From Prison to Poetry

Mr. Rickey Quinn was born and raised in Indianola, Mississippi. He was brought up in the home of Mr. George and Cecilia Ann Quinn with hardcore discipline and a Bible believing etiquette. He attended the best of public schools, Carver Elementary and Gentry High School, where he graduated and joined the U.S. Army. But let's talk about the years of Rickey's growing up and how his life would down spiral, getting caught up in everything that was thought up. During his Christmas and summer vacations, he'd go to Chicago to visit his siblings. However, on one of those visits, he was recruited as a gang member, a Vice-Lord on the Westside of Chicago. He would then participated in basically any street activities that thugs participated in. Rickey would steal, rob, commit burglaries and home invasions, and sell and use drugs, e.g., cocaine, heroin, PCP, until he became addicted, and his addiction would cause him to con people and pimp and play women for the love of their money. Living a glamourous thuggish life in and out of the Cook County Jail, his next destination was hell. In 1984, Rickey was supposed to have gone south to visit his grandmother, which he would do every year for Thanksgiving. Because Rickey had a plan that would probably get him a lot of money, kidnapping was the motive to robbing a drug dealer. So on Thanksgiving morning, about 4:00 a.m., he was pulled over in a stolen vehicle. Rickey pulled off, and the high-speed chase began, speeds up to 100 mph in a residential community. He was later apprehended about 30 to 45 minutes and was in Chicago police custody. During the interrogation, he was beaten and tortured, but he never gave the police a statement, nor did he say a mumbling word. The next day, he was transferred to the Cook County Jail with a ransom for a $100,000 bond, with $10, 000 to walk. Rickey was stuck, and had to sit it out because the majority of his cases carried a maximum of 6 to 30 years in prison. He called his family, but to no avail. No one would come to his rescue, but they did get him a lawyer. Facing life and almost death, he was scared to death, so he began to put his faith in God and rely on Jesus. He began to pray and study his Bible, and the other gang-members joined him. Having rank in the organization, he had control over the other Vice-Lords, which was like being a supervisor on a job, and it was a job trying to govern everything and everybody on that deck (cell house). Being a Vice-Lord, or a brother, you weren't supposed to eat swine or read the Bible. Vice-Lords honored the Holy Koran. Anything outside of that, you would be dealt with or violated, and Rickey was guilty again, this time with his own people. This time, he had a violation coming. A meeting was called in one of the cells, and all the Vice-Lords were there to determine what his violation would be. But God knew that Rickey was serious about His Word and gave him favor with the brothers, and they decided to give him a pass. God saved him again; this time from a pumpkin head. Rickey went back and forth to see the judge, who was a 99-9% conviction rate judge. After ten months of going back and forth, Rickey received God's favor, and mercy was also on his side. All of the class X cases were thrown out, and he pleaded, or copped out, for three years of probation and was then released. His charges stemmed from kidnapping to armed violence to attempted murder. Again, God saved him, but he still hadn't learned. And, trying to be slick, he was locked up again. He didn't stay on the streets but 89 days and was this time charged with robbery, and the only thing that was going to beat him to the penitentiary was the bumpers on the bus. Right back in the cook county jail he was; this time he was gone. Rickey knew he couldn't beat the case, neither would he try, so he decided to get as much time in as he possibly could, then cop-out for the minimum sentence and go to the penitentiary. With six months in, he...