First Chapter

But For The GRACE of GOD

AuthorHouse

Chapter One

It was another one of those mornings when I was absolutely consumed by stress. Sleep had never come for me as I had lain awake all night wondering how the hell I was going to feed my family. For hours I could hear my father's words, "son, you are a failure" echoing through my conscious. He had been dead for a few years but those words were as alive to me as if he were right there saying them. No matter how much I tried to quiet my mind, the mantra wouldn't cease. The damning words only grew louder, hardening like cement upon my reality. Only a few months before, everything in my world seemed beautiful and complete. Yet there I was, tormented by the wreckage of my damned past ... again.

As always, when I found myself in trouble, my thoughts drifted to my father. I had no doubt that my pops loved me, but when he felt that it was time to set me straight, his honesty was cold, brutal and uncompromising. He was old school and he knew no other way but to make it plain. Whenever my "get rich quick schemes" or my "big ideas" exploded in my face, which they often did, he would tell me I needed to "stop my damned foolishness" and handle myself like a man.

Money was very important to my pops, and he didn't respect a man who couldn't keep a dollar in his pocket. I learned this about my pops as a child, when, filled with pride, he would sit me down on his bed and make me count the money he brought home from his paycheck, down to the penny. I hated this weekly ritual because he would be drinking and losing track of my count, making me start over, and over again. It drove me crazy. I was good at math, so I didn't understand why I had to go through that. But it was never about the math. It was his way of showing me what was important in this world.

He knew I was a bright child but, as I grew into a man, he doubted if I ever understood the wisdom he was trying to impart. "Son, if you don't stop taking all of these risks you're going to die with nothing to show for your life" he would say. At thirty, I tossed those words like feathers to the wind. But, at forty four, with a family of my own, and not a dollar in my pocket, the wind tossed those words back to my ass with vengeance.

The "failure" he spoke of certainly dealt with the financial aspects of my life, but he was also speaking on my lifestyle. I didn't place much importance on his disapproval about how I was living because I was always focused on money. When the money was rolling in, it was so easy to dismiss the alcohol drenched jewels he dropped on me.

I also disregarded my pops' words because of the way he lived; busting his ass every day on a thankless job leading to what I felt was nowhere. He was a hardworking man. I respected what he did to take care of his family but I also understood that like 93% of the people in this country, he would always be a slave to the jobs that would leave him destitute. To me, my pops was like the "poor dad" that Robert Kiyosaki talked about.

Besides, when it came to the way I lived my life, who was my father to talk when his own lifestyle left a lot to be desired? I was no different from him in many ways, so how could he pass judgment on me? When it came to how I dealt with women, and how I partied, I got my teachings at his feet. My pops was definitely a rolling stone, constantly cheating on my mother. So if he didn't like what he saw in me, he couldn't like what he saw in himself. However, staying focused in that mess, I never heard his message. I would waste several years of my life lamenting the actions that I took after deciding to ignore my pops' warnings.

Also, despite the self destructive ways he possessed, there was always enough food to eat, clothes on our backs and shoes on our feet. As a man, my "poor dad" was "rich" with knowledge that the essential parts of life covered. Sadly, I could not say the same thing for myself.

It was approximately 9:30 in the morning, when my heavy thoughts were interrupted by the phone ringing upstairs. Each ring felt like someone was plunging a knife in my chest because I knew there was nothing but drama waiting for me on the line. That's the only kind of calls I got, non-stop, all day, all night. Even when I didn't answer, which was often, whatever fragment of peace I had was shattered. I could avoid the words over the phone but I couldn't do a damn thing about the words that constantly poisoned my mind, shaping my wretched reality.

My wife picked up the phone and I strained to listen. After a few seconds I heard her howling and I knew something terrible had happened. My first thought was that someone must have died. Feeling an immediate sense of panic I raised up from the couch to meet her at the foot of the stairs where she was sobbing uncontrollably. My 2-year-old daughter, Shadaje and my 5-year-old son, Malcolm, sensing something tragic and momentous were screaming too.

"Stanley, the phone is for you ... It's your brother Alvin. He's asking me some damn questions about whether or not the FBI has put you in jail!!! What the hell is going on? What the fuck did you do Stanley?

Her words sucked the life out of me. I knew that the Feds were investigating me concerning my business affairs, but hearing her shout those words suddenly took my predicament from the realm of possibility to the grimmest reality. There are few words or acronyms that strike more fear in the hearts of Black people than the "FBI." When a Black man thinks of the FBI we think of the blatant execution of the Black Panther Party leadership in a campaign of terror against the Black community. That campaign led to the proliferation of gang violence in our inner cities. When we think of the FBI, how can we not think of the unlawful persecution they heaped upon Malcolm, Martin and any other leader deemed to be "the next Black messiah" during the Cointelpro campaign? For most Black folks, Hoover and the FBI are nothing more than symbols of the government's systematic oppression of us. They are the legal muscle in the government's genocidal campaign against the Black community.

I first got wind of the investigation a few weeks earlier when Manny, one of my business associates, stopped by my house unexpectedly, after ducking my calls for days. We had deals on the table worth a lot of money to both of us, so I couldn't understand why he wouldn't take my calls. Manny was a cool Italian cat and even though I knew there were no friends in the business I was in, my relationship with Manny was something of an exception. Like most people in business, I kept a keen eye on him when it came to splitting up the profits, but I couldn't deny that the product he brought to me was good. He was a wholesaler with sweet connections and I got my money in a timely fashion. As long as the paper was straight, it was all good, and Manny kept the paper flowing, baby. When he finally showed up, I felt excited. The news had to be so sweet he had to tell me in person. I greeted him warmly but he barely looked me in the eyes. He was nervous as hell and his eyes were red, like he hadn't slept in days.

The first thing he told me was that all the deals we had been working on were dead. He gave a lot of lame ass reasons why the deals couldn't work, but in the game I played reading people was critical to survival. I knew he was bullshitting me and the more he fed me nonsense, the angrier I got. What made him think he could come to my house, after avoiding me for weeks, and insult my intelligence? I let him ramble on for a while and then demanded the truth. My mouth dropped when he laid it on me. "Listen babe, I hate to be the one to tell you this, but you're hot. The Feds have been going around asking a lot of questions about you, and the word I'm getting from some reliable sources is that you are about to get pinched."

I was stunned but I kept my composure. I knew he was studying me to see what my reaction would be. If I started flipping, that could be perceived as a sign of guilt.

"Manny, what the hell are you talking about? Why would the Feds be asking questions about me? That shit doesn't even make sense."

"Look Stan, I don't know what to tell you. As a friend, I am just letting you know what's happening. A lot of people are talking man and nobody in the business wants to have anything to do with you. I don't know where this thing is going, but I have to pull out of everything we had on the table. I got a wife and kids man and I can't take no chances."

I still remained calm on the outside, but on the inside I was losing it. This conversation represented the loss of over $100,000, but that was just scratching the surface. When I started doing the math on the amount of money I stood to lose from the other wholesalers, the numbers were staggering. I was finished. Not only was my business going to die, but I knew that I would not be able to stay in the wonderful, 8 bedroom, 4 bathroom house I had just moved into. The lifestyle that I had afforded my family would be shattered, and that was the best-case scenario. The prospect of going to jail seemed imminent. My mind was drifting but Manny's voice called me back into the moment. "Stan, I have to run, but I am going to be praying that everything works out. If I hear anything else, I'll stop by and let you know, but please, whatever you do, don't try to contact me directly. Do me that favor, alright buddy."

"Yeah, sure Manny, sure."

We shook hands; Manny jumped into his car and sped off. It would be months before I heard from him again. What he had warned me of turned out to be true.

Over the next few weeks the Feds made their presence known. I knew my phone was being tapped so I was very careful about who I spoke to and what I said on the line, I would often see cats sitting in parked cars outside of my home but they never approached the house. They just wanted to let me know I was being watched. Once in a while, when I looked out my window, I would catch their eyes and they would just smile. They were fucking with my head. I tried to maintain my cool, not wanting to send my family into a panic, but the constant surveillance had me on the edge.

With this type of madness going on in my life, one would think that I was caught up in the drug game and was the target of a sting operation, but that was far from the case. The business that I did was real estate investments. The "product" that I received was undervalued houses and I was under investigation for conspiracy to commit bank fraud. The real estate and banking industries were collapsing under the massive multibillion dollar failure of mortgage banks that did sub-prime loans. I was being set up to be one of the many fall guys.

If I got indicted, there was no doubt that I'd be legally lynched, innocent or not. Whenever the Feds brought anyone to trial, they had a 95% success rate. That's a hard cold fact. It wouldn't matter that, as an investor, I didn't even do mortgages nor facilitate most aspects of the loan process. Knowing all of the "gray areas" in the business, I had purposely insulated myself in this manner, but that didn't matter. What they would claim is that I was the mastermind behind a crooked real estate ring that bilked the "poor" mortgage banks out of millions of dollars. They would point to the demise of real estate companies like mine and claim that we were the reason why there was now a major crisis in the real estate industry ... which was a bunch of nonsense. Small time players like me got the heat only because powerful and influential players that pull the strings in the game are beyond the scope of such financial witch-hunts. They are indeed the witches themselves.

Before knocking on my door, I thought it would be wise for the Feds to check out some of the fatter cats I had the misfortune of doing business with. One of those fat cats was this Jewish developer named Josef. He sold me several houses, and he constantly touted the possibility of partnering with me to make millions from the ruins of Newark, which hadn't recovered from the riots in the sixties. At the time Josef owned more than 300 homes and was operating with a 100 million dollar line of credit, which he shrewdly used to fund hundreds of shady deals. He had the financial backing of very powerful and influential people from Brooklyn's Hasidic community, who were extending their reach into Newark. They had already taken what they wanted in Brooklyn. Newark, with its young, investor friendly mayor, Corey Booker, and its large quantity of vacant lots, was ripe to take next.

Josef was their point man, and in me, Josef saw the opportunity to cash in his inventory and put some money back into the pockets of his ever-eager investors. That was cool with me as long as they left enough food on the table for me to eat well.

However, I would soon find out that the Feds had been watching Josef for years. It didn't take me long to find out why. Once we started closing deals the money was always short and the problems with his houses were always long. After hearing about how he beat others in the business, it amazed me that he was still alive and not in jail but those with power are protected. When it came to federal investigations he was like Gotti. They were checking him out, but to my knowledge, he was never indicted. If they seriously went after Josef, they would have to go after the people that stood behind him. They wanted no part of where an investigation like that might lead. Yet, as fat as Josef's pockets were, he was still only a bit player on a stage that was crumbling under the weight of those really making moves in the real estate game.

When major mortgage banks like Country Wide Home Loans (the largest mortgage company in the country) and New Century made loans to applicants in the "subprime" market they knew the risks they were taking. However, with an exploding real estate market, powered by rising property values, the opportunity to make money hand over fist was there and they snatched it. They knew that many of the folks applying for mortgages couldn't afford the homes they were buying. The loans went through only because the credit and financial requirements were relaxed in most cases.

The loans had low payments in the beginning but eventually the rates and payments would rise dramatically and thousands of homes ended up in foreclosure, but what else could be expected? As the door smacked homeowners in the ass on their way to the streets, bankers pocketed billions in fees and on the Brooklyn streets I come from, that's a scam every day but Sunday.

We all know now that powerful Wall Street investment companies like Morgan Stanley, JP Morgan Chase, and Citicorp bought and sold those loans as quick as a whore bats her eyes. They know that the only time paper is made is when paper is moved. If the loans defaulted, that was fine with them. The "loses" were ultimately written off, "written down" or passed along to consumers who invested in the stock market. Those consumers included foreign investors who often got stuck holding the bag, but when they began rejecting the bogus paper, the "crisis" deepened. As a result, the mortgage industry, which had been so kind to investors in the past, completely imploded, leading this country into one of the deepest recessions in our history.

As always, whenever there is a problem in this country, those of us on the bottom are hurt most by it. Many Black folks suffered disproportionately because the high risk, predatory loans were the only way many of us could "afford" to buy a home in our gentrified, overpriced neighborhoods. The dream of home ownership rapidly turned into a financial nightmare for many hardworking, unsuspecting Black folks but the subprime scam wouldn't be a scandal if only Black folks lost their properties. It became a scandal when white folks started losing their homes too, forcing the government to take massive action ... and find scapegoats.

I knew what time it was, but knowing why you are hunted doesn't ease the strain of avoiding the hunter. I had major issues on my hands, both financially and legally and I had no idea how I was going to survive. Damn! What was going to happen to my wife and kids if I went to prison? How would my wife ever forgive me for dragging her through the madness? As I saw the confusion and torment on her face, I doubted if she would ever be able to live past the fear of that moment What made it worse is that all of it was happening on her birthday. I couldn't afford to buy her any presents but she definitely didn't need me to gift-wrap my bullshit like this. She was crying so hard, she could barely breathe. I wanted to reach out and hug her or say something to ease her panic but I was at a loss for words. Forcing the weakest of smiles on my face I gently took the phone from her hands. "Calm down baby, calm down. Let me find out what's going on."

(Continues...)

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Excerpted from But For The GRACE of GOD by Stan Morse Copyright © 2010 by Stan Morse. Excerpted by permission.
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