IBO - Brian R. Lundin (100 books to read in a lifetime .txt) 📗

Street Boys. Williams was the leader and Roberts became his second in command. After William’s was shot and killed by his girl friend Roberts became the leader of the gang. A rival of Robert’s in the gang was Jerome Blackmon. Blackmon was against the merger of the two gangs from the beginning and he never accepted Robert’s as his leader. There was bitter-in fighting between Robert’s and Blackmon and the gang eventually split with Blackmon becoming leader of the Black Warriors and Roberts, the leader of the State Street Boys. The two gangs resumed their violent war and gang killings and shoot-out were common again.
Members of Blackmon’s gang did not like or trust him. They accused him of skimming money from the gang and ordering severe sanctions on members for minor violations. In 1975 he was found shot to death in an alley at 44th South State Street, some say by members of his own gang. The two gangs united once again with Roberts as the absolute leader.

With the arrest, conviction, and incarceration of the top echelon of the Blackstone Rangers or El Rukns in the late 1970’s, one of the earlier leading Chicago streets gangs, The Boys emerged as the most powerful and dangerous gang in the city, especially in the public housing developments on both the west and South Side.
Robert’s organized us with a chain of command, rules of conduct and prescribed sanctions, for violation of those rules. These sanctions could include beatings or death for not only the violating member but also his entire family.
Robert’s decided that the residents had to pay to ride the elevators or use the laundry room. We had our fun with the young girls in the stairwells and elevators and non-gang members could not play in the playgrounds. Boys who refused to join the gang risked severe beatings or worst. When we got into the drug game, especially crack cocaine that’s when the shit started. Mutherfuckas was getting popped all the time.
There independent drug dealers had always sold drugs in the projects and got their drugs from the Italian Mafia, and did not belong to any gang.
The dealers worked for a black man known only as “Blood.” Roberts sent word to Blood that the State Street Boys was taken over the drug trade and they had until that evening to leave
Blood had a good business going and he had over a dozen dealers between South Federal Street and South Michigan Avenue at 43rd, 47th and 51st Streets, ideal locations because of its proximity to the Dan Ryan Expressway that had entrances and exits at all three locations. Blood ignored Walter’s message and continued his operation.

Chapter 9

Malik and Paco like the rest of the Peewees, worked as blowers for the gang’s drug dealer, Contact who sold drugs at the corner of 51st South Federal Street. Paco was at 51st and Malik was at 53rd South Federal Street. Contact sold all of the narcotics between 51st and 53rd and Federal Street. Malik earned $100 in food stamps for being blowers and he got cash by rolling dunks and tips from Contact.
The blower would look out for the police and blow a whistle if the police was in the area. Malik was proud to be a member, his older brothers were members, and now he was one. He had a family he could turn to, who would protect him and no one would messed with him because he was a State Street Boy Peewee and he had many brothers. After school and when not working as a blower Malik would usually go to the playground and play basketball or shoot dice, with the other Peewees or gang members. Many drug addicts paid for their drugs in food stamps or merchandise they had stolen and the gang needed the cash for other purposes.
The dealer usually sold the drugs in the rear of the high-rise buildings on Federal Street. The parking lots were like a graveyard for old busted-up Plymouths, Chevy’s, and Fords. The customer would first approach the hawker and give him his order for the drugs, marijuana, heroin or crack cocaine.
The hawker would direct the customer to the dealer whom he paid for the drugs. While the customer was paying the dealer, the hawker would go get the drugs, which was usually stashed behind a tree, under a car or in a trash dumpster.
The dealer gave the customer a receipt, a small piece of paper with a “p” on it, which meant paid. The customer gave the receipt to the hawker and directed to where the drugs were, usually under or beside the wheels of one of the abandon vehicles. This elaborate system was used to protect the drug operation from the police, if the customer was an undercover police officer who made a buy from the dealer the only evidence they would find on the dealer was money, no drugs, which was usually not enough to make a major case. The hawker would have destroyed the receipt after directing the customers to the drugs. Neither the hawker nor dealer had any drugs on his person if stopped by the police.
Blowers looked out for the police and alerted the drug dealers when the police were in the immediate area. Two short blasts on the whistle indicated that undercover police officers were in the area; two long blasts indicated that the police were getting close to where the drug dealer was, and one short blast meant all clear. The blowers also ran errands and sometimes acting as hit men. Peewees usually carried the drive-bye shooting. If arrested for the shooting he was usually turned over to their parents by the Chicago Police Department’s Youth Officers, and even in serious cases such as murder, they would probably be sent to the Audi Home, a Juvenile Detention Center, for a short time.
The gang had ordered Malik to kill a rival drug dealer and Paco was assigned as the driver of a stolen car. Cinque gave Malik a .38 revolver to use in the shooting and told him to throw the gun away after the shooting
It was a warm night in 1997, there were little children playing on the street and an elderly woman and a young girl were sitting on the front porch of her apartment building talking to other elderly women and watching the children play. When they were three houses away, Timbo slowed the car down. Malik had never fired a weapon before and his hands were shaking, but he knew he had no choice but to carry out his order. The target, a black youth about the same age as Malik was talking with two girls. They were standing in front of a brand new shiny blue Cadillac Escalade which apparently belonged to the young man on the corner of 43rd South St. Lawrence Avenue. He was wearing a lot of jewelry, designer pants and a designer short sleeve shirt. When they were about five feet from the target, the young man noticed the black older model Ford approaching. His eyes locked on Malik. Malik could see the fear in his eyes and before the young man could react, Malik fired three shots, one hit the target and he fell to the sidewalk. Malik did not know or care where the others shots went.
The girls began to run screaming and the elderly women ran inside the apartment building and they knew what to do. As they pass the young man who was lying in the street, Malik looked down at him, his left temple was gone and a dark liquid ran out of his left eye. His left leg was shaking, tears ran down his cheek and his breathing seemed labored. In the background, Malik heard the distinctive sound of police cars and ambulance sirens.
Timbo accelerated and the car sped down the deserted street. As directed two blocks away from the scene, Malik threw the gun into a garbage-filled vacant lot. Malik felt sick and he threw up out the vehicle’s window. He could not stop his hands from shaking and he seemed to be in a daze.
“That was cool man, you popped that muthafucka right in the head,” Timbo said in admiration.
Malik did not respond, he felt sick and ashamed. He rushed home took a shower and watched the television news that evening and it reported the killing of a young girl sitting on a porch with her grandmother, a block away. Malik lay in his bed and cried, for the young man, he did not know, and had killed, and the young innocent child he had probably killed.

Chapter 10

That following morning at six am a young woman wheeled Malik into the waiting area of the operating room. After a short wait a foreign man entered and introduced himself as Doctor Netal the anesthesiologist.
“Prior to the operation I will give you a mild sedative that will put you to sleep, any questions?”
“No sir.”
A nurse who was dressed in green operating room scrubs and wearing a surgical mask over her mouth and nose wheeled Malik into the operating room. There were other people in the room moving around and setting up tables. Shortly his Doctor Westbrook entered the room and walked over to the bed that he was on.
“Ready?”
Malik nodded and the doctor looked at a nurse.
The nurse put an oxygen mask over his mouth and nose and told him to breathe deeply, which he did.
When he awakened, he was in another room, his eyes focused on a wall that contained a colored oversized picture of the female anatomy. Malik shook his head and wondered what the purpose of the picture in this room was. On another wall he noticed a large white face clock with black numbers, it read five o’clock but he didn't know if it was 5:00 am or 5:00 pm He looked for a window but there was none, but there were a lot of people wearing white coats and white uniforms administering to other patients. He did not have any pain, but he noticed he had a cast on his upper body from under his arms to his waist. He observed an Asian nurse walking over to him, smiling.
”How you feeling young man” she asked, in broken English as she strapped a blood pressure cuff over his right arm and looked at her watch.
“A little groggy, but ok. What time is it?” Malik asked.
“It’s about 5:00 pm.,” she said as she was removing the strap.
“Where am I?” he asked.
“You’re in the recovery room; the doctor will be here in a minute, he told us to notify him when you woke up.”
Malik dozed back off and was awaken by Doctor Westbrook.
“How do you feel, any pain?” the doctor asked.”
“I feel Ok, no pain, but I’m hungry and thirsty, how did it go?” “Good, real good, we removed the bullet and repaired the nerve but we won't know for sure for a couple of days.”
The doctor removes a long needle from its case and says,
“Let’s see what happens today.”
Doctor Westbrook inserted the needle about half an inch into Malik's left calf; Malik did not feel anything but his leg jumped. He repeated the procedure