Danny Jones Podcast - #19 - One Step from Pablo Escobar | Anonymous
Aired: 2019-09-02
Duration: 53:52


=== Cocaine Cowboys Begin (14:31) ===

[00:00:07]  We are finally back on the Concrete podcast.
[00:00:10]  It's been a two-week break.
[00:00:13]  It's been slow around concrete for the past two weeks.
[00:00:16]  Got some changes.
[00:00:17]  Some changes.
[00:00:17]  We've been going through a lot of changes.
[00:00:20]  But today's special guest, you have spent over 10 years, over a decade, in the federal penitentiary for trafficking cocaine in the 80s.
[00:00:33]  You were part of the cocaine cowboys days.
[00:00:38]  After what?
[00:00:39]  The cocaine cowboys.
[00:00:40]  You were after the cocaine cowboys, but you went to prison in the 80s, right?
[00:00:44]  A little bit in the 80s.
[00:00:46]  The tail end of the 80s.
[00:00:47]  Well, wait, this is our, we got to officially introduce our guest.
[00:00:50]  Okay, so our guest today is on the concrete podcast.
[00:00:53]  He wants to be held anonymous.
[00:00:55]  So he's wearing a bright orange ski mask.
[00:00:59]  Yeah.
[00:00:59]  And we're going to go by the name Johnny Appleseed.
[00:01:04]  Johnny Appleseed.
[00:01:09]  So Johnny Appleseed.
[00:01:10]  Old Johnny Apple.
[00:01:11]  Are you originally from Florida?
[00:01:14]  Not born here, but raised.
[00:01:16]  You're not born here.
[00:01:17]  Where were you originally from?
[00:01:19]  The Northeast.
[00:01:22]  So how did you end up in Florida?
[00:01:25]  I was a child.
[00:01:25]  I had no choice.
[00:01:26]  No choice?
[00:01:27]  So your parents came down here?
[00:01:30]  I moved down here at three, about three or four.
[00:01:33]  And you originally moved down to South Florida or Pinellas County?
[00:01:36]  Pinellas County.
[00:01:37]  Okay, okay.
[00:01:39]  And how did you originally get involved in the drug world?
[00:01:44]  Where did it begin?
[00:01:45]  Take us to the high school days.
[00:01:46]  The drug world.
[00:01:47]  Began in the high school days, probably ninth grade, right here in beautiful Seminole.
[00:01:53]  My friend, skater, I was a skateboarder, surfer, that type of, you know, bad, bad, bad, bad guy that put a skateboard in the locker.
[00:02:04]  A lot of like us, just like us.
[00:02:05]  Yeah.
[00:02:06]  Exactly.
[00:02:07]  But missed first period always because, you know, it was hash time under the glass.
[00:02:13]  Speak a little louder.
[00:02:14]  You're kind of just like whispering.
[00:02:16]  You got a raspy voice, so speak up.
[00:02:18]  Johnny boy's a little raspy.
[00:02:19]  Johnny's a little raspy.
[00:02:20]  He went out last night.
[00:02:21]  Okay.
[00:02:22]  Yeah, yeah, but don't tell anybody.
[00:02:23]  All right.
[00:02:24]  So, yeah, tell me again how you started and got involved in the drug business.
[00:02:27]  Started selling hash, blonde Lebanese hash, then it got to black tar hash, and then it just took off from there.
[00:02:36]  Marijuana, the gold bud back in the high school days was gold, like his shirt.
[00:02:42]  Woo!
[00:02:42]  I mean, gold, gold.
[00:02:44]  Weed?
[00:02:44]  Weed, yeah.
[00:02:45]  Okay.
[00:02:46]  Weed.
[00:02:47]  And then that.
[00:02:48]  Floated on for a while, probably about six, seven years.
[00:02:52]  Then high school ended.
[00:02:53]  They escorted me out.
[00:02:55]  They said, We've had enough of you.
[00:02:57]  You got kicked out of high school.
[00:02:58]  Of course.
[00:02:59]  They said, Johnny, we've had enough.
[00:03:00]  Yeah.
[00:03:00]  They said, Johnny, take your board and go on down the hill.
[00:03:04]  And how old were you when this happened?
[00:03:06]  Probably about 16 years of age.
[00:03:10]  Went right in.
[00:03:11]  So what happened as soon as you got kicked out of high school?
[00:03:13]  What'd you end up doing?
[00:03:14]  Straight into the drug world.
[00:03:17]  Bam.
[00:03:18]  You were already in the drug world because that's the way you get kicked out.
[00:03:20]  Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:03:21]  The hardcore drugs.
[00:03:22]  Yeah.
[00:03:22]  So that's when you got introduced to the hardcore drugs.
[00:03:24]  Hardcore drugs.
[00:03:25]  Which is what?
[00:03:25]  No, it was marijuana.
[00:03:27]  It was marijuana for the first few years.
[00:03:29]  Got introduced to the boys in Miami, the Keys, and it was all marijuana then.
[00:03:35]  So that's the only thing you did for money?
[00:03:37]  You never had like a.
[00:03:38]  No, I worked.
[00:03:39]  I worked like restaurant jobs and odds and ends, construction, that type of stuff.
[00:03:45]  Did you ever do commercial fishing?
[00:03:47]  No.
[00:03:47]  Never.
[00:03:48]  Where was the marijuana coming from back then?
[00:03:51]  It came from Columbia.
[00:03:53]  And it came from Jamaica.
[00:03:54]  They had the Jamaican tie.
[00:03:57]  But everybody was into marijuana back then.
[00:03:59]  And it was so different than the Coke world back then.
[00:04:05]  There wasn't all the killing and fighting and all that crazy business.
[00:04:10]  You know, people, you know, they treated it like a job.
[00:04:13]  It was like a regular job, you know?
[00:04:14]  Yeah.
[00:04:15]  But once the 80s came and the Coke started blowing, everybody stopped the marijuana and got right into the cocaine.
[00:04:23]  And then came the boat racing.
[00:04:26]  Wait, wait.
[00:04:27]  Didn't you tell me that you were one step away from Pablo?
[00:04:30]  That was in mid to late 80s.
[00:04:33]  Started boat racing.
[00:04:33]  Okay, so this is down the road.
[00:04:35]  This is down the road.
[00:04:36]  Okay, so, so.
[00:04:36]  You got involved in southern Florida.
[00:04:39]  You eventually went down to Miami.
[00:04:40]  You moved down there?
[00:04:41]  I moved down to Miami, Upper Keys, and the whole area.
[00:04:45]  And why did you move down there?
[00:04:46]  Who did you meet that convinced you to move down there?
[00:04:49]  To get away from here because I was in too much trouble.
[00:04:51]  Oh, okay.
[00:04:51]  You just moved down there just because.
[00:04:53]  Not because of drugs, just to get away.
[00:04:54]  Well, that's where the drugs were coming from.
[00:04:56]  So I figured I'd just.
[00:04:58]  So you go down there, and what do you do?
[00:05:00]  I met some guys through my roommate up here.
[00:05:04]  We started going back and forth.
[00:05:05]  It was so cheap back then.
[00:05:07]  So cheap.
[00:05:08]  $19 round trip.
[00:05:09]  From Tampa to Miami.
[00:05:11]  I mean, for flying, yeah, for flying around trip.
[00:05:13]  How much?
[00:05:15]  $19.
[00:05:17]  God damn.
[00:05:18]  Fly down car in the airport from their family.
[00:05:23]  We look like rock stars.
[00:05:25]  Go to Skip's Rock and Roll Club on Madeira Beach.
[00:05:28]  That was a famous place back in the day.
[00:05:31]  Grab a date, fly down, look like a hero, and come back like a zero.
[00:05:36]  So are you bringing it back on the plane with you too?
[00:05:38]  No, no, no, no.
[00:05:39]  That was just fun time.
[00:05:40]  You're just traveling down there.
[00:05:42]  Okay, so let's go back.
[00:05:43]  You moved to Miami.
[00:05:44]  Moved to Miami.
[00:05:45]  And who did you meet?
[00:05:48]  Who got you into the business?
[00:05:48]  What did you start doing for work when you first got to Miami?
[00:05:54]  Sending weed.
[00:05:56]  It was all weed.
[00:05:57]  Sending weed around the country.
[00:05:58]  Where were you sending it to?
[00:05:59]  People were coming and picking it up.
[00:06:01]  From where?
[00:06:01]  Picking up.
[00:06:02]  They're from all over.
[00:06:03]  It was all in the middle.
[00:06:05]  Wisconsin, people were coming from.
[00:06:07]  They were coming from New York, Texas.
[00:06:10]  I mean, all over.
[00:06:10]  We were just loading their cars and sending them up the road.
[00:06:14]  And I did.
[00:06:16]  Load a couple and drive myself.
[00:06:19]  You drove, you traffic killed me.
[00:06:20]  I drove to Wisconsin.
[00:06:22]  All the way to Wisconsin.
[00:06:23]  How much weed did you have?
[00:06:25]  You have 10 minutes for me to tell you the story.
[00:06:27]  I'm just kidding.
[00:06:28]  How much weed did you have on the trip?
[00:06:30]  We had a pickup truck with a camper on the back.
[00:06:33]  We took a pallet of wood, five sheets on the bottom reel, five sheets on the top reel.
[00:06:42]  The whole inside was hollowed out, filled it full, 600 pounds, put Band strapped it down and drove all the way to Wisconsin.
[00:06:50]  Damn.
[00:06:51]  Long drive.
[00:06:54]  Got up there, put the money in, and drove back.
[00:06:56]  How much money did you make on that load?
[00:06:58]  That was only like, for me, only like $3,000 or $4,000.
[00:07:02]  And who were these guys from?
[00:07:05]  These guys were South Florida guys, and the guys up north were like, who knows?
[00:07:10]  I don't even remember how we met them, but they're good.
[00:07:12]  South Florida guys, were they Hispanic?
[00:07:14]  Were they white?
[00:07:14]  No, they're white.
[00:07:15]  White guys.
[00:07:16]  White guys.
[00:07:17]  Okay.
[00:07:17]  Like rednecks.
[00:07:19]  What happened then?
[00:07:19]  What happened next?
[00:07:21]  Um, so you do some trips with those guys, and then what?
[00:07:23]  Yeah, trips with those guys that lasted a while, and then everything slid from marijuana into the cocaine.
[00:07:29]  Cool.
[00:07:30]  How did that happen?
[00:07:31]  Started in the boat racing world that's both mid offshore powerboat racing.
[00:07:37]  You're like, you got this weird kind of whisper going.
[00:07:40]  Sorry, Johnny boy.
[00:07:42]  It's just hard to talk to me.
[00:07:45]  Um, 85 86.
[00:07:49]  85 to 86, you started to go to the boat racing.
[00:07:52]  Boat racing is popular down there.
[00:07:53]  You transitioned from marijuana to cocaine because of.
[00:07:57]  Who was in the boat racing world?
[00:08:01]  Okay, can you elaborate on that a little bit?
[00:08:03]  Well, we raced one season, met all the guys.
[00:08:08]  Are you talking about those long cigarette boats?
[00:08:10]  The super long?
[00:08:11]  The super long and the cat boats.
[00:08:14]  Okay.
[00:08:14]  The ones that go around the buoys and they like flip over, they go so fast, they do like straight up pitch pulls.
[00:08:21]  These are like over here in Clearwater.
[00:08:23]  Okay.
[00:08:24]  But met Captain America.
[00:08:26]  He was like our main connection, a Cuban guy.
[00:08:29]  He was a Marielita.
[00:08:30]  His name was Captain America?
[00:08:32]  Well, his name was Omar, but his boat name was Captain America.
[00:08:34]  Omar.
[00:08:35]  Okay.
[00:08:36]  The Lescaray.
[00:08:37]  Omar Aluscaray.
[00:08:38]  He's not with us anymore.
[00:08:40]  Rest in peace, Omar.
[00:08:41]  Rest in peace.
[00:08:42]  Goodbye, Omar.
[00:08:44]  Met him.
[00:08:45]  Met him.
[00:08:46]  He's from Miami.
[00:08:47]  Talk with more of a full voice.
[00:08:49]  He was our connect in Miami.
[00:08:51]  Our big connection.
[00:08:52]  So the street price was.
[00:08:54]  And he raced speedboats.
[00:08:55]  He was just speedboats.
[00:08:57]  He had his own team.
[00:08:58]  You got to have money to race those fuckers.
[00:08:59]  Yeah, he had a ton of money, but he was selling drugs.
[00:09:02]  And he was Mexican?
[00:09:03]  Or wait, not Cuban.
[00:09:03]  You said he was Cuban.
[00:09:04]  Cuban, okay.
[00:09:05]  Marielito came over into the boat lift.
[00:09:07]  But he was smart.
[00:09:09]  Engineer.
[00:09:10]  Got the houses in the gables.
[00:09:12]  Houses in Upper Keys.
[00:09:14]  You know, million dollar raceboat damn, with the puller, and Omar was multi millionaire, multi millionaire.
[00:09:21]  He was direct connect to you know who Pablo, the guy named Pablo, Mr. Escobar himself yep Garvia yep, direct connect.
[00:09:32]  So the street price was 20.
[00:09:35]  We were for what?
[00:09:36]  For just a kilo, for a key, 20.
[00:09:38]  We were already 3,000 ahead, so we were getting it from from him cheaper already by getting it from him he was.
[00:09:45]  So how much did you sell it for on the street?
[00:09:47]  So you're getting a key from Omar for what?
[00:09:49]  Just say, very.
[00:09:50]  17?
[00:09:51]  Yeah, for 17.
[00:09:52]  We're already $3,000 ahead.
[00:09:53]  Right.
[00:09:53]  All right, gotcha.
[00:09:54]  Street price is $30,000 or $20,000.
[00:09:57]  Street price is $20,000.
[00:09:58]  You're getting it for $17,000 from Omar.
[00:10:00]  So we're already ahead of the game.
[00:10:01]  How many of these things are you slinging?
[00:10:04]  More than I can handle.
[00:10:06]  Really?
[00:10:06]  Every time I go to this little shop, they put a duffel bag in their car.
[00:10:11]  And I'd say, I don't want a duffel bag.
[00:10:12]  Just take it.
[00:10:14]  Green go take it.
[00:10:15]  They gave me more than you wanted?
[00:10:16]  Always.
[00:10:16]  Always.
[00:10:17]  Really?
[00:10:17]  One or two duffel bags more.
[00:10:19]  I don't want any.
[00:10:19]  And you told him, you're like, I don't want that much.
[00:10:21]  I said, Take it.
[00:10:22]  I want to take it.
[00:10:23]  Pay me when you can.
[00:10:24]  Really?
[00:10:25]  And bring me Ruviocita.
[00:10:26]  What does that mean?
[00:10:27]  Blonde hair, blue eyed chicks.
[00:10:29]  That's all he wanted blonde hair, blue eyed chicks.
[00:10:32]  I come to the keys and potty.
[00:10:35]  Oh, my.
[00:10:36]  Crazy.
[00:10:37]  Crazy as kids.
[00:10:38]  So, how old are you when this is all going down?
[00:10:40]  How old were you?
[00:10:42]  24, 5, and 6.
[00:10:44]  26 year old, 25 year old in Miami, rolling around, pulling up to the.
[00:10:49]  Pablo's right-hand man's house and he's on speedboats throwing duffel bags in your car, duffel bags full and okay, so how much, how much money or how much cocaine are you selling every week?
[00:10:59]  And how much money, like on a good one on an hour?
[00:11:02]  Is it key a week?
[00:11:03]  No, key a week?
[00:11:06]  10 15 10, 15 kilos a week?
[00:11:09]  Yeah, you're moving and I'm sending shit all through the mail all over, so you're making over $30,000 a week, just in, just in profit, just in your fee.
[00:11:18]  Probably somewhere off the top, yeah.
[00:11:21]  But I mean, You know, fast as it came in, it went out.
[00:11:24]  Right.
[00:11:24]  You're spending as fast as you get it.
[00:11:25]  Yeah.
[00:11:25]  Limbs every night.
[00:11:27]  What are you buying?
[00:11:28]  Balls.
[00:11:28]  I mean, hookers.
[00:11:29]  I mean, you didn't have to pay for the blow.
[00:11:31]  That was the only good thing.
[00:11:32]  It was cheap.
[00:11:32]  Oh, my God.
[00:11:33]  We were on fire.
[00:11:34]  I'd make a thousand, I'd spend ten.
[00:11:37]  It didn't matter.
[00:11:39]  Wow.
[00:11:40]  How long did you and Omar work together?
[00:11:42]  So he went for a trip to Panama and never came back.
[00:11:45]  Probably about two, three years.
[00:11:47]  He went, you went to Panama with him?
[00:11:48]  No, he went with somebody to go see supposedly Pablo.
[00:11:53]  Said, I'll be back in a few days.
[00:11:55]  And he never came back.
[00:11:57]  So, why were the raceboat industry or why were the speedboat racers so tied into the cocaine business?
[00:12:07]  Because I think my take on it is because the Cubans could speak Spanish, number one, with the Colombians.
[00:12:17]  Right, right.
[00:12:18]  That was part of the thing.
[00:12:19]  And it just took off from there.
[00:12:21]  And they could transport it fast on the boats.
[00:12:23]  The only speedboat racers were Cubans?
[00:12:25]  No, no, no.
[00:12:26]  There's all Americans.
[00:12:27]  There's every kind.
[00:12:28]  But I'm saying the ones that were in the drug world were Spanish speaking.
[00:12:32]  Yeah, mostly Cuban.
[00:12:34]  So, do they use these boats to go back and forth or what?
[00:12:36]  I mean, those boats don't go long distance.
[00:12:38]  No, no.
[00:12:38]  They did some, but mainly it was just airdrops.
[00:12:44]  I'm trying to figure out how to get from.
[00:12:47]  I'm trying to figure out the connection for the speedboat races to the cocaine.
[00:12:51]  I don't understand the connection there.
[00:12:54]  They just had the money and that's what they were into, was racing boats?
[00:12:57]  Or were they removing boats?
[00:12:59]  That's what it was.
[00:12:59]  They were.
[00:13:01]  Into racing boats.
[00:13:02]  And they had a lot of money.
[00:13:04]  Money through the Coke.
[00:13:06]  Right.
[00:13:06]  And the boat.
[00:13:07]  So they're fun.
[00:13:08]  They were fun in the boat business.
[00:13:10]  The boat business is a good money laundering business.
[00:13:12]  Definitely.
[00:13:13]  It's a good way to borrow.
[00:13:14]  Don Arono story.
[00:13:16]  That makes sense.
[00:13:16]  Everybody saw that.
[00:13:17]  The Don Arono story from Cigarette.
[00:13:20]  Who's?
[00:13:20]  Don Arono.
[00:13:22]  Who's that?
[00:13:22]  The guy who started Cigarette Racing Boats.
[00:13:25]  Oh, okay.
[00:13:25]  It was Don Arono.
[00:13:26]  He was part of that whole.
[00:13:28]  That was a little bit before me.
[00:13:30]  But the main players were.
[00:13:34]  The Seahawk racing team.
[00:13:37]  Willie and Sal.
[00:13:38]  Willie Falcone and Sal Magluda.
[00:13:41]  They were the big boat racers.
[00:13:42]  They were the big boat racers.
[00:13:44]  When did they come into the picture?
[00:13:45]  They were in the early 80s.
[00:13:48]  After Omar disappeared?
[00:13:50]  No, no, no.
[00:13:50]  During the whole time, before Omar.
[00:13:53]  They were all friends.
[00:13:54]  If it was all friends in the boat racing world, if we're in Key West or the offshore races and they ran out of some party goods, somebody would send a chopper up to Miami, pick up a Johnny or two, and fly back to party on.
[00:14:07]  Really?
[00:14:08]  Yeah, these guys had money.
[00:14:10]  How did you meet Willie?
[00:14:12]  Willie Falcone?
[00:14:13]  Yep, through the boat racing world.
[00:14:15]  And then I met him inside, in federal prison.
[00:14:18]  Oh, my God.
[00:14:20]  But he's a serious player.
[00:14:22]  He's out.
[00:14:23]  They just caught his brother.
[00:14:25]  They were looking for him for, I don't know how many years.
[00:14:27]  He was like the money man.
[00:14:28]  They caught him in Orlando, like maybe eight, ten years ago, right in Orlando.
[00:14:33]  And they made billions, not millions, billions.
[00:14:37]  Did I say billions with a B?

=== The Boat Racer Era (15:55) ===

[00:14:38]  Yes.
[00:14:39]  With a B. With a B.
[00:14:40]  But I mean Willie made billions him and Sal Sal's doing life.
[00:14:45]  He's done.
[00:14:45]  I think there's like 11 murders in the case.
[00:14:48]  I don't know how Willie got out of that.
[00:14:51]  Oh My god, I better watch what I say Holy fuck And you're 26 years old in the middle of all this.
[00:15:02]  Oh, wait, is this in the middle of all that?
[00:15:05]  When all those murders are happening.
[00:15:07]  It's sort of We're around that but a little bit to the left and we were to the right the boat races were but that was at that Given time, the godmother of cocaine, Griselda, was involved with all that, and she had her hitman.
[00:15:22]  But we that was like I went around all that area, that was like a little irritable.
[00:15:26]  So, you never met Griselda?
[00:15:27]  They're too crazy for me.
[00:15:29]  Too crazy, I know the crazy one, but they're she killed everybody.
[00:15:31]  Yeah, she killed everybody, then she got whacked when she went to Columbia.
[00:15:35]  Any of your friends get murdered, any of your close friends get like murdered, like in Miami when you were doing all this?
[00:15:43]  No, okay, just prison time.
[00:15:45]  Is that that documentary?
[00:15:46]  Documentary made it seem like it was a bloodbath in Miami.
[00:15:48]  No, it was a bloodbath.
[00:15:49]  It was a true bloodbath, but I wasn't involved in all that.
[00:15:53]  I mean, from the marijuana change to the cocaine, marijuana was like mellow.
[00:16:00]  You go to bed at 9, 10 o'clock.
[00:16:02]  You go chillin', sell a duffel bag of weeds.
[00:16:08]  A lot different than somebody banging on your door at 2 in the morning, all whacked out on blow.
[00:16:12]  Because they always want more, right?
[00:16:14]  Oh, always want more.
[00:16:15]  But even if you're at a bigger level.
[00:16:17]  And marijuana wasn't as lucrative as cocaine because it was a lot bulkier, took up a lot more space, right?
[00:16:23]  For sure.
[00:16:24]  So, okay.
[00:16:26]  What was the quality of the cocaine back then compared to nowadays?
[00:16:31]  Don't remind me.
[00:16:32]  Johnny Boy doesn't partake anymore.
[00:16:35]  Right, right.
[00:16:35]  But if you did.
[00:16:37]  That's what it looked like.
[00:16:38]  Can you see this?
[00:16:39]  Yeah.
[00:16:40]  The salt lamp?
[00:16:41]  It looked like if you took a tarpon and just scaled it, shale the shell off, it would just like sparkle.
[00:16:50]  Really?
[00:16:51]  Johnny Boy's sweating.
[00:16:53]  Yeah, Mr. Appleseed's hot over here.
[00:16:55]  I need to sip a drink.
[00:16:56]  It's apple time.
[00:16:57]  Holy shit.
[00:16:59]  So, what happens after Omar doesn't return?
[00:17:01]  Then what do you do?
[00:17:02]  That's your main connect, right?
[00:17:04]  Yeah, that was our main connect.
[00:17:05]  And you're flying all around.
[00:17:06]  You're flying all around the state, all around the country with all this cash in your pocket.
[00:17:09]  Shipping it in the mail.
[00:17:10]  You're just basically living.
[00:17:11]  You weren't scared if you lost half the cash.
[00:17:13]  What was life like?
[00:17:14]  You were just living by.
[00:17:15]  Living, didn't know nothing about credit card, just cash, cash, cash.
[00:17:20]  You could fly anywhere, anytime, under anybody's name.
[00:17:23]  They didn't ask for ID back then.
[00:17:25]  I was like, OJ Simpson running to the airport.
[00:17:28]  It's Mark Avnet.
[00:17:30]  It's Mark Avnet.
[00:17:31]  I'm late.
[00:17:32]  Well, here you go, Mark.
[00:17:34]  Here, fly first class.
[00:17:35]  Oh, my God.
[00:17:36]  That was crazy.
[00:17:38]  So, yeah, then what do you do when your Kinect's gone?
[00:17:40]  When Omar doesn't return?
[00:17:41]  When Kinect's gone, it all starts slowing down.
[00:17:43]  And then Johnny Boy got in a little trouble.
[00:17:46]  How'd you get in trouble?
[00:17:47]  What happened?
[00:17:49]  Took a kilo.
[00:17:50]  Nobody brings dope into the keys.
[00:17:54]  I took a kilo, two kilos into the keys.
[00:17:58]  Why?
[00:17:59]  To sell to somebody.
[00:18:01]  How did you get them, though?
[00:18:02]  Because Omar was gone.
[00:18:03]  No.
[00:18:03]  I found another connect.
[00:18:04]  You always keep one or two more connections in your main, you know?
[00:18:08]  Yeah.
[00:18:08]  But took it in.
[00:18:11]  Why did you take it to the Keys?
[00:18:12]  You just knew the key.
[00:18:13]  That's where the buyer was.
[00:18:14]  That's where the buyer was.
[00:18:15]  And this guy gave it to somebody.
[00:18:17]  He got set up and calls me with the feds.
[00:18:24]  For another one?
[00:18:25]  No, calls me and says they don't want it.
[00:18:28]  To come pick it back up.
[00:18:29]  Yeah.
[00:18:30]  And I said, no, I'm not taking that thing back.
[00:18:32]  I mean, that thing is beautiful.
[00:18:33]  I mean, it was nice.
[00:18:36]  And he's taping me during this whole time.
[00:18:38]  I don't know that.
[00:18:40]  I just told him, drop on the ticket.
[00:18:42]  I don't care.
[00:18:43]  I'm not taking it back to Miami.
[00:18:45]  So I called my buddies in Miami, another set of Cubans, and said, hey, I'm bringing it back up.
[00:18:53]  See you in 45 minutes.
[00:18:54]  I go to meet the guy.
[00:18:55]  Because they didn't want to drop on the ticket.
[00:18:57]  Yeah, he didn't want to drop on the ticket, but he was setting me up.
[00:19:00]  He was already setting me up.
[00:19:02]  I pull up to a fast food restaurant.
[00:19:04]  So you come to pick it back up?
[00:19:05]  Pick it back up.
[00:19:06]  So he told you he got in trouble.
[00:19:08]  He didn't tell me he got in trouble.
[00:19:09]  He called.
[00:19:10]  So he calls what later that day?
[00:19:11]  Oh, so he got caught after you gave him the kilo.
[00:19:14]  Exactly.
[00:19:15]  And then they basically got him to set you up.
[00:19:18]  Yeah, exactly.
[00:19:19]  And said, Here, tell him to meet me back at the same place.
[00:19:21]  Okay.
[00:19:22]  I go in.
[00:19:23]  And you said, No.
[00:19:23]  You said, No, I'm not going in.
[00:19:25]  No, I said, I don't want to take it back.
[00:19:26]  Drop.
[00:19:27]  It's nice.
[00:19:28]  There's no reason why I should take it back.
[00:19:30]  I said, Drop on the price.
[00:19:30]  I don't even care.
[00:19:31]  I'm not going to drive out of the keys.
[00:19:33]  It's easy to drive into the keys, hard to drive out.
[00:19:37]  Go back to pick it up.
[00:19:37]  Okay, so he didn't want to drop on.
[00:19:39]  He said, No, I don't want it.
[00:19:40]  So you agreed to go back and get it.
[00:19:41]  Pick it up.
[00:19:42]  Yeah.
[00:19:42]  Okay.
[00:19:42]  And then, shoo, they swooped in.
[00:19:45]  Where were you?
[00:19:46]  Where was this?
[00:19:47]  On US Highway 1, a little fast food restaurant.
[00:19:50]  What fast food restaurant?
[00:19:51]  A small one.
[00:19:52]  Dairy Queen?
[00:19:53]  I think it was Dairy Queen.
[00:19:55]  Or Burger King, one of the two.
[00:19:58]  I walked in, made a phone call.
[00:20:00]  You walked in the Dairy Queen, you got in the payphone?
[00:20:03]  Yeah, made a phone call, walked out, and next thing I know, guns are all over me.
[00:20:08]  Cops everywhere.
[00:20:09]  Cops everywhere, surrounded.
[00:20:11]  As soon as you make the phone call?
[00:20:12]  Right after.
[00:20:13]  How many cops?
[00:20:15]  Do you even see your guy?
[00:20:18]  Or no?
[00:20:18]  I don't see my guy, no.
[00:20:19]  You just get off my gun and there's cops.
[00:20:21]  I was private calling him.
[00:20:22]  I walked back out, cops everywhere, front, back, all around, guns drawn.
[00:20:26]  Fuck.
[00:20:28]  They put the cuffs on, and you know, Johnny Boy's a little crazy.
[00:20:33]  How old are you now at this point?
[00:20:34]  Probably 28.
[00:20:36]  28, I think.
[00:20:39]  They say, Johnny Boy, you have two choices here.
[00:20:44]  And they're surrounding me.
[00:20:45]  They put their guns away.
[00:20:47]  I'm cuffed up.
[00:20:49]  They said, you can either take you to Miami and we can go to jail, or we can call some of your friends and set them up.
[00:20:58]  Johnny Boy says, I think we got three choices.
[00:21:02]  They said three choices and this is FBI, DEA and local police.
[00:21:09]  They say what do you mean?
[00:21:12]  Three choices?
[00:21:12]  I said I could run and you could shoot me.
[00:21:15]  And they said, get him in the back of the car and get him out of here, Johnny Boy, you're going to jail.
[00:21:19]  Oh no yeah, that's what they took you to jail right then and there, right there and then.
[00:21:24]  When then I went to a little substation in the upper Keys and it's a very small place, Four cells I see people I don't know the first cell, people I don't know the third cell.
[00:21:36]  Guess who was in the next cell?
[00:21:40]  The guy that I was selling the kilo to.
[00:21:42]  Yeah, the guy set you up after he snitched you out.
[00:21:45]  Yep.
[00:21:45]  They took him to jail.
[00:21:47]  He went to jail.
[00:21:48]  All you do is keep his mouth shut Johnny boy would have got him an attorney when they were when they were setting people up when they would tell somebody that we'll We'll work with you if you can snitch out a couple of your friends They would get those people that person a rat and then it was still they would just not honor that they would just still lock him up Not get not do it.
[00:22:05]  Probably just for a little bit and then they let him out.
[00:22:08]  Oh, so they would actually do something for him.
[00:22:11]  They would work with him because do you know you're set up as soon as the cops come?
[00:22:15]  I knew I was done.
[00:22:16]  You knew, but do you know you're set up by that guy?
[00:22:19]  Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:22:21]  So when you see him in there, you know he set you up.
[00:22:23]  I said, what's going on?
[00:22:25]  Why would you do that to Johnny Boyd?
[00:22:27]  Yeah, you know, you just keep your mouth shut and you could have got out on bond and maybe an attorney.
[00:22:33]  He what could he say?
[00:22:35]  He knew he was, you know, caught.
[00:22:37]  He knew that we knew.
[00:22:38]  He knew that we knew.
[00:22:39]  And what did he say to you?
[00:22:41]  Nothing.
[00:22:41]  I'm sorry.
[00:22:43]  Older guy, you know.
[00:22:44]  Older than Johnny Boy at the time.
[00:22:46]  So, how much time do they give him?
[00:22:48]  I'm not sure.
[00:22:48]  Tell you the truth.
[00:22:50]  I got five.
[00:22:51]  So, you get five years.
[00:22:52]  Five years.
[00:22:53]  That's it?
[00:22:54]  For one kilo?
[00:22:54]  Five years?
[00:22:55]  Yeah.
[00:22:55]  How much would you get now, you think?
[00:22:57]  For one.
[00:22:57]  If you've never been in trouble about the snow, about the snow, about the same.
[00:23:00]  Well, I don't know.
[00:23:02]  We had Tampa Tony on it, but he got busted with like 10 keys for his first charge.
[00:23:06]  And then you go to the charges.
[00:23:07]  It's different.
[00:23:08]  You have guidelines to follow.
[00:23:09]  Yeah.
[00:23:10]  But, um,.
[00:23:11]  This guy was an idiot.
[00:23:13]  Keep your mouth shut and get out of bond.
[00:23:18]  Work it out from there.
[00:23:19]  So, what was prison like at 28 years old for five years?
[00:23:23]  Where's the prison?
[00:23:24]  In Miami?
[00:23:25]  No, no.
[00:23:26]  You go to holdover.
[00:23:27]  Right.
[00:23:28]  You go to a holdover and then you travel around.
[00:23:30]  What's a holdover?
[00:23:30]  A holdover.
[00:23:31]  Just a county school.
[00:23:32]  A holdover.
[00:23:33]  A holdover federal facility.
[00:23:37]  You're doing that weird whisper thing again.
[00:23:38]  Okay.
[00:23:39]  Sorry about that.
[00:23:40]  Johnny Boy's a little parched.
[00:23:42]  We had to cut you off real quick because your mask was getting too hot and you needed to get a more breathable mask so you wouldn't sweat so bad.
[00:23:51]  It's a little hot in here.
[00:23:52]  Are you feeling better now, Mr. Appleseed?
[00:23:53]  Yeah, Johnny's.
[00:23:54]  All right, so let's go back.
[00:23:56]  I want to go back to when you're moving the cocaine.
[00:23:57]  So, yeah, before you got locked up, were you getting high on your own supply?
[00:24:01]  I mean, that's like one of the cardinal sins in slinging dope, is don't get high on your own supply.
[00:24:07]  Well, they say that, but when you have so much cocaine, can you really do it all?
[00:24:11]  I mean, you have a duffel bag with 10 kilos in it?
[00:24:15]  Right.
[00:24:16]  You know how long it would take to do 10 kilos of whooping it?
[00:24:19]  You die.
[00:24:20]  I mean, yeah, out of a supply of McDonald's straws.
[00:24:23]  Ronald McDonald will probably be chasing me down.
[00:24:26]  The redheaded guy.
[00:24:27]  Yeah, yeah, I know he is.
[00:24:28]  No, but the Coke was so good back then, you didn't need a lot.
[00:24:34]  We'd stay up all night, partying.
[00:24:37]  And let's go back to the boat racing world.
[00:24:41]  For a little bit, the boat races all had to take physicals and all that.
[00:24:44]  The doctor at the end of it all started telling all the drivers and people in the boat, lean back.
[00:24:51]  We got to see inside your nose.
[00:24:54]  They're doing so much blow.
[00:24:55]  Because they know everybody's on blow.
[00:24:57]  In the boat on blow.
[00:24:59]  Really?
[00:25:00]  Oh, just look at this.
[00:25:01]  They take their own little bottles.
[00:25:04]  Who was drug testing them?
[00:25:06]  The Association of Boat Raising World.
[00:25:08]  Right.
[00:25:10]  Like being on cocaine would affect your well, I mean, you're driving.
[00:25:14]  You can't drive fucking NASCAR and be on cocaine.
[00:25:17]  The drug was a different era.
[00:25:19]  The drug was so good.
[00:25:21]  So everybody knew that smoking Coke was bad.
[00:25:25]  Now they call it crack, I think.
[00:25:27]  Is that what it's called, crack?
[00:25:28]  Yeah, it's called crack.
[00:25:30]  Back in the 80s.
[00:25:31]  Were you guys ever smoking it back then?
[00:25:34]  Nobody was supposed to smoke it.
[00:25:35]  Everybody knew that.
[00:25:36]  But I'm not going to lie.
[00:25:38]  Johnny Boy did get wild a couple of times here and there.
[00:25:41]  What did they call it back then?
[00:25:42]  Freebase!
[00:25:43]  Freebase, right?
[00:25:45]  It wasn't crack back then.
[00:25:46]  Yeah, nothing free about it either.
[00:25:48]  It's called freebase?
[00:25:49]  Freebase, yeah.
[00:25:50]  But it was like Richard Pryor.
[00:25:52]  They bring it back.
[00:25:53]  I never really cooked it myself, but they bring it back and it had ether involved.
[00:25:57]  And that's how Richard Pryor, the comedian, caught on fire.
[00:26:01]  Really?
[00:26:01]  Yeah, trying to put ether on it like after the wash.
[00:26:04]  And his rig blew up or something, right?
[00:26:06]  Yeah, something blew up.
[00:26:07]  He's on fire.
[00:26:07]  Richard Pryor was free basin?
[00:26:09]  Oh, yeah.
[00:26:10]  Really?
[00:26:10]  It's a very known story.
[00:26:11]  Oh, I didn't even know that.
[00:26:12]  Yeah, he's like, the cops came, the fire department came or something.
[00:26:15]  He was in the house cooking up and it blew up.
[00:26:17]  No way.
[00:26:17]  That was the ether blew up.
[00:26:19]  And then a few good bands back in the day.
[00:26:22]  Casey and the Sunshine Band.
[00:26:24]  Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:26:25]  Casey, heavy on the smoke.
[00:26:28]  Heavy on the smoke.
[00:26:29]  Woo!
[00:26:30]  Hey, so what other celebrities are around like back then?
[00:26:33]  You see, like, partying.
[00:26:34]  You're out there partying.
[00:26:35]  Miami it was like that was the Madonna era.
[00:26:37]  I mean I didn't see her yeah, doing.
[00:26:39]  It was all that kind of air.
[00:26:40]  I mean all the clubs are you seeing, like football players and stuff, or well, down there I really didn't know that many football players, but everybody was partying.
[00:26:48]  Back then everybody was partying.
[00:26:50]  I'm talking about the mayor was partying, just like New York.
[00:26:53]  Remember what was that guy's name?
[00:26:55]  Oh, the guy in Canada.
[00:26:57]  Yeah, he got caught smoking crack.
[00:26:58]  Yeah yeah, that guy.
[00:27:00]  But no, but Miami in the 80s, it was just once the 80s in the drug world Slowed down.
[00:27:07]  They put all the laws and started arresting everybody.
[00:27:10]  Like half the bars in Fort Lauderdale went out of business.
[00:27:13]  Really?
[00:27:14]  All the drug money.
[00:27:15]  There was a bar, it's called Sundays on the Bay.
[00:27:17]  It's still open.
[00:27:19]  All the dopers would come.
[00:27:21]  Some of these guys' bar tabs for a Sunday afternoon was $8,000.
[00:27:25]  I remember exactly.
[00:27:26]  For a bar tab.
[00:27:27]  For a bar tab in the afternoon.
[00:27:30]  Johnny Boy, one night, did partake in the party with the boys.
[00:27:36]  They remind me, hey, don't you have to run these two kilos up to Palm Beach?
[00:27:42]  I said, damn, you're right.
[00:27:43]  Johnny Boy's going to get all ass.
[00:27:46]  I'm driving on 95.
[00:27:47]  Fading, just ready to fall out.
[00:27:51]  Johnny Boys, I'm tired.
[00:27:55]  I said, Damn, what am I tired about?
[00:27:57]  I reached under the seat, cut a window, pow, pow, pow.
[00:28:01]  Hit the road.
[00:28:02]  It was like the fucking Wild West, huh?
[00:28:05]  Oh, super Wild West.
[00:28:06]  Met my Connect.
[00:28:08]  Usually had a little system.
[00:28:10]  We'd go eat lunch, buy some clothes, shoes, whatever.
[00:28:14]  Yeah.
[00:28:15]  And I just said, Here's your shit.
[00:28:17]  Give me the money.
[00:28:17]  Let me get the frick out of here.
[00:28:19]  Oh, my God.
[00:28:20]  It was the Wild West.
[00:28:21]  People were ripping each other off, shooting.
[00:28:23]  I mean, it was just like if you.
[00:28:25]  People getting their arms whacked off for a Rolex?
[00:28:28]  For the machete?
[00:28:29]  That was just in a stoplight.
[00:28:31]  If you're in a convertible and have your Rolex hanging out, somebody's going to get it.
[00:28:36]  And they would just machete your fucking arm off.
[00:28:38]  Yeah.
[00:28:41]  That's the crazy crack people they call them now.
[00:28:44]  But back then, it was just like they were just whacked on the freebase.
[00:28:47]  It was so strong.
[00:28:49]  Very strong.
[00:28:50]  Ten times as strong as it.
[00:28:52]  Stuff they smoke now, but i'm not really sure because I don't really smoke it, but Johnny Boy did partake one time.
[00:28:59]  Wow, all right.
[00:29:01]  So let's fast forward back to when you went, got locked up.
[00:29:03]  Then you met the guy in the cell block three that ratted you out at the Dairy Queen cell block three.
[00:29:09]  The guy who uh, ratted you out of Dairy Queen and yeah, also a Pablo, was his name really Pablo?
[00:29:15]  Yeah, his name really was Pablo.
[00:29:17]  Wow, he was um, where's he at now?
[00:29:19]  I'm not sure, probably probably dead.
[00:29:22]  Then they took me to Miami.
[00:29:23]  They took you to Miami.
[00:29:24]  Miami.
[00:29:24]  So Miami, right there, get sentenced and federal.
[00:29:27]  Then you get five years.
[00:29:28]  How long did that take?
[00:29:29]  Months.
[00:29:30]  You go over months waiting for all that stuff to happen.
[00:29:32]  But then at that time, all the guys in the upper keys, all the Coast Guard station is in Alamarada.
[00:29:41]  So there was a whole era when all the Coast Guard guys got in trouble.
[00:29:45]  They would call the smugglers and say, hey, we're heading out in 20 minutes.
[00:29:51]  Boatload of stuff floating.
[00:29:53]  Get out there and get back grab what you can and go and then they get broken off They get some guard guys.
[00:30:00]  Yeah, coast guard guys.
[00:30:01]  They all tip off the the pickup guys They pick so you got 20 minutes to grab what you can and go and they would pay the coast guard or they would just give them coke Pay them cash pay them cash.
[00:30:12]  Okay, but and they got busted.
[00:30:15]  Yeah, they got five or six of them did no way late 80s, whole big pair.
[00:30:21]  Jesus, They didn't tip off the dealers.
[00:30:26]  They grab some coke, slip some under under their vest and they'd sell it to somebody that they trusted.

=== Coast Guard Corruption (05:36) ===

[00:30:33]  Johnny Boy got a couple of those, did you really?
[00:30:36]  They were going for 24 to 26.
[00:30:39]  Coast Guard guy had it.
[00:30:41]  I paid 8 000, sold it that afternoon for 25.
[00:30:45]  I gave him a deal, I took a thousand off 25.
[00:30:49]  That's what you call a home run.
[00:30:50]  Wow, that happened a few times, but that's once in a while, you know, yeah.
[00:30:57]  And then what happened when you went to court and you got sentenced Five years?
[00:31:00]  Did you have an attorney?
[00:31:01]  Yeah, attorney.
[00:31:03]  So appointed?
[00:31:04]  Nope.
[00:31:05]  You paid a guy?
[00:31:06]  And then I had a state case running with that one, too.
[00:31:08]  What was the state case?
[00:31:11]  Damn it.
[00:31:11]  That was Coke, too, wasn't it?
[00:31:13]  Shit.
[00:31:13]  How many of you were getting so close to Coke?
[00:31:15]  You had two cases at once?
[00:31:16]  Yeah.
[00:31:16]  We missed this one.
[00:31:17]  What happened to this one?
[00:31:18]  This one was I was meeting somebody, and it was a fluke.
[00:31:25]  Total fluke, if you know what that means.
[00:31:27]  I was at the wrong place at the wrong time, and it was state.
[00:31:30]  But I think I would have beat it.
[00:31:32]  But I already got a Fed charge, so they just ran it together.
[00:31:35]  They didn't care.
[00:31:37]  Right, so you were in the wrong place at the wrong time.
[00:31:38]  What happened?
[00:31:39]  Dropping something off in the lower key.
[00:31:41]  You were dropped something off?
[00:31:42]  Do you not want to tell us what it is?
[00:31:44]  No, it was Coke again.
[00:31:46]  How much?
[00:31:47]  That one was two kilos.
[00:31:49]  And how do you get popped on that one?
[00:31:51]  Wrong place at the wrong time.
[00:31:52]  Why did the cops just randomly show up?
[00:31:54]  They were next door and thought something was going on.
[00:31:57]  They were watching the place or something.
[00:31:59]  No, they really weren't watching it.
[00:32:00]  They just stopped us.
[00:32:02]  The guy in front of me was the buyer.
[00:32:04]  He took off.
[00:32:04]  He got to go, stopped me, started searching.
[00:32:08]  It was a legal search, but what can you say after they see the two kilos, you're going to jail.
[00:32:14]  That was it.
[00:32:15]  It seems like you can do this interview without your mask on.
[00:32:17]  Do you want me to take it off?
[00:32:19]  Yeah, you can take it off.
[00:32:20]  Do you want to take it off?
[00:32:22]  I mean, all the stuff you've been, you went to prison for, you did your time.
[00:32:25]  I mean, what are you afraid of?
[00:32:27]  Why do you want to hide your identity?
[00:32:29]  There's still people around.
[00:32:32]  They're looking after me, but there's still some active stuff going.
[00:32:35]  Just because you're telling all these stories, you're kind of worried?
[00:32:38]  No, but all the people.
[00:32:40]  Yeah, you should keep your identity hidden.
[00:32:42]  I think I should, too.
[00:32:43]  Yeah.
[00:32:46]  Oh, man.
[00:32:47]  There's no reason for the people to know who Mr. Johnny is.
[00:32:50]  So you got sentenced to five years.
[00:32:53]  Where'd they ship you off to after Miami?
[00:32:55]  Ship me off to North Florida.
[00:32:58]  Went to federal prison camp.
[00:33:02]  That's where the boys from Wall Street and bankers, you know, and you play handball.
[00:33:07]  Easy, easy camp.
[00:33:09]  It's camp, low, medium, and penitentiary.
[00:33:12]  Okay.
[00:33:12]  You don't want to go to the penitentiary.
[00:33:15]  You're at camp.
[00:33:16]  I'm at a camp.
[00:33:16]  The lowest.
[00:33:17]  The lowest of the low.
[00:33:18]  Yeah.
[00:33:19]  Why do you get sent there?
[00:33:20]  Because you got no previous charges?
[00:33:21]  No, no previous.
[00:33:22]  You know, no violent charges exactly, but I worked my way up to a low and got out.
[00:33:27]  I got in trouble.
[00:33:28]  You know, camps you can do anything, you can wear the clothes, you can have watches, and cell phones.
[00:33:33]  We, right?
[00:33:35]  Radios, TVs.
[00:33:36]  Do you meet anybody interesting when you're there?
[00:33:37]  Oh, at the camp next to mine, North Florida, was um, it was Softly Camp, who was at that one, was a pretty famous guy, and at my camp.
[00:33:46]  But that one was um, one of the guys from Studio 54, Ian Schrager.
[00:33:51]  He was from Schrager Hotel Group, he was at the camp.
[00:33:55]  You remember Schrager?
[00:33:56]  No, no.
[00:33:57]  Delano, Miami, and like 10, 12 properties all around the country.
[00:34:01]  Probably before my time.
[00:34:02]  Yeah, it was before your time.
[00:34:03]  Studio 54, you remember that?
[00:34:05]  No.
[00:34:05]  You don't remember, but we heard of it.
[00:34:07]  We heard of it, yeah.
[00:34:07]  Yeah, Michael Jackson.
[00:34:09]  Right, everybody.
[00:34:10]  Blondie, you know, all these people were hanging out.
[00:34:13]  That's when cocaine was glamorous.
[00:34:15]  They made it like the rich people were doing it.
[00:34:18]  The super people were doing it.
[00:34:20]  Wall Street.
[00:34:21]  Wall Street, yeah.
[00:34:23]  I was with the Wall Street Whiz kid, Leslie Roberts.
[00:34:27]  He was there at my camp.
[00:34:29]  His uncle owned Alcoa, still being traded on the stock market now.
[00:34:33]  I guess he scammed him out of like, I don't know how many millions, but he had a jet, flew around, lived on some lake in Boca Overtone.
[00:34:42]  I mean, he was a shyster, total shyster.
[00:34:47]  He shystered some of the drug dealers out of their money after he'd already been in trouble inside, telling them how to trade stocks and this and that.
[00:34:54]  I mean, wow.
[00:34:56]  I guess once a shyster, always a shyster.
[00:34:58]  What was his name?
[00:34:58]  Leslie Roberts.
[00:35:00]  Leslie Roberts.
[00:35:01]  The Wall Street whiz kid, they don't.
[00:35:03]  The Wall Street whiz, uh.
[00:35:04]  The black guy no no no white, white guy okay, there was a few other guys.
[00:35:14]  Um, there's a couple guys, a lot of bank robbers, but non-violent, you know, no shooting.
[00:35:19]  We had the Reebok bandit, the Who Reebok Bandit, they called him.
[00:35:24]  What did he do?
[00:35:25]  He would go in the bank real athletic jump right over the counter, clean the doors up, pop pop, pop and jump right when they had their print of a Reebok in and out.
[00:35:34]  That was it in and out, And they finally caught him.
[00:35:36]  Then Gainesville, the baby bank robber, goes to the vault, comes out, shoots the camera.
[00:35:46]  He's lucky.
[00:35:46]  He only got nine years.
[00:35:48]  Shoots the camera, ricocheted, hits a computer, running out of the bank.
[00:35:53]  The die pack falls out.
[00:35:56]  They think it's pros.
[00:35:57]  Really, it just fell out of the bag.
[00:35:59]  So they think, oh, these guys are professional.
[00:36:01]  He's the baby bank robber.
[00:36:02]  I have a little picture of his baby face.
[00:36:04]  It's 17 years old.
[00:36:06]  Wow.
[00:36:07]  He was there.
[00:36:08]  That's crazy.

=== Nine Years in Custody (09:20) ===

[00:36:09]  So you were only in that camp or whatever for five years?
[00:36:13]  No, about three years.
[00:36:14]  Only three, right?
[00:36:15]  Because you're in holding for a while before you get there.
[00:36:17]  Yeah, three on five.
[00:36:19]  The guidelines change now you do 85% of whatever time it is nowadays time there's no or back then Now now 85% what was it then?
[00:36:31]  It depends on where you fell what where you fell and what time you got in trouble and all and They all got out all my friends.
[00:36:38]  You weren't just like a pawn in this whole thing You were actually like people actually waited on like you were no were you an important piece of the puzzle or were you just like a pawn?
[00:36:45]  I was a lot of people were pawns, but you were a pawn, right?
[00:36:48]  Yeah, you were you were you were you were expendable Exactly.
[00:36:52]  Everybody else in that business.
[00:36:53]  Yeah, everyone.
[00:36:54]  You see what happened?
[00:36:56]  Everybody is.
[00:36:57]  Pablo, what happened to him?
[00:36:59]  We asked him, didn't we?
[00:37:01]  Pablo?
[00:37:02]  Mm-hmm.
[00:37:03]  But, yeah, everybody's expendable in that business.
[00:37:07]  Everybody.
[00:37:08]  So you get out and all your buddies are doing the same.
[00:37:12]  Give me half a kilo for me to keep.
[00:37:15]  Soon as you learn.
[00:37:16]  What happened the day you got out?
[00:37:17]  What happened when you first got out the first time?
[00:37:19]  I first got out.
[00:37:20]  Twelve friends of mine were waiting on me.
[00:37:23]  Picked me up at Miami Airport and it was on What do you mean it was on?
[00:37:28]  Party and drink.
[00:37:29]  I got kicked out of every bar.
[00:37:31]  I mean the day you got out.
[00:37:32]  They got out So the whole time you're in there, you're not thinking I'm changing You know when you get out you're going right back to you think you think that and then you get out and they hand you have nothing left They hand you half a kilo keep that for you make the money No, get back on your feet the other kilo burning churn.
[00:37:51]  We need some money for that one and you're back on bam 14 months 12 months later click click Get it again.
[00:37:58]  You got busted again.
[00:38:00]  Yes.
[00:38:00]  No, wait.
[00:38:01]  When you first got out.
[00:38:02]  14 months later.
[00:38:03]  When you first got out and they were all basically like treating you like it was your homecoming.
[00:38:08]  Were they basically like rewarding you for not ratting out anybody or like not snitching out?
[00:38:11]  They were happy that you didn't roll on anyone.
[00:38:13]  These were guys that I met inside.
[00:38:16]  Oh, okay.
[00:38:16]  And they got out.
[00:38:17]  But all my friends outside were still the same.
[00:38:19]  But most of my friends outside were not dope dealers.
[00:38:21]  You're not worried about them thinking that you snitched on anybody or anything?
[00:38:24]  No, I didn't.
[00:38:24]  They know I didn't.
[00:38:25]  I was only the one kilo.
[00:38:27]  So the only guy I could have snitched on was nobody really.
[00:38:30]  Okay, so what did you do for the year after you got out?
[00:38:33]  The year after you got out, what did you do?
[00:38:38]  Sold a cleaning product and some tanning oil as a front and got right back in the cocaine business.
[00:38:49]  All purpose cleaning product, had a van.
[00:38:51]  Why?
[00:38:51]  Because you have to get a job or what?
[00:38:53]  Oh, yeah, you always have to have a job.
[00:38:55]  But I was already back out of the store.
[00:38:56]  Are you on parole?
[00:38:57]  Yeah, on parole.
[00:38:58]  So you get out on parole.
[00:39:00]  On parole.
[00:39:00]  And you have to get a job.
[00:39:01]  You have to get a job.
[00:39:02]  Okay.
[00:39:03]  So that makes more sense.
[00:39:04]  So Johnny Boys running all around selling cleaning product and blow at the same time.
[00:39:10]  And you're already a decent salesman anyway.
[00:39:12]  Yeah, I guess.
[00:39:13]  I guess my product was good.
[00:39:14]  You're like 31, 32 now.
[00:39:15]  The cleaning supply is good.
[00:39:17]  Cleaning supply is real good.
[00:39:19]  Going wide open.
[00:39:20]  Top gun sales guy.
[00:39:21]  I think I got an award even.
[00:39:23]  Next thing you know, bam.
[00:39:27]  You get popped.
[00:39:27]  How long are you on parole for?
[00:39:28]  Why?
[00:39:30]  Somebody rolled in four years.
[00:39:32]  So you're on parole for four years after you get out.
[00:39:35]  Yeah.
[00:39:35]  And you get popped within the first year.
[00:39:38]  I love it after the first year.
[00:39:39]  A little bit after.
[00:39:41]  For 14 months, you said.
[00:39:44]  Yeah.
[00:39:46]  Stupid.
[00:39:46]  Kids stay in school.
[00:39:48]  Explain to me how you got popped.
[00:39:49]  How does that one go down?
[00:39:51]  Set me up on that one.
[00:39:52]  Again.
[00:39:53]  Again.
[00:39:53]  That's the only way.
[00:39:55]  The feds have a 97% conviction rate, meaning that if I got popped with a kilo and said I wasn't guilty and wanted to fight it, If you lose, they're going to give you the top of the guidelines and say you could get nine or ten.
[00:40:12]  If you bleed out, you get four or five.
[00:40:17]  If you say, I agree, I'm guilty.
[00:40:20]  Why is that?
[00:40:21]  They want their conviction.
[00:40:22]  Because it looks good for them.
[00:40:23]  Because they want to fill up the prisons.
[00:40:26]  Or is it about the war on drugs?
[00:40:28]  They never want to lose at trial.
[00:40:30]  Exactly.
[00:40:31]  They don't want to lose.
[00:40:31]  That's why they have 97%.
[00:40:34]  Is that for packing statistics on the war on drugs?
[00:40:38]  Or is that for filling the prisons?
[00:40:41]  Why are they so incentivized to convict all these people for drug dealing?
[00:40:46]  They want their conviction.
[00:40:47]  They want the conviction, number one.
[00:40:49]  It's not just the filth.
[00:40:50]  It's a big, it's a money machine.
[00:40:52]  Yeah.
[00:40:52]  It's deep.
[00:40:53]  It's super deep.
[00:40:54]  Prisons are run for profit.
[00:40:55]  And there is a prison.
[00:40:57]  There's prisons that are run by separate, not by the government.
[00:41:02]  Right, for profit.
[00:41:03]  We could go buy a vest in a prison.
[00:41:04]  Exactly.
[00:41:05]  We could own our own prison.
[00:41:06]  Yeah.
[00:41:08]  And you get money per inmate from the state.
[00:41:11]  From the FEDS.
[00:41:12]  Right right right, right.
[00:41:13]  So you have to fill it up because you just I do remember um Noriega was at the holdover in Miami.
[00:41:22]  They called him Pineapple Face Noriega.
[00:41:24]  Noriega yeah, he was a big cocaine dealer, oh yeah, huge.
[00:41:28]  He had his own private cell, wasn't allowed in population, they walked him at night.
[00:41:34]  I mean, he could go outside at night but he had only like a room probably half as big as this nice, you know, probably his wife, a lot of.
[00:41:41]  I don't know if she's allowed to spend the night, or whoever she was supposed to be his wife.
[00:41:47]  Yeah, once we get your claws in, you're done.
[00:41:49]  And then you had already been in prison for five years.
[00:41:52]  They caught you again.
[00:41:53]  What was it like when they caught you the second time?
[00:41:55]  Was it guns out everywhere, same as the first time?
[00:41:58]  It's a scenario.
[00:41:59]  Just a rest.
[00:42:00]  Where do they pick you up at the second time?
[00:42:02]  I get popped at, again, another fast food restaurant.
[00:42:05]  I think I should stay away from fast food restaurants.
[00:42:08]  But I'm at a fast food restaurant.
[00:42:11]  They whip in, check the guys in front of me.
[00:42:14]  They had money in a thermos.
[00:42:15]  They got away.
[00:42:16]  They checked me, they kept the two kilos.
[00:42:18]  It's a state charge.
[00:42:19]  That's when they had me in custody.
[00:42:21]  Then the guy rolls and they just came and put the charge on me.
[00:42:24]  That's what happened.
[00:42:25]  The first charge was just straight.
[00:42:26]  I forgot about that.
[00:42:28]  Yeah, Johnny Boy gets a little mixed due to prison.
[00:42:30]  So now, how much they get.
[00:42:31]  Now what they pop you for another five.
[00:42:33]  No, they popped me for they wanted to give me um five years.
[00:42:37]  No, they wanted to give me 10 years, 10 years, the second time, 10 years.
[00:42:41]  And then you and I did eight, I did seven on ten, seven on ten.
[00:42:45]  So that made my ten.
[00:42:46]  Wow, Seven years.
[00:42:47]  When I, when Johnny Boy, realized he's in.
[00:42:50]  So you missed the 90s, all the 90s, you didn't even, you weren't even out of prison during night.
[00:42:55]  And from 91 to 99 you were in prison.
[00:42:59]  90, Yeah, whatever it's about 92 92 to almost 2000 Wow all the 90s things did change not too much, but yeah, we already had cell phone and all just a bit the technology Okay, so you're in for the seven are you going straight after you get out on this one going straight you're going straight going straight done with it all change your Surroundings change your people.
[00:43:23]  Didn't I meet you after that?
[00:43:25]  You were a little older and wiser.
[00:43:27]  I met you when I was like 17 years old.
[00:43:29]  Wow.
[00:43:30]  Or no, no, no.
[00:43:30]  I was older than that.
[00:43:31]  I met you when I was like 19 or 20.
[00:43:34]  No, bro.
[00:43:34]  This is my 21st birthday.
[00:43:36]  Yeah.
[00:43:38]  21st birthday.
[00:43:39]  I was about 19 or 20 when I met you.
[00:43:41]  What happened between then, about 10, 15 years ago, to where you are right now?
[00:43:48]  So Johnny Boy's been good all this time.
[00:43:50]  Got rid of, quit doing all the dealing for the millionaires.
[00:43:55]  Just stepped away.
[00:43:55]  The drug business is gone.
[00:43:57]  The drug business is over.
[00:43:58]  Totally over.
[00:43:59]  Johnny Boy quit doing drugs.
[00:44:02]  He's trying to live the healthy lifestyle.
[00:44:05]  What have you learned from your lesson in dope dealing and being in the cocaine cowboy 80s and 10 years in prison?
[00:44:11]  10 years in prison, 80s are gone.
[00:44:13]  What's your message to young kids growing up, maybe tempted to get involved in the drug game, the drug world?
[00:44:21]  What would you say to them?
[00:44:22]  It's so crazy now.
[00:44:24]  Stay in school.
[00:44:25]  But there's one saying that holds true.
[00:44:29]  It's not what you know.
[00:44:31]  It's who you know.
[00:44:33]  Is that true?
[00:44:35]  That old myth?
[00:44:36]  It's not an old myth.
[00:44:37]  It's not what you know.
[00:44:39]  It's who you know.
[00:44:41]  You can step stones and get way far ahead if you know the top people, in which I think, Danny, you know a few top guns around town yourself.
[00:44:53]  I do.
[00:44:53]  I do.
[00:44:54]  Thanks to you.
[00:44:54]  I got introduced to a lot of top guns.
[00:44:56]  You know, I met our buddy Ben, who's no longer associated with concrete.
[00:45:03]  Full disclaimer.
[00:45:04]  He is no longer associated in any way, shape, or form with concrete or anything.
[00:45:10]  Any of its subsidiaries.
[00:45:12]  Uh, I met him through Mike the fish Guy.
[00:45:16]  Mike Uh Bush, Mike Bush, you know Mike Bush, aka Bushwhacker.
[00:45:20]  Bushwhacker Mike Bush used to buy Johnny Boy and his friends beer at the Causeway Lounge many years ago.

=== Rambo Style Escapes (02:56) ===

[00:45:30]  Do we got any?
[00:45:31]  Uh, crazy stories?
[00:45:32]  We skipped over.
[00:45:33]  What were we talking about?
[00:45:34]  We have a few crazy stories.
[00:45:36]  The Don Cesar we missed the Don Cesar.
[00:45:38]  The Rambo story we missed that whole story.
[00:45:40]  Yeah, Have you ever been to the Don Cesar?
[00:45:43]  Yeah, the Don Cesar, the Big Pink building.
[00:45:44]  Great intro.
[00:45:46]  Great fucking segue.
[00:45:47]  Hey, the Big Pink building down by Passagril?
[00:45:50]  Yeah, that one.
[00:45:51]  Okay, yeah, that's the one.
[00:45:52]  Yeah, yeah.
[00:45:53]  I went down there with a friend many years ago.
[00:46:02]  It was a surprise costume birthday party for one of the Hubbards.
[00:46:09]  Right across.
[00:46:09]  One of the Hubbards.
[00:46:10]  Yeah, one of the people who owns John's Pass.
[00:46:12]  Yeah, yeah.
[00:46:12]  That same Hubbard family.
[00:46:14]  I forget who it was.
[00:46:15]  Me and a friend went down there.
[00:46:17]  It was like we're in the Rambo era.
[00:46:19]  So we dressed up with Rambo and had bands and hand grenades and, you know, took a certain.
[00:46:25]  It was like Halloween.
[00:46:27]  Yeah, Halloween, but it wasn't Halloween.
[00:46:28]  It was summer.
[00:46:29]  Costume party, though.
[00:46:29]  Costume party for birthday, though.
[00:46:31]  Right.
[00:46:32]  We go down to the Don Cesar.
[00:46:33]  Me and a friend named Gilbert.
[00:46:35]  Everybody knew him.
[00:46:35]  He was a bouncer at Skip's Rock and Roll Club.
[00:46:39]  Go down there, dressed as Rambo.
[00:46:41]  Took a certain family member of mine car, made it look like a tank.
[00:46:46]  Go down out by the pool.
[00:46:48]  He screams, All right.
[00:46:50]  All bikini tops off.
[00:46:51]  He pulls a hand grenade.
[00:46:53]  We're throwing black cats.
[00:46:54]  Firecrackers are going off.
[00:46:56]  The police come.
[00:46:57]  They grab Rambo here.
[00:46:58]  They grab Johnny Boy.
[00:47:00]  They grab and say, You're going to jail, Johnny Boy.
[00:47:02]  They walk me out, throw me down, kick me, beat me up a little bit.
[00:47:07]  Gilbert jumps in the pool with a straw like you see in the movies.
[00:47:11]  Breathing out of a straw.
[00:47:12]  Where do you get the straw?
[00:47:14]  I don't know where he got a straw.
[00:47:15]  It was some girl's cocktail.
[00:47:16]  I'm not sure, but he's breathing out of it.
[00:47:18]  So he's hiding under the water.
[00:47:19]  Breathing out of the straw, hiding under the water.
[00:47:21]  It's a pool.
[00:47:23]  Johnny boy, but he's underneath.
[00:47:24]  Like they can't see the fucking guy.
[00:47:25]  No, no, but people are full.
[00:47:28]  People are scrambling.
[00:47:29]  Police are called.
[00:47:30]  They arrest Johnny Boy, throw him down on the side, say you're going to jail.
[00:47:35]  They put the cuffs on.
[00:47:36]  Big old cop puts the cuffs on Johnny Boy.
[00:47:39]  He can't feel his hand.
[00:47:40]  They take me to the police station, little substation, St. Pete Beach.
[00:47:45]  Johnny Boy's ready to get out of there.
[00:47:48]  He'd only been there for like 10 minutes and my hand, I couldn't feel my hand.
[00:47:52]  I call the front.
[00:47:54]  Johnny Boy calls the front and says, hey, we got to let my client out.
[00:47:58]  Keep going.
[00:48:01]  He's got to go to the hospital.
[00:48:02]  So he released me on RR.
[00:48:04]  Johnny Boy's family shows up.
[00:48:06]  In the rabbit?
[00:48:07]  Johnny Boy was done.
[00:48:10]  He shows up in the Hubbard bar.
[00:48:13]  You can't keep Johnny Boy down.
[00:48:16]  You get arrested and you get bailed out and go back to the bar.
[00:48:19]  Right back to the bar.
[00:48:20]  Bam.
[00:48:21]  What year was this?
[00:48:22]  About 1985.
[00:48:24]  This is before all the prison.
[00:48:25]  Oh, before all the cocaine.

=== Arrested at the Station (03:28) ===

[00:48:26]  Wow.
[00:48:27]  We were just doing blood back then.
[00:48:29]  The beaches were crazy.
[00:48:30]  I was supposed to get the Cocaine Cowboys guy on this podcast, the guy who made that documentary.
[00:48:34]  He was actually supposed to come on here last weekend, but something happened.
[00:48:37]  I want to get the Don Cesar story.
[00:48:40]  Don Cesar's story is over.
[00:48:42]  But what we want to do is, I want to ask you a couple stories.
[00:48:49]  Ask me whatever you want.
[00:48:50]  I got all answers for you.
[00:48:51]  My question to you is you started a certain show, and now it's turning back and biting you in the butt, and you're just a little guy scratching at the surface, trying to make some money and doing okay.
[00:49:06]  And then these greedy.
[00:49:10]  Millionaires, you know, don't call them greedy millionaires.
[00:49:13]  That's not fair.
[00:49:14]  Well, I mean, you're right.
[00:49:16]  You're right.
[00:49:16]  But I mean, they all seem to be.
[00:49:17]  Don't just assume people are greedy because they're millionaires.
[00:49:20]  Well, they got that way somehow.
[00:49:23]  But I mean, when you offer them something and then they just want more and then they want to shut you down.
[00:49:28]  I mean, why don't you tell us that little story?
[00:49:30]  Well, it's not the same.
[00:49:32]  It's Life for Sale, that show.
[00:49:35]  That's when you started.
[00:49:36]  That's the one I started.
[00:49:37]  And you started this.
[00:49:38]  I started this.
[00:49:38]  All on your own.
[00:49:39]  All on my own.
[00:49:40]  Correct.
[00:49:40]  I got some backing.
[00:49:40]  Well, he helped me.
[00:49:41]  He gave me some money.
[00:49:42]  He helped me buy some equipment.
[00:49:43]  But he gave me actually one of the video cameras.
[00:49:46]  He got me a lens.
[00:49:46]  He got me a hard drive, stuff like that.
[00:49:48]  Let's give that back.
[00:49:50]  It's not that that person is greedy.
[00:49:52]  That guy's not a greedy person.
[00:49:53]  That guy's actually a very generous person.
[00:49:55]  And so the show started how many years ago?
[00:49:59]  We met and we started filming seven years ago, and we started putting it on YouTube a little over three years ago.
[00:50:06]  And about 2015, we started putting it on YouTube.
[00:50:08]  And that show took off?
[00:50:09]  The show took off.
[00:50:11]  Like wildfire.
[00:50:12]  Only after.
[00:50:14]  three years.
[00:50:15]  So we started in 2015 and it didn't really take off like wildfire until summer of 2018.
[00:50:24]  So summer of 2018 after I think it was season two started.
[00:50:30]  So after whole, we did a whole season with like 30 episodes, took a little break and then we did season two.
[00:50:37]  And then about August of 2018, we did an episode where we went to a house for sale in Weston on the East Coast near Deerfield.
[00:50:49]  And it was Birdman and Lil Wayne's old house, the Cash Money Records.
[00:50:54]  It was their old house.
[00:50:55]  We went there.
[00:50:56]  That episode took off like a nuclear rocket.
[00:51:00]  And that blew up the entire show.
[00:51:03]  Now, every episode we were posting was getting hundreds of thousands of views.
[00:51:07]  And it blew up my YouTube channel and Concrete, which was my media brand, which is my Concrete.
[00:51:16]  So I created Concrete.
[00:51:18]  I had Concrete.com.
[00:51:20]  I had a YouTube channel, social media, or whatever.
[00:51:22]  And I had kind of like a media company, right?
[00:51:24]  And I was producing life for sale underneath all of this.
[00:51:27]  So once life for sale blew up, it elevated my brand and my company.
[00:51:31]  So now I, you know, I was still creating other stuff.
[00:51:33]  I was still doing interviews.
[00:51:34]  I was still doing like other little series.
[00:51:36]  I did a series called deck hands that followed commercial fishermen and Madeira beach and like the commercial fishing industry, which also blew up.
[00:51:44]  That blew up almost bigger than life for sale, but it was only four episodes.
[00:51:49]  So really anything.
[00:51:50]  So what it did was it boosted my platform.

=== Building a Media Empire (01:57) ===

[00:51:55]  So he's.
[00:51:57]  Involved the show is about him, but you guys aren't making money Nobody's making nobody's making money three four years first three years.
[00:52:05]  Nobody's making any money around doing videos and self-taught correct.
[00:52:10]  Yes self-taught Okay, but when I first put it on the internet, no one thought everyone thought that was a stupid idea.
[00:52:16]  This guy's like fucking YouTube.
[00:52:17]  Why would I guess whatever go ahead do it?
[00:52:20]  I said yeah, it'll be good.
[00:52:21]  It could work.
[00:52:22]  You're like his It's kind of like his bastards.
[00:52:25]  I was kind of like his bastard stepchild for all those years All right, let's wrap this fucking thing up.
[00:52:31]  I want to make sure there's like a positive ending to it.
[00:52:33]  I want to make sure that young kids don't end up being a fucking idiot like you were when you were young.
[00:52:38]  I was a total idiot.
[00:52:40]  Stay in school and don't think all that glamour is there.
[00:52:44]  Oh, yeah, it's glamorous for a hot second, but the end of the road, the payday is not worth it.
[00:52:49]  What do you do for work now, by the way?
[00:52:51]  Let's talk about your glamour days back in the 80s and you're making 50 grand a week.
[00:52:53]  I don't know if we could talk.
[00:52:55]  You don't have to say exactly.
[00:52:58]  You're a day laborer now.
[00:52:59]  How old are you?
[00:53:01]  60.
[00:53:01]  So you should be.
[00:53:02]  Let's just say you work a nine to five nowadays.
[00:53:04]  Yeah, a regular nine to five.
[00:53:06]  You work hard work out in the hot sun doing day labor shit.
[00:53:10]  I don't even have to get into all that.
[00:53:13]  Let's just say you work a regular nine to five nowadays, right?
[00:53:16]  And you're 60 years old.
[00:53:17]  So the drug business did not pay off.
[00:53:21]  That's what we're saying.
[00:53:22]  It did not.
[00:53:23]  You should let your story be a lesson to young people and to the youth.
[00:53:27]  You see all that fast money?
[00:53:29]  Yeah.
[00:53:29]  It's.
[00:53:31]  Not going to happen.
[00:53:32]  Run from it.
[00:53:33]  There's an old saying.
[00:53:34]  If it's too good to be true, it is.
[00:53:39]  That's exactly what San Patoni said, I think.
[00:53:41]  Yeah.
[00:53:42]  If you think it's too good to be true, turn around.
[00:53:46]  If there's any sort of suspicion that's too good to be true, it's over.
[00:53:51]  Awesome.
[00:53:51]  Thanks for coming on the show, Johnny.