From Theft to Survival

At eleven years old, I helped plan my first robbery. I just didn’t know

it yet. A girl from school invited me to her pool party. When I got home,

I couldn’t stop talking about her house. My dad didn’t interrupt. He studied.

The next day, my mom handed me a notebook. “Write down everything you remember.”

That notebook became a blueprint. By fourteen, police knew my name. Juvenile detention

knew my face. Steel doors. Hourly flashlight checks. No sleep.

Then my lawyer said one sentence that erased everything else: “They want to try

you as an adult.” Twenty-five to life. I was fourteen. In there, I learned silence