Editor’s word: The next article is an op-ed, and the views expressed are the writer’s personal. Learn extra opinions on theGrio.
Together with the notorious jester Boo Boo the Idiot and the much-despised slavemaster Willie Lynch, Dave the Dope Fiend is probably one of the iconic fictional characters in Black America.
Sparked by a singular point out in Slick Rick’s 1989 hit, “Kids’s Story,” the title alone has impressed exultation and viewers participation in nightclubs and events for generations. Whereas the long-lasting music about a teen whose decisions land them in hassle with the regulation stays a part of hip-hop canon, there are unanswered questions which have lingered within the minds of hip-hop followers for years.
Did he actually not know the that means of water or cleaning soap? How did he begin taking pictures dope? Why would he provide a spanking shotgun to a whole stranger? Most significantly, what occurred to him and the stickup child he helped?
Effectively, we discovered the solutions.
After an exhaustive search, theGrio’s Black Music Month investigative crew (mainly, me) tracked down Dave the Dope and the opposite characters concerned on this iconic hit to search out out what actually occurred on that fateful day. That is the just about true story of Dave the Dope Fiend.
All tucked in?
Right here we go.
As soon as upon a time, not way back …
Not solely has Dave the Dope Fiend by no means used dope, maybe greater than anybody in America, he is aware of the that means of water or cleaning soap.
Born in 1975, David Darwin Dauphin was a straight-A scholar who spent his youth attempting to flee poverty. Earlier than crack hit New York, the Bronx River Housing was a spot the place individuals wore pajamas and lived life sluggish. Dave was the quintessential “wiz child” everybody within the neighborhood protected.
In accordance with nonexistent transcripts reviewed by theGrio, Dauphin’s excessive grades and standardized take a look at scores earned him admission to the Bronx Excessive College of Science, a public academy for high-achieving college students recognized for producing a few of America’s brightest minds.
Day by day, Dave traveled greater than an hour every solution to attend Bronx Science. After a yr, it was clear he was struggling to regulate. “It wasn’t the journey; I may deal with the teachers — the scholars at Bronx Science weren’t any smarter than the youngsters at my old-fashioned.” Dauphin informed theGrio. “I used to be simply poor. I didn’t have the garments and the sneakers like my classmates. Typically, my mother couldn’t pay our water invoice so I couldn’t wash my garments or bathe earlier than college. The cool youngsters teased me about it loads.” Fortuitously, Dave didn’t let his circumstances have an effect on his future. He had a plan.
He was going to win the 1984 Bronx Science Truthful.
Beneficial Tales
At a faculty that produced 9 Nobel Prize winners, the Bronx Science Excessive College Science Truthful is likely one of the best contests in Ok-12 academia. Impressed by his classmates’ bullying, Dave created “So Contemporary, So Clear” — a proprietary chemical course of that allowed poor individuals to wash their our bodies, even with out entry to water or cleaning soap. All he wanted was a solution to pay for the testing and supplies.
Someday, a stranger approached Dave and supplied him a job tutoring grownup chemistry college students. It appeared like the right approach to offer for his household, and it will truly assist him win the science truthful.
Rising up in an setting the place individuals wore pajamas and lived life sluggish, Dave had no thought he was truly educating drug sellers tips on how to cook dinner crack cocaine. In his naive thoughts, he was tutoring youngsters who had been as concerned with chemistry as he was. Day by day, Dave went to the entice home on the highest ground of an deserted constructing and defined chemical reactions, acid-base options and tips on how to use bunsen burners. He spent the remainder of the time within the well-equipped laboratory finding out, refining his invention and getting ready for the science truthful.
On the day of the large science truthful, Dave stayed up all evening refining his challenge. He had figured all of it out. He didn’t even hassle to bathe earlier than giving his huge presentation. Every thing on the science truthful had gone completely. (Except for when the judges’ panel requested him to check the price of Daves Dry Wash to the worth of water and cleaning soap, inflicting considered one of his classmates to yell out: “He doesn’t know what that’s!”).
Dave’s Dry Wash got here in first place by a landslide.
Dave didn’t even look forward to the trophy. He bolted to the entice home to inform his “employers” that he was retiring. The dope boys had been elated that Dave had achieved his dream and would lastly “get out of the hood.” After a couple of minutes of celebration, they left Dave alone to gather his tools. He was nearly completed packing every thing up when he heard a knock on the door.
Dave assumed considered one of his former employers was coming to retrieve a shotgun that the “safety guard” had left within the nook of the entice home to guard the “lab.” Who else could be operating up the steps to the highest ground of an deserted constructing? Dave opened the door with out even trying by means of the keyhole.
It was Ty the Stickup Child.
A bit boy misled
Tyson James, a shy however athletic third grader who largely saved to himself, lived throughout the corridor from Dave. As a result of Ty struggled with dyslexia — a prognosis he found throughout his incarceration — he discovered tips on how to battle at an early age. That’s why the schoolyard bullies at his elementary college knew to not retaliate when Tyson intervened in a roasting session on his third-grade classmate and neighbor.
“His title is (smack!) … David (smack!) … Dee (smack!) … Dauphin (smack!),” introduced Ty, open-hand slapping the schoolyard bullies throughout the again of the neck. “It’s not Dave the Dope Fiend.”
Sure by proximity, poverty and a need to flee the lesser of the 2 Americas, the boys shortly grew to become greatest pals. They might even swap garments to make their wardrobes seem extra numerous. After Dave’s switch, Ty was recruited by a stickup crew. When Dave came upon his good friend was robbing previous of us and taking a splash, Ty stop the crew.
“I’d by no means be silly sufficient to rob a DT undercover,” mentioned Ty, utilizing the widespread time period for an undercover detective. “I used to be out of that life. It’s not like I couldn’t cease or I had a illness.” As a substitute, Ty claimed he was framed and assaulted by a corrupt police officer.
“He grabbed me by the arm and informed me to maintain nonetheless; there was no want for static,” Ty defined. “I used to be going to conform however he punched me within the stomach and gave me a slap, so I chilly dashed, and I ran across the block.”
Thus started one of the iconic chases in hip-hop historical past.
Ty additionally says Dave was simply within the unsuitable place on the unsuitable time. When Ty knocked on the door of the entice home, Dave simply smiled and mentioned: “I received the science truthful.” He anticipated Ty to be as elated as everybody else however instantly sensed one thing was unsuitable.
“I want bullets,” Ty replied. “Hurry up, run.”
Dave didn’t even flinch. As a substitute, he shortly pointed Dave towards the again door and handed Ty a spanking shotgun. The cops burst in, threw Dave to the bottom and slipped on {the handcuffs}. Minutes later, in the midst of this madman’s dream, Dave heard gunshots.
“We shot the child,” mentioned a voice on the police radio. To this present day, Dave nonetheless hears the screams.
“To be clear, it wasn’t Dave’s shotgun or his bullets,” he added. “To begin with, I didn’t even shoot at them! In accordance with the police stories, they scattered after I rat-a-tat-tatted. However through the trial, the jury found that they only made that half up! Shotguns don’t even rat-a-tat-tat.”
Ty was sentenced to 3 consecutive life sentences for assaulting law enforcement officials, strong-arm theft, resisting arrest, auto theft and reckless endangerment. As a result of prosecutors alleged that Dave was Ty’s confederate, he was charged with the identical crimes as Ty, together with RICO costs for the drug operation. “I don’t blame Ty,” Dave defined. “My life is the results of the alternatives I made. I selected to work in a entice home. I selected to inform Ty the place the gun was.”
Whereas Dave was resigned to spending the remainder of his life in jail, his cellmate, Ty, was consumed with overturning their responsible verdict. They acquired a second likelihood due to his good friend’s dedication to true justice and each males’s dedication to creating honest amends.
“I by no means accepted the concept legal guidelines had been stern and justice stood,” Ty informed theGrio. I begged each legal professional to take Dave’s case. Sadly, nobody would…”
Till Lakisha got here alongside.
Not simply one other story in regards to the unsuitable path
“On April 21, 1988, witness Jane Doe was strolling residence when she was held hostage by the suspect in query,” reads a police witness assertion reviewed by theGrio. “The armed suspect pulled out an automated weapon, held it to Jane Doe’s head, introduced that the gun was stuffed with lead and warned the responding officers to again off or, quote: ‘Honey right here’s useless.’ Noting that the hostage was pregnant, officers complied.”
The assertion continues:
After pleading for the lifetime of her unborn little one, Doe started experiencing labor pains. Officers helped the abductee escape and rushed her to the hospital, thereby shedding the suspect. Officers resumed pursuit.
Upon additional questioning, Doe recognized suspect Tyson James and confederate Dave the Dope Fiend.
When legal professional Lakisha Holmes acquired a letter from inmate Tyson James, she immediately acknowledged the story. She knew all the main points. The truth that she grew up within the Bronx River Properties had nothing to do with it, nor did the truth that Lakisha graduated from Bronx Science earlier than heading to Spelman and Howard Regulation College. Her birthday was the spark.
On April 21, 1988, lower than six hours after David Dauphin’s triumphant science truthful victory and Ty the Stickup Child’s life-altering abduction, “Jane Doe” welcomed her new daughter into the world.
Lakisha at all times thought her mom was joking round when she insisted she was the “pregnant girl” in one of many most-played songs on Black radio. Dave’s letter was proof her mom was telling the reality.
Lakisha referred to as her mom, who revealed that she by no means recognized Ty as her abductor, and, in fact, she by no means implicated Dave. A number of witnesses testified that solely individuals from exterior their Bronx neighborhood would ever consult with Dauphin as “Dave the Dope Fiend.” Collectively, they uncovered the falsified police stories and uncovered the reality. Lakisha’s mom even discovered her unique witness assertion, which corroborated Ty’s claims that he was unarmed when the police shot him.
“They didn’t should shoot that boy,” Doe mentioned in her unique assertion, “Deep in his coronary heart, he knew he was unsuitable.”
After three many years in jail, an appeals court docket overturned the convictions. Of their determination, a three-judge panel cited police corruption, falsified proof and witness tampering. To settle a subsequent federal civil rights lawsuit, the NYPD paid Dave and Ty $13.7 million for his or her wrongful convictions and agreed to fund a mentorship program in perpetuity.
Right this moment, Dave and Ty are co-executive administrators of Knock ’em Out the Field — a free program supplied by the New York State Workplace of Kids and Household Companies. Whereas packages like The Innocence Undertaking and Undertaking BUILD serve incarcerated adults, Knock ’em Out the Field is the primary to supply counseling and authorized justice for juvenile offenders in hip-hop songs. Former individuals embrace Millie (accused of pulling a pistol on Santa), together with dozens of kids whose dad and mom simply didn’t perceive.
Requested in the event that they harbored any in poor health emotions, they each acknowledged their regrets. “I apologize to everybody I harm,” mentioned Ty. “I reached out to the sister and informed her I used to be sorry for aiming for her head — thank God I missed her. I despatched an apology to the previous man I knocked down — I swore I killed him. I wrote one other and one other and a sister and a brother.”
“I want I knew that it was truly white individuals who don’t know the that means of water or cleaning soap,” Dave lamented. “Think about if we gave Jason Kelce an endorsement deal. Dave’s Dry Wash may have been large!”
Good evening.
Michael Harriot is a author, cultural critic and championship-level Spades participant. His NY Occasions bestseller Black AF Historical past: The Unwhitewashed Story of America is obtainable in bookstores in all places.
