"Freeway" Rick Ross

Many are aware of the impacts of the crack cocaine epidemic but don’t know the faces behind the empires. There are common names behind the sale of the drugs, like Pablo Escobar, but one man is known amongst communities for being an infamous presence in California; “Freeway” Rick Ross. Not to be misinterpreted with the rapper Rick Ross, “Freeway” Rick Ross had one of the largest drug empires in California during the late ’80s and ’90s. But his ambitions weren’t always to become a drug kingpin. Born in 1960, Ross moved around Texas, before settling in LA. His parents came southern sharecropping farms and made Ross stay away from the street life common to kids in his area. In his local Manchester Park, he found a passion for tennis and wanted to pursue a professional career. Ross constantly avoided class, as he remained illiterate until he was 28. This would cause him to lose a scholarship in High School, which made him go to his local public high school. Ross never was into drugs, but in the early 80s, he found selling drugs to be another alternative to his college.

Ross attended the Los Angeles Techincal college and got caught up in the Freeway Boys, a criminal auto theft group. As the group started getting into the sale of drugs, Ross followed, quickly escalating his operations to higher felony drugs. A year after meeting the Freeway Boys and getting involved in crime, he was able to create his own ring and circle to sell his drugs. His international and national connections spread his product nationwide. From New York to Los Angeles, he would add gasoline to the fire that was the crack epidemic. Ross would later admit the impact of his drugs would cause greater damage to the communities. The large presence in the LA area would cause him to attract the attention of the local police and the federal government. Ross stated at a certain point, his net worth was over 800 million dollars, all originating from his sale of drugs. He would eventually be arrested for drug charges and was sentenced to ten years, but served four. This wouldn’t be the last time he would go to jail, as he was convinced by a colleague who was an informant with the DEA, to get back into drugs after his release. Ross was served to live in prison but was able to get out in 20 years in 2009, after finally learning how to read.

Because of drug dealers like “Freeway” Rick Ross, the crack epidemic became more widespread across the nation. But for a kid who was illiterate for almost half of his life, he found the sale of narcotics to be the only way out of a cycle of poverty and sharecropping that plagued his family.

Sources:

https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/freeway-rick-ross-1960/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%22Freeway%22_Rick_Ross

https://oig.justice.gov/special/9712/ch06p3.htm