“Is Kody Scott your son?” one of the policemen asked my mom.
“Yes, Kody is my son, why?”
“Well, ma’am, we have a warrant for his arrest for murder and six counts of attempted murder.”
“Oh,” Mom began with a slight chuckle, “you must be mistaken. Kody was just released from the hospital two days ago. He could not have possibly killed anyone.”
“Well, we have several eye witnesses who say it was in fact Monst—I mean Kody who they saw.” His voice sounded no-nonsense.
“Well,” Mom said, trying another angle, “can you call the station to make sure it’s Kody you want?”
“Ma’am, we are sure who we want. Now is Kody here?”
“Yes, he’s here. Kody!” Mom called out after me.
After hearing as much as I needed to I began to get dressed. Me and Li’l Bro hugged and said our good-byes. I stepped forward and allowed the police—henceforth soldier-cops—to take me in.
At the station I got the details. Some Brims had said that while they were shooting dice in their park, Harvard Park, I had stepped out of the shadows with, of all things, a double-barrel and blasted them. This was supposed to have happened the same night that I was released from the hospital.
Once again I found myself in solitary confinement at Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall. But this time I was in bad physical condition from the shooting and the operation. I also had the cast on my arm with the ’hood struck up all over it, along with the names of some homies. After my standard week in the box I was transferred to unit C-D. In Los Padrinos the housing units are designated by alphabet. I had pretty much been in them all. When I got to C-D I met up with Queek from Eight Tray Hoover. He and I were the only Crips in the entire unit. All of the New Afrikans were Bloods, and the Chicanos and the Americans were strongly supporting them.
There were approximately twenty-five people in the day-room. At least thirteen were New Afrikans and the rest Chicano or American. There were twenty plastic chairs on metal frames welded together in rows of five. These were situated in front of an old black-and-white television. Queek and I sat there, primarily because to sit any other place would be foolish. We also wanted to stipulate the distinction between us and them, Crips and Bloods. Most of the Bloods were Pirus from Compton. Every so often, as if on cue, one of the Pirus would leap to his feet and shout, “All the ’Rus in the house say ho!” at which time everyone—except Queek and me—would jump to their feet fanatically shouting “Hoooo!” This went on throughout the night at hour intervals, but no one approached Queek or me personally.
The next day while Queek and I sat on our bench—our meager territory—and talked, we drew some pretty mean stares from the chair section. Once, in the course of conversation, I said “cuz” to Queek and the whole dayroom fell abruptly silent. Even the characters on television seemed to pause and look over at us. No one moved, no one said a thing. And then, as if he were an ambassador to the U.N., Bayboo from Miller Gangster Bloods cleared his throat and started walking over toward us. He was a viciously ugly person with a huge jug head, which was covered with small braids in no fixed pattern. His complexion was dark, but not that shiny smooth darkness like Marcus Garvey or Cicely Tyson. It was a flat darkness, broken in spots by chicken-pox marks that had become infected from scratching. His eyes held no light, no humor, no remorse. His eyes each had black rings around them and they were sunk deeply into their sockets. His lips and nose were uncut Afrikan from the continent. I would guess he weighed 170 pounds then, quite muscular with a broad chest. He stopped in front of me.
“What did you say?” he asked, looking down on me with total ugliness.
I looked at Queek for some sign of mutual liability, but my stare went unacknowledged. I stood up so he would not have the advantage of a downswing.
“I said cuz to my homeboy,” I replied. Murmurs from the chair section began to grow louder.
“You must not know where you at, Blood. This is our unit and we don’t allow no punk-ass crabs over here. I should knock you out, boy.”
Far from being a fool, I took a step backward out of his firing range.
“And what you think I’m gonna be doin’ while you knock-in’ me out?” I shot back, hoping I hadn’t made him too mad, because for sure I was in no physical shape to fight anybody, especially him.
“Wha…” he started, and made a quick step in my direction. I took one step back and a brother whom I hadn’t even noticed came between us, but facing Bayboo.
“Man, stall dude out. You see he all fucked up, cast and shit,” the brother said to Bayboo.
“Fuck that fool, he don’t know where he at or somethin’.”
“I know where I’m at,” I managed to say.
The staff was becoming suspicious, as the dayroom had grown too quiet. Shit, everything was fine as long as there were Pirus shouts every hour, I guess. But the quiet was out of order.
“You,” a Chicano staff member said, pointing at me. “Come on in here.” He gestured at his office. When I went in and sat down he asked what the problem was. I told him that there was no problem, but he wasn’t buying it.
“Oh, I see, you a Crip. And,” he continued, turning his head to read the graffiti on my cast, “you are from ETG, Eight Tray Gangster, huh?”
“Yeah, that’s where I’m from.”
“Well then, that explains it. You are starting confusion in my unit,” he said matter-of-factly.
“Man, I ain’t startin’ nothin’ in yo’ unit,” I tried to explain.
At this, he opened a desk drawer and brought out a red marker.
“Paint your cast, ’cause the gang graffiti is a problem,” he said, pushing the marker toward me.
“I ain’t coloring my cast dead”—a disrespectful term for red. “You must be crazy.”
“Oh, well, we’ll see about that.”
He reached for the phone, dialed, and talked with someone. Five minutes later a New Afrikan man came in.
“What’s happening?” he said.
The Chicano cat explained as best he could, which wasn’t too good. When he had finished, the brother simply asked, “You a Crip?”
“Yep.”
“Are you a real Crip?” “Yep.”
“Here, then, paint your cast blue,” he said, handing me a blue marker.
Perhaps this was a ploy and he thought I wouldn’t do it because of my situation. Well, I did. I broke open that marker and painted my cast Crip blue. The brother just stared. The Chicano was visibly upset. I went back out into the dayroom and had no further problems that night.
The next morning I went to court and got arraigned on murder and attempted murder charges. Because of the serious nature of the crime, I was being tried as an adult. This meant I would face the same time as any adult would for the case. Sixty years to life was the maximum penalty. Also because of their decision to try me as an adult, I had to stay in East Lake Juvenile Hall, also known as Central. Los Padrinos did not house juveniles who were being tried as adults. This was cool with me because Crazy De and other homies were at Central. I’ve always preferred it over L.P. anyway.
I was put in unit E-F. Central, like L.P., designates their units by alphabet. E-F and G-H were where all the hard-core bangers were housed. In E-F we had staff from South Central who treated us like family. There was Brother Blackburn, who let Crazy De use his radio so we could go into the unit library and jam. He also let us go into the unit office and lift weights. There was Brother Doc, who gave us phone calls all the time. He let us stay back from school and just kick it. He also tried to flirt with our mothers during visiting hours. There was Stewart, Heron, and Cryer, but our favorite cat was Brother Gains. He was a strong brother with a genuine concern for people of color. He was the source of all power in unit E-F.
De and I were on the same side, E side. Central was packed with future Ghetto Stars from both sides of the color bar and varying divisions therein. It was also packed with soon-to-be-dead gang members. Many who were there in 1981 have since been gunned down in street battles. Others were sent to prison and killed there. Few, very few, have lived since then in any prolonged state of peace.
Who became Ghetto Stars? There was Devil from Shot Gun Crips, Fish from Outlaw Twenty Bloods, Fat Rat from Five Deuce Hoover, Roscoe—a Samoan—from Park Village Compton Crips, Taco from Grape Street Watts, Mace from Eleven Deuce Hoover, and Kan from Black P. Stone Bloods. Each is of the highest level of banger. Even if any of them do not subscribe to banging today, their mark is firmly planted in their respective ’hoods.
