Survived Early 90s Drug Game in NYC AMA

[timothy_strickland]

Did you cross path with neonazi skinheads? I Heard they were Deep in numbers during that era late 80s, early to mid 90s

 

[TDUBB]

Ever come across Pistol Pete Rollack? Was he really that crazy when he was roaming free?

 

[Bigsuk]

I never saw Preacher or his people in person. Have no idea what his relationship was with Alpo or if they had any.

Preacher's reputation traveled, but so did a lot of other crews just like his. They might have been more violent than the others, but I doubt it. What made their infamy reach another level was what happened to Rich Porter's little brother and that alleged incident with Bobby Brown.

I think a lot of you don't understand the "extortion" business model as it was employed back then. And that's not your fault, you had to be there to get it. The government has a vested interest in making us (Black and Latin people) look like beasts who apply no logic to our drug economy.

It's just like the way Italian mafia used to do. The mafia wouldn't directly do different hustles, but they would provide "protection" to hustlers so they could make $$ under their umbrella. There is an element of a threat (something will happen to you if you don't hustle with me) but that's not the key element.

From what I understand, Preacher had a long run, and you don't achieve that by being a goon with no brain. The business model was that a guy from a small section like a 3-6 block area, who knew all the major players, faces, probably grew up with them, would put a crew together (a couple dozen goons, full time muscle/shooters) and they would be the "owners"... you pay rent or you buy your spot for a lump sum paid to that crew. In exchange, they make sure no freelancer comes through and tries to push you out. And if you pay a few extra Gs they might make a problem go away for you. 3

Preacher didn't do that on the East side or the BX, because dudes would have rocked him immediately. In another section he wouldn't know the players/faces/names so a random dude could walk right up on him and blow his brains out. There was a method to the madness, if you understand.

Things could get messy if two tenants of the same extortion crew got into a beef, if there was any internal beef in the extortion crew so paying one owner didn't mean you kept everyone happy... or if an outside crew called the owner's bluff and started pushing into territory... if that last scenario happened (it did) it would be a very hot summer (or even winter).

My point is that this shyt was business. People like Preacher and many others (there were Preachers in most hoods where there was $/clientele) found a way to capitalize off of brawn (i.e. make people with psychotic tendencies useful as shooters) while others found a way to capitalize off of brains/access to product. One hand washed the other.

Much respect ....... yeah I seen a few things on preacher .... his top goon was an ex housing office John kuff aka Jack Frost which might have helped him avoid law enforcement etc in away .... I seen the documentary with his son ..... crazy how preacher snitched on everyone in his crew including his own son/daughter .... his son was in witsec cause he become a informant too had a few bodies on him .... what they did to rich porters brother was fukked up apple is a piece ov shyt to do that to his own flesh n blood

 

[BmoreGorilla]

Dope thread. Was always fascinated by how different the weed game is compared to dope or crack. Your experience was way different than mine

 

[Alvin]

@Piri Tomas

I know you said you were going for the tough guy look when rocking clothes at the time, what did you wear during warmer temperatures? Its kind of hard to rock fatigue everything and times in heat.

What's your opinion of people doing drugs? From your time on the block until now, did you see them as weak? Whats your opinion on marijuana legalization?

 

[Sensei]

Things could get messy if two tenants of the same extortion crew got into a beef, if there was any internal beef in the extortion crew so paying one owner didn't mean you kept everyone happy... or if an outside crew called the owner's bluff and started pushing into territory... if that last scenario happened (it did) it would be a very hot summer (or even winter).

My point is that this shyt was business. People like Preacher and many others (there were Preachers in most hoods where there was $/clientele) found a way to capitalize off of brawn (i.e. make people with psychotic tendencies useful as shooters) while others found a way to capitalize off of brains/access to product. One hand washed the other.

Too bad the crew(s) you got exorted from...excuse me hired ,weren't able to protect you and your spots from being robbed.

 

[Piri Tomas]

So you have no beef with Yard Man? Tons of Hispanic dealers hated Jamaicans and Haitians back in the day....

New York was very spatially divided (still is to an extent) in terms of ethnicities. West Indians then and even now had areas in which they were the dominant group--Crown Heights, Flatbush, north Bronx. There was ZERO West Indian presence in the areas in which I hustled (Spanish Harlem/South Bronx), even though the areas were mixed black American and Latino.

We never had ethnic-based rivalries in New York in terms of the drug game and violence. For the most part Jamaicans would war with other Jamaicans, Dominicans against other Dominicans, etc. In mixed areas it was usually one mixed crew up against another mixed crew, based on blocks/organizations rather than ethnicity.

What you're describing sounds more like a Miami thing or something, where Latinos and West Indians might be competing over the same markets... wasn't part of the NYC of the crack era.

 

[Indiglow Meta (R$G)]

So you have no beef with Yard Man? Tons of Hispanic dealers hated Jamaicans and Haitians back in the day....

No they didn't.

 

[Indiglow Meta (R$G)]

Too bad the crew(s) you got exorted from...excuse me hired ,weren't able to protect you and your spots from being robbed.

Aren't you British?

 

[Piri Tomas]

Did you cross path with neonazi skinheads? I Heard they were Deep in numbers during that era late 80s, early to mid 90s

Not in New York LOL. That wouldn't have gone well... In the wild out era a skinhead wouldn't have made it one block without getting that bald dome cracked open.

I remember when the KKK came to town in '99 or 2000, they were in lower Manhattan and needed a presidential police escort, riot police, tactical teams to keep them from getting touched. It was super ugly. NYC doesn't put up with that type of shyt.

 

[Piri Tomas]

Much respect ....... yeah I seen a few things on preacher .... his top goon was an ex housing office John kuff aka Jack Frost which might have helped him avoid law enforcement etc in away .... I seen the documentary with his son ..... crazy how preacher snitched on everyone in his crew including his own son/daughter .... his son was in witsec cause he become a informant too had a few bodies on him .... what they did to rich porters brother was fukked up apple is a piece ov shyt to do that to his own flesh n blood

Honestly, that's the game. The story of the Preacher crew is ugly, but so were the demise of most crews from that era. Murder, betrayal, greed, that was the rule, not the exception.

 

[Piri Tomas]

Dope thread. Was always fascinated by how different the weed game is compared to dope or crack. Your experience was way different than mine

The weed game is like the sturdy middle class of the drug economy. Not subject to the boom and bust cycles that crack and heroin (to a much lesser extent) saw. I don't know of any weed dealer who was getting money like the crack/dope guys in our prime, but it did bring longevity. Dudes stay below the radar and send their kids to college off of the money they make in the weed game. I know one blunt man in the Bronx who's been doing it since at least '94 and he's lived a very decent middle class life in an expensive ass city.

In my era weed dealers were not subject to the same craziness in the streets for the most part because they didn't need to operate on a bloc/territory or anything. Most of the blunt men I knew would go around on little mopeds when custies hit them up on the pager. And not surprisingly a lot of their customers were dope/crack dealers--being able to spend hundreds of dollars on weed was a status thing too back then (not my thing though).

Blunt men carried guns in New York in that era, but anyone running a cash business did. I never heard about them going to war with each other or having any serious beef. It was a stable relatively calm way to make money on the low in an insane era.

 

[Piri Tomas]

@Piri Tomas

I know you said you were going for the tough guy look when rocking clothes at the time, what did you wear during warmer temperatures? Its kind of hard to rock fatigue everything and times in heat.

What's your opinion of people doing drugs? From your time on the block until now, did you see them as weak? Whats your opinion on marijuana legalization?

New York summers are hot lol. If you were on the block the emphasis was on utility. I'd sweat a lot so my typical uniform was a wife beater, shorts, either Nikes or even timbs in the summer (yes lol, some BX/uptown stereotypes have their basis in reality).

Glad you mentioned this, because I'd like to clarify another misconception. When OGs talk about how in the "golden era" of the hustle game (whatever that means lol) real street dudes didn't touch drugs, that's a complete lie. Most people I knew who hustled struggled with some form of addiction (including myself) of various degrees of severity. Some of us were alcoholics, had a crack/powder dependency, even H in some cases, and of course sex.

Think about it this way... in your daily life you're caught in a hopeless cycle of violence, incarceration... you see and do terrible things all day.... you're in constant need of ways to numb yourself/cope with it. None of us were in therapy, so we self-medicated to cope. We partied a lot out of boredom/needing to forget for a while what our life was really like. Partying meant drugs, lots of liquor, anonymous sex. There were dudes at the top of the game who were laser-focused and didn't touch anything but they were the exception... if you were on the block chances are you over-indulged.

The whole thing was that as long as you could show up and do what you were expected to do in the streets and not make too many mistakes, nobody really cared what you did on your own time. It's like most jobs except a crack/dope crew will never ask you to urinate in a cup or give hair samples.

There was stigma in terms of being a crackhead or over-dependent on drugs/alcohol, but that was some shyt the government sold us and we internalized it in a way that we denigrated our own people. Someone whose addiction was out of control was seen as grotesque and deserving ridicule, but how exactly were we better selling to them (and often hiding our own addictions at the same time)?

Making fun of crackheads/junkies was just another way the government convinced black and brown people to detest our own people/dehumanize our brothers and sisters. That's why I roll my eyes when hip hop OGs whine about how the youth are rapping about being on drugs when they know damn well selling the shyt/using it were two sides of the same coin in our era as well. We shouldn't be glorifying any of it.

 

[Piri Tomas]

In terms of weed legalization I'm somewhat torn. I think it should be decriminalized because it's historically been a convenient way for them to give our young people criminal records.

At the same time I worry about the livelihood of our people who make a living off of it. My concern is that we won't have the social/economic capital and institutional savvy to transition into that sector... like it will just be another things whites get to dominate. So I worry about that. I would hate to see our blunt men in NYC get put out of business by granola-eating vegan white transplants.

 

[Piri Tomas]

Ever come across Pistol Pete Rollack? Was he really that crazy when he was roaming free?

Pistol Pete was known. One of my friends (didn't hustle with the guy knew him from being in the section of the Bronx where I was hustling at that point) actually took a contract out on the guy before he got knocked. He wasn't any more crazy than a lot of guys back then. He found himself in beefs, but a lot of guys did too. We just know about him because the Feds went after him. Add that to the fact that he was one of the first major "Blood" figures in the city, so he was a trophy for the government. But no, he didn't have the Bronx shook or anything. He was a killer who handled his business like a lot of other killers.