them, trying to keep them
Speaker 1: fed and taken care of, is better than what they had.
Speaker 2: Because they're looking for love.
Speaker 1: That's what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: Listen, it could have been an eighteen bedroom house if
Speaker 2: ain't no love being passed out. That don't mean shit.
Speaker 2: You going, man, I'm kids looking for love. When I
Speaker 2: hit the screech, I was looking for love. When I
Speaker 2: joined my gang, I was looking for love. I was
Speaker 2: looking for acceptance. I was looking for people that wanted
Speaker 2: me to be around you. Fuck if it meant selling,
Speaker 2: eat or blowing your ass off. I just wanted to praise.
Speaker 2: I wanted to feel good about myself. I wanted to belong.
Speaker 2: That's all these kids want. Shit, that's what anybody wants.
Speaker 2: That's why we journed for turning is that's why we
Speaker 2: get these good jobs and why we get all in
Speaker 2: these social groups. Because what in the end of the day,
Speaker 2: everybody want to fucking belong. So when a kid, when
Speaker 2: you're growing up and you're not getting the love from
Speaker 2: your momy or your dad, you gotta get it from somewhere.
Speaker 2: I mean, because you're gonna themed for it. That's human nature.
Speaker 2: You're gonna theme for love. You're gonna seek out love.
Speaker 2: That's how biggest thing get period. Man, Before we do anything,
Speaker 2: we're gonna love on you.
Speaker 1: We'll be right back. So you got this knowledge, you
Speaker 1: got these kids, you're doing this football thing, and then
Speaker 1: you come up with this idea.
Speaker 2: Actually I got pushed into the idea.
Speaker 1: How'd you get pushed I'm surprised anybody pushed you out? Well,
Speaker 1: life did, Okay.
Speaker 2: So the whole plan was so I created this little
Speaker 2: league team and I made these kids really good, to
Speaker 2: the point where we actually took them to FBU on
Speaker 2: the national circuit. So it was only two hundred middle
Speaker 2: school kids that were invited. Thirteen of them was mine. Wow,
Speaker 2: and one of the kids. Two of the kids in
Speaker 2: up winning MVP in they certain area. So I said,
Speaker 2: you know what. And at the time, I was training
Speaker 2: this guy's son that went to a private school, and
Speaker 2: they was adamant about the boys playing with him at
Speaker 2: the private school. So I'm like, okay, here it is
Speaker 2: all over again. Yeah, we're gonna send all these kids
Speaker 2: to the private school and they'll get their great education.
Speaker 2: But now they have me.
Speaker 1: So they got them to erase the nat naivety, to
Speaker 1: raise the misunderstanding, to do the very thing I was
Speaker 1: talking about. You needed a broadcrest that you didn't get.
Speaker 1: They would get the education, the unbelievable experience, but they
Speaker 1: would have you to mentor them through.
Speaker 2: That problem mental to navigate it good, like, nah, don't
Speaker 2: say that shit, No no.
Speaker 1: No, no, no, no.
Speaker 2: It's true, but don't you say that, YO ain't gonna
Speaker 2: be back in the ghetto.
Speaker 1: Don't you dare say that.
Speaker 2: And man, I thought we had a solid plan. The
Speaker 2: guy who came up with the idea had a pocket.
Speaker 1: Full of money, and big heart wanted to help.
Speaker 2: Big heart wanted to help his kids was involved. I mean,
Speaker 2: it seemed like the perfect fit. And then the guy
Speaker 2: understand dude, that the kids was going to need support
Speaker 2: outside of the school to be able to hold up.
Speaker 2: Perfect Well, we meet with the administration of the school
Speaker 2: and they say, we just need them to take this test.
Speaker 1: The dreaded Entry and Aptitude test, to make sure they
Speaker 1: can actually handle it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so I said, yeah, I said cool. I said,
Speaker 2: I'm telling them a little bit behind, you know, I
Speaker 2: don't know how much. So, you know. So the guy
Speaker 2: was like, oh, no, we probably can make a special
Speaker 2: school inside of a school, and don't worry about it.
Speaker 2: Don't We've gotten these kids before. They'll be fine, coach,
Speaker 2: don't worry about.
Speaker 1: Is that your white person talking? It doesn't look like it. Yeah.
Speaker 1: If I start trying to talk like a black person,
Speaker 1: I would look as goofy as that I was. So
Speaker 1: I'm like, all right.
Speaker 2: So then he comes back and he's like, they scored
Speaker 2: in a zero percentile.
Speaker 1: And reading zero and at the time not zero point
Speaker 1: five zero.
Speaker 2: So I'm like, man, what the fuck that mean?
Speaker 1: They can't read?
Speaker 2: No, you know he did it better. They can't come here, right,
Speaker 2: I said, oh, hell all right?
Speaker 1: So now, and in fairness, they the school, those schools
Speaker 1: are not equipped to handle kids that are so far behind. Correct,
Speaker 1: where are they gonna put them, How they're gonna teach them?
Speaker 1: They're gonna be behind. So I mean, it's horrible, but
Speaker 1: the fact is they can't take them to their school
Speaker 1: because they're not equipped to deal with the deficiency in
Speaker 1: learning that they've had to that point.
Speaker 2: And I wasn't mad at the school.
Speaker 1: No, for real, But I'm just saying nobody needs to
Speaker 1: hear that and think, well, that damn school turned their
Speaker 1: back on those kids that they're not equipped.
Speaker 2: They weren't equipped, they wun't.
Speaker 1: No, But you got a problem. You got all these
Speaker 1: schedus you care about that needs you, and clearly they
Speaker 1: need an education.
Speaker 2: So that's how I came up the crazy idea, which
Speaker 2: is I said, whatever we were removing from the school system,
Speaker 2: create a small, nurturing environment that's conducive to learning, that's
Speaker 2: conducive to being caught up. And they reached their full
Speaker 2: potential like anybody else.
Speaker 1: So you're gonna make your own school.
Speaker 2: So at this time, so that was.
Speaker 1: A parolled convicted felon gonna start a school.
Speaker 2: That was the plan. So at the time, Tam and
Speaker 2: she was a one day a week volunteer and they
Speaker 2: had one out of town, and I had told about
Speaker 2: this great plan about them going to the private school,
Speaker 2: and she was calling checking in on the plane and
Speaker 2: I was like, ah, it didn't work out like that,
Speaker 2: I said, I said, the school didn't take me. I said,
Speaker 2: but I need your help schooling these kids. I said,
Speaker 2: this is the idea. She says, ma'am. But we're not educated.
Speaker 2: I said, I know. I said, but zero percentime, we
Speaker 2: know more than they know, so we can just start there.
Speaker 2: And I told her, I said, if we could just
Speaker 2: start there and just get just get some people to
Speaker 2: wrap their arms around, I said, because they're not dumb,
Speaker 2: they're just untaught.
Speaker 1: There's a huge difference of being dumb and being uneducated.
Speaker 1: The a's dumb. They just not been taught.
Speaker 2: They just they just hadn't been taught. So this Tammy
Speaker 2: dived in head first with me. She she reached out
Speaker 2: to a couple of volunteers. They dived head and I
Speaker 2: reached out to a couple and we basically did round
Speaker 2: the clock education with these kids. So the fact that
Speaker 2: they were living with me allowed us to do education
Speaker 2: at night. So that was the plan. We're chopping it
Speaker 2: this way, chopping it away. The first year we got
Speaker 2: a three point seventh grade level jump. Man Tammy went crazy,
Speaker 2: and then you know, I was like, just your first year.
Speaker 2: So the second year, we get a three point one
Speaker 2: grade level jump on our kids and now every like
Speaker 2: so I said, let's put them against the Act. That ain't
Speaker 2: nobody can say anything if they go against Act. So
Speaker 2: then our kids started to hit the college benchmarks and
Speaker 2: reading right. We had a couple of kids with a
Speaker 2: composite of a twenty compositive twenty one. I mean, there
Speaker 2: was ways away from kids that we had. When they
Speaker 2: first got to us, they was reading on third and
Speaker 2: fourth grade reading.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but in twenty and twenty one's you're qualifying for
Speaker 1: college you're qualifying for football scholarships, and you have a
Speaker 1: proficiency in being able to read reading comprehension math No.
Speaker 1: Twenty twenty one on at eight Rhodes scholars But it's
Speaker 1: a hell of a flock from zero percent time cooking
Speaker 1: a huge jump cooking. It's life changing.
Speaker 2: I mean, and that's when we said, that's when we
Speaker 2: knew we said it works. I said, y'all, I've been
Speaker 2: telling y'all it's the environment. The way I grew up
Speaker 2: is not what I wanted to do. I said. These
Speaker 2: kids are the same. I said, so if we can
Speaker 2: give them everything that they need to.
Speaker 1: Be successful, an education, love and nurturing environment and food, compassion,
Speaker 1: food and accountability, they flourish.
Speaker 2: So so they hit the they hit the benchmarking, and
Speaker 2: it was like, okay, all right, let's let's be efficient.
Speaker 2: Because everybody was talking about homeschool and Tammy was jumping
Speaker 2: through the hoops with N C. A A and turning
Speaker 2: in this paperwork, and of course everybody saying all we
Speaker 2: did was football, And I mean, so he was like, no,
Speaker 2: now that we know this pilot program work, let's skill
Speaker 2: it up. I said, because there's a million malevns throughout
Speaker 2: the United States, and they all need what I need, love, opportunity, accountability.
Speaker 2: But see it, you don't need ship else you give
Speaker 2: me those three things, I got it. I'm good to go.
Speaker 2: So we formed. We formed a school called Peer Academy.
Speaker 1: Spells stands for.
Speaker 2: So peer stands for progress and under restraints.
Speaker 1: And the streams were.
Speaker 2: Progressing under restraints and extremes. That's what I've done my
Speaker 2: whole life. And these kids in Memphis that's living in
Speaker 2: double the national average of property, that's living in double
Speaker 2: the national average of food hardship. That's what they're doing.
Speaker 2: The progressing under the most all the restraints and the
Speaker 2: streams you can think about.
Speaker 1: So now you got pure the school. And that brings
Speaker 1: me to where I first met you, where you guys
Speaker 1: bought a house on a swamp to put a school.
Speaker 2: You know what it was actually for us to uh
Speaker 2: to have a safe place. So the doing the entire organization.
Speaker 2: Every time somebody found out the truth, they would kick
Speaker 2: us out. So, like I said in the beginning, I
Speaker 2: had a gym. So I owned my gym for seven
Speaker 2: years and I closed down my gym to turn into
Speaker 2: a school. Well, when the landlord got w into that
Speaker 2: we're not gonna renew your least well the house that
Speaker 2: we were staying in when we got on the news
Speaker 2: and my landlord found out, it was a convicted feeling.
Speaker 2: I can't stay here, buddy. So it was at one
Speaker 2: point that me and the kids went homeless. We'll be
Speaker 2: right back. We was literally sleeping on board members couches,
Speaker 2: living out on my escalade. I mean, so it was
Speaker 2: one of those things where at the time I went
Speaker 2: to my board chairman, I was like, Ginaltisten, damn it,
Speaker 2: I need y'all help. I'm a drug dealer. Ain't had
Speaker 2: no paperwork. I gave. This ain't gonna I mean, I
Speaker 2: need y'all to do this, I said, but it's gonna work.
Speaker 1: Drug Dealer's make sure every buyers fans. You dropped the
Speaker 1: life by this point.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's that's overWe we ain't picking that up. And man,
Speaker 2: they they had a hearter goal. I mean they understood,
Speaker 2: they had an artic goal, and they understood the mission.
Speaker 1: I mean.
Speaker 2: So, so me and Tammy was running around through the
Speaker 2: city trying to find a house.
Speaker 1: You've you've talked about Tammy Tammy gall One. So that's
Speaker 1: who it's Tammy.
Speaker 2: That's that's like miss glue man. She keep it, She
Speaker 2: keep it all together, you know, I mean from me,
Speaker 2: the boys, the donors, I mean the bridge. I mean,
Speaker 2: you gotta be honest. Without Timmy, I ain't getting too
Speaker 2: many rooms with white boys.
Speaker 1: She's an angel for you.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, like, without without a doubt.
Speaker 1: So now you buy the house that looks like a swamp.
Speaker 2: Now, so we bought it. We buy the house that
Speaker 2: looked like swamp. And I know zero about construction, but
Speaker 2: I'm so headstrong and this is what we're gonna do.
Speaker 2: So I end up mismanager all the construction money I'm
Speaker 2: talking about. Man, we looked up. Me and the boys
Speaker 2: are living in a house without heat, mhmm, without plumbing.
Speaker 2: But we had this big gate that I put up
Speaker 2: to keep everybody out. So then we started using loze,
Speaker 2: We start using the bath, throwing around the problem.
Speaker 1: Need no gate. Nobody wants to come in the house
Speaker 1: without heating, plumbing.
Speaker 2: But you know what we am getting Nick saving to
Speaker 2: come in. I never forget one of our kids, Chris
Speaker 2: at the time was ah At the time, he was
Speaker 2: like ranked the twenty eighth player in the country, and
Speaker 2: Nick saving comes down and he says, this is where
Speaker 2: y'all live. I said, yeah, coach, unless you got a
Speaker 2: better spot.
Speaker 1: Corse, you should have seen last year. You should seen
Speaker 1: last year you would have gonna visit us in the
Speaker 1: parking lot and my escalator, that's what you did to do.
Speaker 2: I was gonna take your call in the parking lot.
Speaker 1: And this is nice. You see the gate said you
Speaker 1: see a game.
Speaker 2: So then Jimbo Fisher come out. He says, you got
Speaker 2: the number one kids sleeping on the floor. I said, shit,
Speaker 2: I'm sleeping on the air mattress.
Speaker 1: What you want me to give him? And it was
Speaker 1: just I can't believe it. This is better And where
Speaker 1: it came from, it was a.
Speaker 2: Lot better than where he came because he's safe, he's full,
Speaker 2: and nobody playing with his booty at night, and and
Speaker 2: he's loved. What's all the kids need?
Speaker 1: And so you rip out the woods, y'all bring in
Speaker 1: three hundred loads of dirt.
Speaker 2: Man, So now, and that's what I mean another time.
Speaker 2: So I'm gunn home, knocking down all these trees and
Speaker 2: we need to feel and this, this and this having
Speaker 2: no idea what I'm doing, so we knocked down over
Speaker 2: eighty trees. Now we're sitting in a seventeen foot drop
Speaker 2: swamp out Like, Hi, I don't know what to do.
Speaker 2: I was. I was completely stuck. And I get up
Speaker 2: two thirty in the morning, and I started my meditation
Speaker 2: in my prayer and then I started my workout. And
Speaker 2: at this time, they was redoing the Memphis Airport concord A,
Speaker 2: and I'm watching these dumb trucks as I go to work.
Speaker 1: All that dirt.
Speaker 2: So I said, I'm gonna follow these trucks. I'm gonna
Speaker 2: figure out where they're going and where they're coming from.
Speaker 2: I want to know. So I followed the truck, figure
Speaker 2: out where they're going, where they come from. I'm clocking
Speaker 2: the mileage. And I called one of my buddies. I said, hey,
Speaker 2: you ever heard of this company? I google them and
Speaker 2: they're in car you here?
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know them.
Speaker 2: Can I have us following them because I need some dirt.
Speaker 2: So I'm calling, I'm calling. I'm calling. Finally say hey, listen,
Speaker 2: I don't track your trucks. I can save you on mileage.
Speaker 2: I can save you, and I know somebody is paying
Speaker 2: you to dump that. I said, listen, you come give
Speaker 2: it all to me. I need over three hundred and
Speaker 2: eighty longs. You come to me. It's like all right,
Speaker 2: he hangs up. I'm like fucking seriousness. So I'm calling
Speaker 2: them back. I'm calling them back. I said, hey, listen, listen, listen,
Speaker 2: just come check it out. If I'm wrong, don't ever
Speaker 2: fucking call me again. But if I'm right, give him
Speaker 2: a dirt. So I convinced the guy to come down
Speaker 2: and see it. He pulls in with this big black
Speaker 2: truck and it gets out and you're right, I said,
Speaker 2: I know that's what I've been telling you. Now can
Speaker 2: I get my damn dirt? And he agreed, and boy,
Speaker 2: for you know it, they had all the dump trucks
Speaker 2: from the airport re routed and we end up filling
Speaker 2: in US seventeen foot drop to create our practice field.
Speaker 1: Which is now the pure football field is now.
Speaker 2: So we once we did that, and I went to
Speaker 2: donors and told them what we were doing. I said, listen,
Speaker 2: if you will buy the sad, me and my boys
Speaker 2: will roll it. We ain't a problem working. We just
Speaker 2: can't afford the sod, you know what I mean. And
Speaker 2: we had some foundations to jump on with us. We
Speaker 2: bought the sod and me and the bulls. We had
Speaker 2: over one hundred rolls. A saw the big rolls and
Speaker 2: we rolled it out. Some of it got crooked. We
Speaker 2: had to pull it together with a rake. And now
Speaker 2: we had a proud practice field that sent over twenty
Speaker 2: kids to college.
Speaker 1: So for the listeners, my first vision of this campus,
Speaker 1: this four acres was a house that had been cordoned
Speaker 1: off into classrooms with probably twenty four twenty five kids inside.
Speaker 1: They're going to school, but the student teacher ratio is
Speaker 1: probably five six, seven to one. And then behind the
Speaker 1: house under a tenth as a weight room, and behind
Speaker 1: that is another room or another building that look like
Speaker 1: a trailer. And then off to the right of that
Speaker 1: is a practice field. And then next to the practice
Speaker 1: field are the dormitories where the kids live. And how
Speaker 1: many kids live at Pure Academy typically annually twenty three four.
Speaker 2: Five something like that, twenty five twenty five.
Speaker 1: Kids that are fed three squares.
Speaker 2: No reference LUNs dinner, two snacks.
Speaker 1: Reference Lut's dinner, two snacks, and.
Speaker 2: They love, they get educated, they're working out, we're working out.
Speaker 2: We take them, We take them all throughout the United States.
Speaker 2: So one of the things we do the first week
Speaker 2: in June, we rent a charter bus and we take
Speaker 2: our kids throughout the country to various colleges and universities.
Speaker 2: They get a chance to participating in the school camps,
Speaker 2: interact with the coaches, look at the college campus, what
Speaker 2: they like, what they.
Speaker 1: Get exposed to the world they never dreamed of. Yep.
Speaker 1: So here's the thing. I was coaching football when Pure
Speaker 1: showed up, and I'm like, well, that was Pure, you know,
Speaker 1: because out of nowhere, all of a sudden, there's this Pure,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, man, this is gonna be this ragtag thing.
Speaker 1: Ain't nothing.
Speaker 2: I got pushed. There was another push too.
Speaker 1: And then I started to knowing Pure started kicking everybody's
Speaker 1: ass pretty good. Not only was Pure teaching kids, loving kids,
Speaker 1: providing for kids, they were pretty fair at the game
Speaker 1: of football too.
Speaker 2: Absolutely.
Speaker 1: And how many years since you moved to the four
Speaker 1: Acres and actually started the boarding school years ago? Was
Speaker 1: up five and considering twenty five kids about annually, And
Speaker 1: that doesn't mean twenty five in and twenty five out,
Speaker 1: because some of these are freshman, sophomore, senior, so they're rotating.
Speaker 1: So you're graduating seven eight to ten kids a year, right,
Speaker 1: So that's fifty kids about graduated, and you're saying twenty
Speaker 1: have gone under play college.
Speaker 2: Football full athletic scholarships.
Speaker 1: And the other ones are still going to school.
Speaker 2: Some are still going to school. I was just bragging.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's not just about football scholarships. They're getting educated.
Speaker 1: Moving on.
Speaker 2: No, yeah, don't. I don't care. I don't care about
Speaker 2: football or even the college. There's this one kid man,
Speaker 2: I love him to death. His name is Tick Brown,
Speaker 2: and we went through a lot of shit with.
Speaker 1: Tears, just kind of growing up.
Speaker 2: His stepdad thought that he could put his hands on
Speaker 2: the house, so we had to visit with him. Like, man, listen,
Speaker 2: I can't tell you what to do with your woman,
Speaker 2: cause I don't know what's going on. But if you
Speaker 2: hit Terry again, there's gonna be some serious consequences. Take
Speaker 2: that for whatever it's worth, I said, because you can't
Speaker 2: get mad at him for the shortcomings of your life.
Speaker 2: So let's snip that in the bud. So Terry stayed
Speaker 2: with us, graduated, and he didn't wanna. He decided to
Speaker 2: go back to Raleigh, Egypt after the football season, graduated,
Speaker 2: got a job at Amazon.
Speaker 1: Amazon.
Speaker 2: Amazon. I called him. I said, ter I think you
Speaker 2: better than that. I said, nothing's wrong with Amazon. I said,
Speaker 2: I think you got more than that though. I said, listen,
Speaker 2: you're just eighteen. Come back, come back to period. Let
Speaker 2: me give me, give me more time, give my staff
Speaker 2: more time, give us more time with you. It's a
Speaker 2: lot of shit we can tron out and the crazy
Speaker 2: boty battle. I gave him the same speech Freeze gave me. Man,
Speaker 2: if you trust me, I'll get you to college. Terry
Speaker 2: trusted me. We sent Terry to Fort Valley in Georgia.
Speaker 2: First year, Terry flunks out. He called me and said, Coch,
Speaker 2: I don't want to do this shit. I said, cool,
Speaker 2: So what do you want to do? He said, I
Speaker 2: want to drive trucks. I want to what I want
Speaker 2: to drive trucks? I said, guess what? Then I mana
Speaker 2: help you get your CDs. We're gonna figure it out.
Speaker 2: So now to this day, Terry Brown is made in
Speaker 2: sixty five grand driving trucks. He just told one of
Speaker 2: our staff and some more people that he's driven fifteen
Speaker 2: states in the last two weeks.
Speaker 1: It's pure, even though it does put a lot of
Speaker 1: good athletes out into the world because of what the
Speaker 1: program is.
Speaker 2: It ain't about that now, it's about it's about producing men.
Speaker 2: It's about producing more melvins, to save more melvins. That's
Speaker 2: what periods about football is just this. That's how we meet.
Speaker 1: It's the hook. The hook.
Speaker 2: So you think about, like this, where else were you
Speaker 2: gonna meet hundreds of black kids in the hood? Little
Speaker 2: leaf football because everybody think they're gonna be the next
Speaker 2: Michael Vick, Michael Jordan.
Speaker 1: Yeah, which we've already established earlier on ain't happening.
Speaker 2: Right, So you're telling me you want to be Michael
Speaker 2: Vick cool by four years a high school, three years
Speaker 2: of couch. Then we'll talk about that. But before you
Speaker 2: can ever do that, hey man, these are the things
Speaker 2: you gotta do. And then by the time you realize
Speaker 2: NFL is not in a deck.
Speaker 1: Of cards, you got to back up finally, rather than
Speaker 1: an ad for attendance, We'll be right back. So Pure
Speaker 1: saving lives, but you want to scale it.
Speaker 2: I do so.
Speaker 1: Share with our listeners the unbelievable truth about where Pure
Speaker 1: is going to be this August.
Speaker 2: So the good part about it, we just bought the
Speaker 2: old Memphis Health and Science Academy building in Chelsea.
Speaker 1: Which is a defunct school. There was a charter school.
Speaker 2: There was a charter.
Speaker 1: School before it was that it was.
Speaker 2: It was a Baptist college, a Baptist college.
Speaker 1: But it's a facility on how many acres.
Speaker 2: It's a facility on seven acres. Were over sixty five
Speaker 2: thousand square feet of building.
Speaker 1: That was defunct and left because of the school vacated correct.
Speaker 2: And it's amazing how much damage to a building was
Speaker 2: done in less than twelve months. I'm talking about everything
Speaker 2: they could took they took.
Speaker 1: And so you guys bought it. You your board, Pure
Speaker 1: Academy bought it.
Speaker 2: And you know the crazy thing about it, that was
Speaker 2: really a blessing. I got a phone call and somebody
Speaker 2: was sharing their good news with me and I was like, Okay,
Speaker 2: what the fuck does they got to do with me?
Speaker 2: And she says, can your air gonnass just listen for one,
Speaker 2: just one second, just just one. I said, hey, one
Speaker 2: thousand and forty minutes of the day, God need you
Speaker 2: to get to your point. And she says, coach, you
Speaker 2: can buy the high school. I said, what she said,
Speaker 2: go look at it? You can buy the high school,
Speaker 2: I said, for real. So I drive over there and
Speaker 2: I go wow, I said, but I gotta call the
Speaker 2: glue to make sure it's gonna work. Because if it
Speaker 2: ain't gonna work, ain't no even you said, so damn it.
Speaker 2: Where are you at? I'm headed, I'm headed back to town.
Speaker 2: I just came from North Carolina. I said, can you
Speaker 2: can you stop by the actress before you get to
Speaker 2: the house, I said, I said, five minutes. I just
Speaker 2: need I just need you five minutes. So me and
Speaker 2: my security and tem you know, breaking into this abandoned builder,
Speaker 2: and she's like, Melvin, you're right. She's like, it's a
Speaker 2: hard sale. A lot of people are gonna be mad
Speaker 2: at you because we had already on our current campus,
Speaker 2: we was already one hundred and twenty five grand into
Speaker 2: architect fees. We already had a groundbreaking ceremony about converting
Speaker 2: what you had about converting with We've already took over
Speaker 2: four million dollars of donors money. And she's like, Mailvin,
Speaker 2: you we gotta do this. I said, I know, I said,
Speaker 2: but I needed you to see it first. Now I
Speaker 2: got you on board, Let's go talk to the people
Speaker 2: that gave us the money, because I.
Speaker 1: Said, if you and the people in the money, if
Speaker 1: you use this money for something different.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean because because yeah, they gave it to me.
Speaker 2: But you know what I mean, you gotta be respectful.
Speaker 1: I mean.
Speaker 2: And one of the guys that gave me the money,
Speaker 2: I mean, he was a good friend. He was the
Speaker 2: guy that spearheaded the whole private school thing that just
Speaker 2: didn't work out. So the last thing I wanted to
Speaker 2: do was tell him, all we're doing something in white
Speaker 2: hen and look up and his money isn't North Memphis
Speaker 2: and Chills and his name is on the wall and
Speaker 2: North Memphis, I mean so And we told him and
Speaker 2: he was like, Melvin, thanks for calling. He's like, normal
Speaker 2: people don't even call. I was.
Speaker 1: And so, now your academy is going to be on
Speaker 1: seven acres and a sixty how many squire.
Speaker 2: Feet over sixty five thousand.
Speaker 1: Square How many kids can you house?
Speaker 2: So we'll be able to house over one hundred and
Speaker 2: seventy five kids, and we'll be able to educate over
Speaker 2: three hundred and fifty is a day, Melbourne.
Speaker 1: In six years from the back of your escalade, you're
Speaker 1: going to be able to house, love, nurture, educate, and
Speaker 1: feed one hundred seventy.
Speaker 2: Five kids by the blessing of God.
Speaker 1: And then have a day school that will throw another
Speaker 1: two or three hundred kids into that list.
Speaker 2: No, no, no, no, the three fifty is not included.
Speaker 2: The one seventy five, another three fifty, right, so it'd
Speaker 2: be like a total of like five twenty five.
Speaker 1: And to be clear, this is not a city school,
Speaker 1: nor is this a charter school. This is a private school.
Speaker 2: Yes, Category one accredited through the State of Tennis Department
Speaker 2: of Education. Private school. So right now eighty five percent
Speaker 2: of our fund in is private.
Speaker 1: This is how we break the chain.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've always I've always seen to break a vicious cycle,
Speaker 2: you must create a vicious cycle in some way. It's
Speaker 2: gonna work.
Speaker 1: On your website as a quote that says it's far
Speaker 1: easier to build children, I'm paraphrasing as far as your
Speaker 1: build children than it is to fix broken men. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: what grade will this thing start at?
Speaker 2: So right now, we got nine through twelfth, and we wanna,
Speaker 2: we wanna, we want to solidify the ninth through twelfth
Speaker 2: and then we're going to start to reach back. So
Speaker 2: our whole out of the pilot program. We founded that
Speaker 2: the kids that we that we got younger had even
Speaker 2: more success. But what kind of derailed our.
Speaker 1: Earlier to catch them? The more success you can have,
Speaker 1: that seems obvious.
Speaker 2: But what derailed the program is when we had the
Speaker 2: craziest superintendent who shut down school and football with all
Speaker 2: sports for inner city kids.
Speaker 1: And the reason COVID.
Speaker 2: So we immediately had to grab a hold to those kids,
Speaker 2: and our kids that was in the programming was affected.
Speaker 2: So that's how we got launched into just strictly ninth
Speaker 2: through twelve. So our whole thing is once we solidify
Speaker 2: this in two or three years to make sure we
Speaker 2: got it, then you reach back and Pure ideally would
Speaker 2: build a sixty twelve school and then one day we
Speaker 2: maybe in year five, May year seven.
Speaker 1: I can't Pure. Why can't Pure exist in Baltimore and
Speaker 1: Little Rock and Cincinnati and Chicago and Cleveland? And it can,
Speaker 1: it can and.
Speaker 2: It will because all those places have the same problem Melvin's.
Speaker 1: But to scale that, that's a lot of money. Well,
Speaker 1: why is this not something that all of these large
Speaker 1: national brands that are pouring money into naming rights for
Speaker 1: stadiums and everything else, And I get it. Profits is
Speaker 1: a necessary measure of niting business success, and marketing and
Speaker 1: advertising promotion is part of that. And so companies are
Speaker 1: putting their money where they think they're going to get
Speaker 1: the most notoriety for their brand. I get it. But
Speaker 1: why couldn't this be a national brand thing?
Speaker 2: That's the plan, because like I said, you've action in
Speaker 2: the same courses that I'm accing. My board members are acing,
Speaker 2: supporters are excellent. If a company got eight nine hundred
Speaker 2: million dollars to invest in warehousing everything else, well about
Speaker 2: you got that same money to invest in the community
Speaker 2: as well. So I think it's just about having those
Speaker 2: uncomfortable conversations and not being afraid to have them.
Speaker 1: The other thing is moment. It's about people just knowing it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the opportunity is there. Yeah, that's another thing. That's the
Speaker 1: biggest thing, because I think in the defense of those.
Speaker 2: Corporations, at least the ones I've dealt with, once you
Speaker 2: make them aware of the problem and the solution and
Speaker 2: the solution, they typically help.
Speaker 1: Melvin, you grew up a bread a born and bred
Speaker 1: drug dealer, and by all rights you might should have
Speaker 1: been dead by now. You did time, and you saw
Speaker 1: something horrific in prison, and you made a deal with God.
Speaker 1: And it started with Little League and away program, and
Speaker 1: by this August it will have blossomed into a full
Speaker 1: fledged private school that has the potential to serve five
Speaker 1: hundred kids that could be scaled across our country and
Speaker 1: literally change the face of what a private school looks
Speaker 1: like in our urban areas. Yep, what do you see
Speaker 1: when you look in the mirror?
Speaker 2: Just a commitment, not not no guid that's holy. It
Speaker 2: didn't die no better than nobody else. I just simply know,
Speaker 2: Guy is the last person you want.
Speaker 1: To reneed Melvin. Uh, We're not going to spend all
Speaker 1: this time telling a story and not asked, Like you said,
Speaker 1: you just got to ask if people are interested in
Speaker 1: supporting Peer, partnering with pere branding with Pure, or even
Speaker 1: seeing how to bring Peer to their town. All of
Speaker 1: our guests share their information. How do people get in
Speaker 1: touch with you?
Speaker 2: Uh? My email address is Melvin co at Peer Academy
Speaker 2: nine O one dot com, or you can also visit
Speaker 2: our website at ww dot Pero Academy nine O one
Speaker 2: five one three yes five O one C three Text deductible.
Speaker 2: We've been in good standings over the last thirteen years.
Speaker 1: And to be clear, you're living with and around these kids.
Speaker 1: This is not Melvin's get rich scheme.
Speaker 2: No, if I wanted to get rich, I just go
Speaker 2: back to cocaine.
Speaker 1: So the point is, yeah, this is if you hear
Speaker 1: the story and it's worth supporting. Understand these dollars are
Speaker 1: going to change the most disadvantaged among us kids' lives,
Speaker 1: mentored by a guy who holds them accountable, teaches them
Speaker 1: and loves them and requires that of the whole staff.
Speaker 2: That's the first thing when we're hiring. Do you love kids?
Speaker 2: Because if you're here for paychick, wrong plays.
Speaker 1: Buddy, Hopefully, hopefully some people out there listen will reach
Speaker 1: out to you, bro hope. So we're an army of
Speaker 1: normal folks. And I'll say it again. When passion and
Speaker 1: discipline meet at opportunity and the person with that discipline
Speaker 1: and that passion sees a need and takes the opportunity
Speaker 1: to fill it, amazing things can happen in our world.
Speaker 1: And we talk about those stories every week, and yours
Speaker 1: is good, gosh, the epitome of it. And if a
Speaker 1: guy from your background can do it, why can't anybody
Speaker 1: else if they just find their discipline and passion and
Speaker 1: meet it at opportunity. Man, brother, what a story, What
Speaker 1: an amazing thing you're doing, and if done, the lives
Speaker 1: you're changing. And you know, bro, I'm honored to know you,
Speaker 1: and at the risk of sound and condescending, and I
Speaker 1: hope you don't take it that way. I'm so proud
Speaker 1: of you. I'm proud to be your friend, I'm proud
Speaker 1: to know you. I'm proud you're doing this in Memphis,
Speaker 1: and man, brother, I can't imagine what this thing is
Speaker 1: going to be in ten years from now. Go be incredible.
Speaker 1: Thanks for joining me, Thanks for having me. I appreciate it,
Speaker 1: and thank you for joining us this week. If Melvin
Speaker 1: Cole or another guest has inspired you, in general, or
Speaker 1: better yet, to take action by donating to Pure, by
Speaker 1: starting something like it in your area, or something else entirely,
Speaker 1: please let me know. I'd love to hear about it.
Speaker 1: You can write me anytime at Bill at Normalfolks dot
Speaker 1: us and I will respond. And if you enjoyed this episode,
Speaker 1: share with friends and I'm social, subscribe to the podcast,
Speaker 1: rate and review it become a premium member at normalfolks
Speaker 1: dot us. All of the things that will help us
Speaker 1: grow an army of normal folks. I'm Bill Courtney. I'll
Speaker 1: see you next week.