CHAPTER 9
EXILED
“The LORD keeps watch over you as
you come and go, both now and forever.”
—Psalm 121
Every day before leaving the basement of my mother’s home, I said a prayer, peeking out cautiously like a fugitive on the run. Money was low, options even lower. Being banished from Veer wasn’t just exile—it was death in slow motion, only I was still breathing. I wondered what would happen if I ran into any of my old crew. We had the same training, same instincts, same guns—and the same will to kill, if it came to that.
For years, the Front Page and Back Page were my compass. Every hallway I tagged with “Ace,” every nod exchanged with a familiar face, was part of my rhythm. Then suddenly, the beat dropped. OttoShine’s words echoed like a bell tolling: “I don’t want to see you in Vanderveer again.”
No warning. No appeal. Just a death sentence. I imagined a showdown, like in a Spaghetti Western—one-on-one, draw at dawn. But the Veer crew never walked alone, and I’d be outgunned. So I moved like a ghost—I was everywhere and nowhere at the same time, a ninja, an art mastered through survival. Men wouldn’t see me until it was too late. I hugged the walls, walking on my toes. I was behind enemy lines.
I floated from gates to gates, trying to stay alive, visiting the scattered remnants of what once was the Untouchables. In these gates I sold bag weed, read Psalms, cooked Ital stew. I’d sit in silence, wrestling with the irony of reading scripture while carrying a pistol. I grew tired of the Rasta sermons. I needed action. Although, a lion may be safe in the comfort of his pride, he was not made for that, but made to hunt and eat. More dangerous neighborhoods pulled at me. I leaned on my reputation and the weight of my brother Kesner’s legacy for safety.
I started doing burglaries, stick-ups, any felonious opportunity that could keep me fed and feared. One day I ran into Anthony Brown—the same one who got me into this mess. He had once been a Veer man, just like me, until OttoShine & the crew caught him on Flatbush and stabbed him for getting too cozy with the Linden Boulevard crew. Outcasted to die.
Now we were both exiles.
Anthony had Rat (Harold) as his protector (an original Veer man), like I once had Cadien. He asked me to roll with him to the Castle on 21st and Church Ave to see Tony Tuff, a paranoid psycho killer, to borrow a gun. We were heading to East New York—to Pink Houses— to link up with Rat. Anthony emerged with a .380 and a sock full of extra bullets.
“Why the extras?” I asked.
“Just in case—we’ll be a long way from home,” he said.
I checked the .38 snub nose in my waistband. I was only 15, but I felt like a vet with something to prove.
At Pine Street, Rat greeted me like a brother. The old world we knew in Veer was gone. Now he had a new kingdom, a new crew: King Tut, Papa Lesley, Big Wise, Deckie, Knowledge—serious men from Pink Houses and Cypress Hills. Rat moved through neighborhoods like smoke. But if you got caught slipping, he’d “jukes” you without hesitation. We used to call him the robbing ninja—and not just for laughs. He made many men uncomfortable when he showed up, from Bedstuy to Fort Green, Crown Heights to Flatbush and now East New York.
He introduced me around. Then I traded him my .38 for his Python .357 magnum—Dirty Harry’s gun. It felt enormous and ominous in my small hands. Rat didn’t need to say why he carried it. I already knew—it hypnotized the enemy like a cobra stare. Robbery victims would freeze from the mere size of the nozzle.
We headed straight to Cypress Hills, found a dice game. Eight men, loud, betting hard. Me and Anthony rolled up and drew our guns. “Don’t move!” I shouted. “Empty your pockets and keep your hands up!”
I saw fear—mouths open, frozen. The Python did its job.
Then—pop! A shot. Anthony again. “I said don’t move!” he barked.
Another shot rang out, and pain stabbed my ankle. I buckled. His bullet had ricocheted and hit me. I wanted to scream, but adrenaline held me upright. The dice players watched me closely, they seen my buckle— if they sensed weakness, they’d disarm and kill me. We grabbed the money, then I stared through the pain and limped off like nothing happened. We made it back to Pine Street. My ankle was swollen, but not bleeding. I told myself right then: Never again with Anthony.
The next day, four Cypress Hills men showed up to Rat’s spot asking about “the two dudes from Flatbush.”
“How you know they from the Bush?” Rat asked.
“They had Lee jackets and pants with button up shirts, baseball caps, and the biggest damn gun we ever seen.”
I wasn’t just searching for a crew anymore. I needed structure. I had tasted power but never controlled it. Always someone’s runner. Never the boss. That had to change. I linked up with Kojac and Everton off Cortelyou Road. They weren’t punks—and they had my back.
Then came the slip-up. One night I wandered to Tilden and Lott Street to visit Melsun and Eugene. An enemy spotted me—Leslie. He crept behind me, snatched my .38, and stomped my head into the concrete. Every kick I took, I cursed OttoShine. Leslie also took my new diamond ring—something I had just robbed a man for. I limped away in shame, thankful he wasn’t smart enough to kill me.
The rule in Veer? Never let anyone disarm you. Die before that.
Leslie had once allegedly killed Spangler, a Veer ally. Someone was murdered for it, but Leslie bragged he did it. We had even chased him once—from Walt Whitman Park to his doorstep on Tilden Ave firing but missing our mark, regretfully, me, OttoShine, and Paul.
Now he had robbed me.
The next day Rat pulled up, heard what happened. “We getting that ring and gun back,” he said, handing me the Python.
We spotted Leslie on a bike. Rat pulled over. “Listen,” he said, “under no circumstances do you kill him right now. Too public.”
He stepped out and spoke to Leslie while I watched through gritted teeth. Leslie still had my ring on. I wanted to explode. But Rat came back with the ring in hand. “He not giving the gun back. But you got this.”
I took it. I hated it. But I had to eat it. That’s how the streets were, you gave losses and took them too. I was grateful to have escaped with my life. Lucky for me, big mistake for Leslie.
After a few close calls with Leslie and with Veer men, I disappeared to Miami. I linked with some old Rastas, that was loosely connected to the Untouchables, hit a few marijuana robberies, and returned on Greyhound with 10 pounds and a 15-shot Smith & Wesson. I had revenge in my blood. I wanted war. I fantasized about killing Leslie in the open. Then riding to Vanderveer and gunning down five men. Then calling OttoShine to the center and saying: Draw.
But that only happens in movies. I romanticized with the theatrics of the lifestyle that was serious. I had some serious choices to make or I would be in exile forever. There was no other place I wanted to control more than Vanderveer. I was doubting my ability to even survive these streets let alone Veer as a Haitian. Maybe my ambition was too great.
Weeks later, my conquest plans would be foiled because while on my way to 42nd Street to see a movie, my cab I was in got pulled over by the notorious 71st Precinct detectives. I had a .22 caliber on me. A gun I’d carry just for those kind of outings. First time caught. First time going to Rikers Island.
I was 16.
C74—the adolescent ward—was filled with familiar faces. Everyone who’d disappeared from the neighborhood was there. I got one year and was transferred to C76. I had five months left.
There were names in that ward the streets would remember: Ticky Devoe, one of the original Veer men. Donovan from Linden Boulevard Crew. Domencio from Bed-Stuy. Even in jail, the lines blurred, and we found ways to look out for each other.
Then came mail call. I was playing a game of spades when the C.O yelled out,
“David Dagio.”
I froze. I stood up, placing my cards on the table, then scanning the room. There he was—my old white nemesis from Sheepshead Bay, standing like a deer in headlights. I walked over. “Hey, David. You from Sheepshead Bay?”
He nodded. “You remember me?” He looked confused.
My hand moved instinctively around his neck, then the other hand cocked back and came down hard across his face. The slap cracked like thunder across the dorm. Front hand. Backhand. He whimpered, didn’t fight back. He was what I always thought—a coward. It was anticlimactic, David had no fight in him.
When I got out eight months later, almost 17 now, there was only one place I needed to go.
Vanderveer.
Not to beg. Not to explain. Exile taught me that loyalty can be a trap. Brotherhood can blind you. But identity? That’s yours. I started building something new—not a crew, but a creed. A way to move in this life that couldn’t be revoked by anyone.
It was time to confront OttoShine. I had every right to run Veer like any of them—and they’d have to kill me to stop me.
CHAPTER 9
EXILED
“The LORD keeps watch over you as
you come and go, both now and forever.”
—Psalm 121
Every day before leaving the basement of my mother’s home, I said a prayer, peeking out cautiously like a fugitive on the run. Money was low, options even lower. Being banished from Veer wasn’t just exile—it was death in slow motion, only I was still breathing. I wondered what would happen if I ran into any of my old crew. We had the same training, same instincts, same guns—and the same will to kill, if it came to that.
For years, the Front Page and Back Page were my compass. Every hallway I tagged with “Ace,” every nod exchanged with a familiar face, was part of my rhythm. Then suddenly, the beat dropped. OttoShine’s words echoed like a bell tolling: “I don’t want to see you in Vanderveer again.”
No warning. No appeal. Just a death sentence. I imagined a showdown, like in a Spaghetti Western—one-on-one, draw at dawn. But the Veer crew never walked alone, and I’d be outgunned. So I moved like a ghost—I was everywhere and nowhere at the same time, a ninja, an art mastered through survival. Men wouldn’t see me until it was too late. I hugged the walls, walking on my toes. I was behind enemy lines.
I floated from gates to gates, trying to stay alive, visiting the scattered remnants of what once was the Untouchables. In these gates I sold bag weed, read Psalms, cooked Ital stew. I’d sit in silence, wrestling with the irony of reading scripture while carrying a pistol. I grew tired of the Rasta sermons. I needed action. Although, a lion may be safe in the comfort of his pride, he was not made for that, but made to hunt and eat. More dangerous neighborhoods pulled at me. I leaned on my reputation and the weight of my brother Kesner’s legacy for safety.
I started doing burglaries, stick-ups, any felonious opportunity that could keep me fed and feared. One day I ran into Anthony Brown—the same one who got me into this mess. He had once been a Veer man, just like me, until OttoShine & the crew caught him on Flatbush and stabbed him for getting too cozy with the Linden Boulevard crew. Outcasted to die.
Now we were both exiles.
Anthony had Rat (Harold) as his protector (an original Veer man), like I once had Cadien. He asked me to roll with him to the Castle on 21st and Church Ave to see Tony Tuff, a paranoid psycho killer, to borrow a gun. We were heading to East New York—to Pink Houses— to link up with Rat. Anthony emerged with a .380 and a sock full of extra bullets.
“Why the extras?” I asked.
“Just in case—we’ll be a long way from home,” he said.
I checked the .38 snub nose in my waistband. I was only 15, but I felt like a vet with something to prove.
At Pine Street, Rat greeted me like a brother. The old world we knew in Veer was gone. Now he had a new kingdom, a new crew: King Tut, Papa Lesley, Big Wise, Deckie, Knowledge—serious men from Pink Houses and Cypress Hills. Rat moved through neighborhoods like smoke. But if you got caught slipping, he’d “jukes” you without hesitation. We used to call him the robbing ninja—and not just for laughs. He made many men uncomfortable when he showed up, from Bedstuy to Fort Green, Crown Heights to Flatbush and now East New York.
He introduced me around. Then I traded him my .38 for his Python .357 magnum—Dirty Harry’s gun. It felt enormous and ominous in my small hands. Rat didn’t need to say why he carried it. I already knew—it hypnotized the enemy like a cobra stare. Robbery victims would freeze from the mere size of the nozzle.
We headed straight to Cypress Hills, found a dice game. Eight men, loud, betting hard. Me and Anthony rolled up and drew our guns. “Don’t move!” I shouted. “Empty your pockets and keep your hands up!”
I saw fear—mouths open, frozen. The Python did its job.
Then—pop! A shot. Anthony again. “I said don’t move!” he barked.
Another shot rang out, and pain stabbed my ankle. I buckled. His bullet had ricocheted and hit me. I wanted to scream, but adrenaline held me upright. The dice players watched me closely, they seen my buckle— if they sensed weakness, they’d disarm and kill me. We grabbed the money, then I stared through the pain and limped off like nothing happened. We made it back to Pine Street. My ankle was swollen, but not bleeding. I told myself right then: Never again with Anthony.
The next day, four Cypress Hills men showed up to Rat’s spot asking about “the two dudes from Flatbush.”
“How you know they from the Bush?” Rat asked.
“They had Lee jackets and pants with button up shirts, baseball caps, and the biggest damn gun we ever seen.”
I wasn’t just searching for a crew anymore. I needed structure. I had tasted power but never controlled it. Always someone’s runner. Never the boss. That had to change. I linked up with Kojac and Everton off Cortelyou Road. They weren’t punks—and they had my back.
Then came the slip-up. One night I wandered to Tilden and Lott Street to visit Melsun and Eugene. An enemy spotted me—Leslie. He crept behind me, snatched my .38, and stomped my head into the concrete. Every kick I took, I cursed OttoShine. Leslie also took my new diamond ring—something I had just robbed a man for. I limped away in shame, thankful he wasn’t smart enough to kill me.
The rule in Veer? Never let anyone disarm you. Die before that.
Leslie had once allegedly killed Spangler, a Veer ally. Someone was murdered for it, but Leslie bragged he did it. We had even chased him once—from Walt Whitman Park to his doorstep on Tilden Ave firing but missing our mark, regretfully, me, OttoShine, and Paul.
Now he had robbed me.
The next day Rat pulled up, heard what happened. “We getting that ring and gun back,” he said, handing me the Python.
We spotted Leslie on a bike. Rat pulled over. “Listen,” he said, “under no circumstances do you kill him right now. Too public.”
He stepped out and spoke to Leslie while I watched through gritted teeth. Leslie still had my ring on. I wanted to explode. But Rat came back with the ring in hand. “He not giving the gun back. But you got this.”
I took it. I hated it. But I had to eat it. That’s how the streets were, you gave losses and took them too. I was grateful to have escaped with my life. Lucky for me, big mistake for Leslie.
After a few close calls with Leslie and with Veer men, I disappeared to Miami. I linked with some old Rastas, that was loosely connected to the Untouchables, hit a few marijuana robberies, and returned on Greyhound with 10 pounds and a 15-shot Smith & Wesson. I had revenge in my blood. I wanted war. I fantasized about killing Leslie in the open. Then riding to Vanderveer and gunning down five men. Then calling OttoShine to the center and saying: Draw.
But that only happens in movies. I romanticized with the theatrics of the lifestyle that was serious. I had some serious choices to make or I would be in exile forever. There was no other place I wanted to control more than Vanderveer. I was doubting my ability to even survive these streets let alone Veer as a Haitian. Maybe my ambition was too great.
Weeks later, my conquest plans would be foiled because while on my way to 42nd Street to see a movie, my cab I was in got pulled over by the notorious 71st Precinct detectives. I had a .22 caliber on me. A gun I’d carry just for those kind of outings. First time caught. First time going to Rikers Island.
I was 16.
C74—the adolescent ward—was filled with familiar faces. Everyone who’d disappeared from the neighborhood was there. I got one year and was transferred to C76. I had five months left.
There were names in that ward the streets would remember: Ticky Devoe, one of the original Veer men. Donovan from Linden Boulevard Crew. Domencio from Bed-Stuy. Even in jail, the lines blurred, and we found ways to look out for each other.
Then came mail call. I was playing a game of spades when the C.O yelled out,
“David Dagio.”
I froze. I stood up, placing my cards on the table, then scanning the room. There he was—my old white nemesis from Sheepshead Bay, standing like a deer in headlights. I walked over. “Hey, David. You from Sheepshead Bay?”
He nodded. “You remember me?” He looked confused.
My hand moved instinctively around his neck, then the other hand cocked back and came down hard across his face. The slap cracked like thunder across the dorm. Front hand. Backhand. He whimpered, didn’t fight back. He was what I always thought—a coward. It was anticlimactic, David had no fight in him.
When I got out eight months later, almost 17 now, there was only one place I needed to go.
Vanderveer.
Not to beg. Not to explain. Exile taught me that loyalty can be a trap. Brotherhood can blind you. But identity? That’s yours. I started building something new—not a crew, but a creed. A way to move in this life that couldn’t be revoked by anyone.
It was time to confront OttoShine. I had every right to run Veer like any of them—and they’d have to kill me to stop me.