
Say Hello to Rick Ross - kitcar
http://www.esquire.com/print-this/rick-ross-drug-dealer-interview-1013?page=all
======
bonemachine
Meet Gary Webb, the Pulitzer-winning investigative journalist who committed
suicide in the wake of the public tar-and-feathering (and financial
impoverishment) he endured as his reward for bringing Ross and his exploits to
the attention of our great nation:

    
    
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Webb

~~~
derwiki
Damn, ".. Webb was found dead from two gunshot wounds to the head, which the
coroner's office judged a suicide." Two self inflicted shots to the head
sounds intense.

~~~
taternuts
I kind of glossed over that when I read it...but two gunshots to the head?
What are the chances that from that range he missed so badly that he was able
to pull the trigger again?

~~~
anigbrowl
You would be surprised - many people try to shoot themselves in the head and
fail. Talk to a homicide cop or forensics investigator sometime - they often
get called to scene like this because it looks like there was a shootout,
except that when they analyse the blood spatter etc., it turns out the person
shot themselves, then lurched around trying to pick up the gun they dropped to
finish it off. I'm not making light of this - some of the stories I've heard
about this phenomenon are quite horrific.

~~~
taternuts
Wow, what a terrible way to go - I would think adrenaline would play a part in
that, and what part of the brain the bullet went through.... unlucky

------
aaronbrethorst
To be clear, this is 'Freeway' Ricky Ross, not Rick Ross the rapper (who
actually faced a lawsuit from the real Ross over the use of his name).

[http://m.rollingstone.com/music/news/judge-drops-rick-
ross-n...](http://m.rollingstone.com/music/news/judge-drops-rick-ross-name-
lawsuit-20120330/)

~~~
colmvp
Not going to lie, I was wondering why something rap related and not named Rap
Genius got onto the front page of HN.

~~~
jere
Really ya'll? This is hinted at in the first sentence and explained fully in
the second paragraph. Not to mention the photo is of the original Rick Ross.

------
nikatwork
> _Back in the day, Ross would offer the same deal with crack cocaine — to
> start you out, he 'd give you $100 worth for free and you could sell it for
> $300._

So - he was a pioneer of the freemium model then.

~~~
nrser
no, he's actually extending credit - 'fronting' the product. he would loan
someone an amount worth $300 in small end-user sales, for which the person
would owe him $100 that they could pay back after selling it.

freemium would be letting people sample small amounts of the stuff and/or for
a limited time, then making them pay when they want a larger amount or to keep
doing it. my DARE class in elementary school told us that drug dealers would
try and hook us like this, but i'm 29 and i'm still waiting for my free
samples.

------
westicle
Pretty fascinating that this guy's life story was essentially stolen by the
rapper Rick Ross, who has made a very healthy career out of the persona.

Just an example of lyrics seemingly directly drawn from the life of Freeway
Rick Ross:

[http://rapgenius.com/Rick-ross-hustlin-lyrics](http://rapgenius.com/Rick-
ross-hustlin-lyrics)

~~~
chjj
> Pretty fascinating that this guy's life story was essentially stolen...

If that interests you, have a look at the real 50 cent:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kelvin_Martin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kelvin_Martin)

~~~
jere
Heh, interesting.

To be fair, the rapper 50 Cent deserves the title a lot more than the rapper
Rick Ross deserves his. He actually was a crack dealer _and_ he was shot 9
times.

------
cromulent
There was a pretty good Planet Money podcast with him a couple of years ago.

[http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2011/05/05/135991890/a-former...](http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2011/05/05/135991890/a-former-
crack-kingpin-on-the-economics-of-illegal-drugs)

------
dmn757
I didn't read the article yet, but some further reading/listening for those
interested:

-'Freeway' Rick Ross on the Joe Rogan Experience Podcast: [http://vimeo.com/41214597#t=123](http://vimeo.com/41214597#t=123)

-Rick Ross, the rapper, was actually a correctional officer before his rap career took off: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rick_Ross#Correctional_officer_...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rick_Ross#Correctional_officer_photos) [http://i.imgur.com/r2hYgO0.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/r2hYgO0.jpg)

------
derwiki
"How to make money selling drugs" also has a bit on Rick Ross:
[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1276962/](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1276962/)

------
mschuster91
Stuff like the Webb episode or the sting drug deal set up by the DEA is class
A food for conspiracy theoretics all over the world.

Enticing someone to do a drug deal should be illegal.

~~~
andyhmltn
Indeed it should. In this case, he was selling a LOT of drugs. But I seem to
remember a story (maybe someone can get the link as I can't think of it right
now) where they sent an undercover woman cop into a school.

A boy ended up falling in love with her and she persuaded him to get her
marijuana. When he did, he was arrested. The kid didn't even smoke it himself,
he was just hopelessly in love with her.

------
jmtame
I mean, don't quit your day job or anything but if this type of thing
interests you, check out Rick Ross and some other major drug dealers in this
documentary:
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxRVhgbVN9o](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxRVhgbVN9o)

------
420365247
In the documentary Cocaine Cowboys, he has a large part where he describes his
role with us officials to smuggle coke into the usa.

------
wavesounds
My friend met this guy and told me all about this a few months ago and I
totally thought she just bought some random dudes BS ... but wow was I wrong.
This should be a movie.

------
Theodores
Somehow I learned of the real Rick Ross through the fake Rick Ross - I
actually sought out the 'everyday I am hustlin' track on YouTube and, a few
clicks later, there I was reading the legend on Wikipedia etc. Hence,
sometimes to some people imitation really is the 'sincerest form of flattery'.

I am surprised the real Rick Ross made it onto Hacker News, what next, how the
'CIA invented rap music just to keep the black man down?' \- that too is a
great 'what if?' urban myth...

------
mbrutsch
I just want to know where to get the t-shirts.

~~~
codyb
My thoughts exactly. I'd definitely send him a 100 for 10 of those. He seems
like an awesome person everyone could learn from no matter his part in the
crack epidemic. I mean the guy learned to read while behind bars and found the
hole in the law he needed to become a free man again on his own. That takes
drive. That's impressive.

------
bluedino
I have a theory that cocaine, and later crack cocaine, were really the
downfall of the United States from the late 70's to late 80's. It wasn't
Reagonmics, it wasn't the Japanese. All the white collar (and a lot of the
blue collar) guys were all doing powder cocaine, and all of the rest of the
blue collar workers and the unemployed were all doing crack. Crime got worse,
business got worse...

~~~
aaronbrethorst
[http://www.orthocuban.com/2011/09/baby-boomers-and-the-
crime...](http://www.orthocuban.com/2011/09/baby-boomers-and-the-crime-rate/)

~~~
contingencies
The initial sudden drop in rising crime rates coincides neatly with personal
computing and games consoles, and the final smackdown is delivered with the
popularisation of the internet.

~~~
simcop2387
[http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/photos/uncategorized/2008/...](http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/photos/uncategorized/2008/04/08/violencegraph.jpg)

Very neatly.

~~~
anigbrowl
Except that there were plenty of videogames in the 80s, when crime was still
going up...which is a glaring hole in the theory. Sure, the graph shows that
claims of videogames leading to increased violence are probably bogus, but
there's no evidence that they reduce violence either.

~~~
contingencies
Alternate theory: the rise of ecstasy?

~~~
anigbrowl
My money's on the environmental lead theory. I think the rise of ecstacy is
too marginal to account for the scale of the change. But that's just a hunch.

------
contingencies
1980s crack epidemic? How about just epidemic. Coke is virtually _free_ in
some parts of Los Angeles.

------
icpmacdo
the stuff you should know podcast just did a episode on crack and talked a lot
about Freeway Ricky

[http://www.stuffyoushouldknow.com/podcasts/crack-
works/](http://www.stuffyoushouldknow.com/podcasts/crack-works/)

------
qq66
Fascinating article, but seems better suited for Longreads than Hacker News.

------
smallegan
He clearly has the entrepreneurial hustle.

------
iliiilliili
He explains his story in one of the best drug documentaries I've seen: ``How
to Make Money by Selling Drugs'' (don't let the title fool you).

I watched it on YouTube, if it's available in your country, please do too.

[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1276962/](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1276962/)

------
o0-0o
Neither Rick Ross should be glorified. In fact, it might be fun to watch them
fight to the death during the halftime of the superbowl...

~~~
smtddr
Preempting anyone else: Remember what I said the other day...
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6441795](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6441795)

 _Every single time..._

~~~
iliiilliili
And yet again you jump to conclusions involving race. Somebody says Oakland is
dangerous, `oh you're putting African Americans down'. Another person states
you shouldn't glorify a `criminal', you think it's because he's racist. Would
you have posted that if Rick Ross had been White. Of course you wouldn't have.
People like you, the hyper pc that will find racist connotations in every
negative comment, like Al Sharpton, make everybody seem like a bad person for
not being anti-white.

~~~
codyb
The original commenter stated that these two people would be fun to watch
fight to the death.

Said about two white people or two blacks or two people in general you know
it's a superfluous comment that does not add anything to the discussion.

Your parent poster is entirely right. Comments such as these drag the quality
of the comments section here at hacker news down.

If you don't believe you should glorify a criminal or a rapper than you should
say that and leave it at that. If you think that it is wrong to try to
understand the mind set of a man who learned to read behind bars and read so
many law books he found a hole in the law which allowed him to become a free
man again you should tell us why there is nothing inspirational, interesting,
or glorifying about this mans life.

Saying that two people would be fun to watch fight to the death, no matter how
sarcastic, adds nothing and is superfluous.

~~~
o0-0o
I think you read my comment and responded w/o re-reading it, and not to mince
words I chose the word 'might' carefully. Might and would are on the opposite
side of logic. Therefore, I reject the premise of your comment on basic
levels. I do concur with your conclusion that it is a sarcastic comment,
however you likely don't need to point that out here.

