This is the story of Chino Hardin, a transsexual crack dealer in Brooklyn who was conceived when his mother, a crack addict, was raped by his father, an NYPD officer. Chino’s remarkable life – and the wider context I place it in – reveal, I hope, one of the most disastrous effects of the drug war in the real world. These interviews with Chino were conducted over three years, from 2011 to 2014.
This is Chino talking about his childhood:
This is Chino describing how he started selling crack when he was thirteen:
This is Chino describing how his dog, Rocky, was used in his crack dealing:
This is Chino describing why, as a drug-dealer, you have to be violent:
This is Chino describing his gun:
This is Chino describing a time he fought back against some older dealers:
This is Chino reflecting on that:
This is Chino describing that further:
This is Chino explaining why he had to whip one of his homies:
This is Chino elaborating:
This is Chino explaining the link between drug-dealing and gangs:
This is Chino explaining why his mother could never get any justice after being raped:
This is Chino reflecting on his mother’s rape:
This is Jason Santiago, a close friend of Chino’s, reflecting on Chino’s childhood:
This is Chino talking about his mother:
This is Chino recalling his mother’s assault on another woman:
This is Chino describing his father’s colleagues looking for him:
This is Chino wondering if his mother loved him:
This is Chino explaining his early identification as male:
This is Chino elaborating:
This is Chino describing his mother’s attacks on him:
This is Chino describing the last time he ever saw his mother:
This is Chino describing what his mother’s boyfriend said to him at her funeral:
This is Chino describing why he started using crack himself:
This is Chino describing his criminal record:
This is Chino describing how a fellow prisoner showed him compassion in Riker’s Island:
This is Chino describing the only time he ever met his father:
This is Chino describing when he would try to steal boats in the harbour:
This is Jason Santiago, Chino’s friend, explaining why Chino had to act this way:
This is Chino describing why he had to be seen as a man:
This is Chino elaborating later:
This is Chino describing how crack felt to him:
This is Chino saying he is afraid people will see him as sociopathic:
This is Chino describing selling crack to his friend’s mother:
This is Chino describing why it is hard to suppress compassion:
This is Chino explaining why he was sent to juvenile detention at first:
This is Chino describing how it felt to be behind bars:
This is Chino explaining why prison is brutal:
This is Chino remembering the Bloods oath:
This is Chino remembering how an act of compassion by a fellow prisoner changed him:
This is Chino describing fighting back against a rapist prison guard:
This is Chino describing solitary confinement:
This is Jason Santiago describing what Chino was like on crack:
This is Jason elaborating:
This is Jason elaborating further:
This is Chino describing the film Natural Born Killers and why it gave him hope:
This is Chino describing how he looked after his period of crack addiction:
This is Chino describing his mother’s life, and how he carries her demons:
This is Chino describing his numbness:
This is Chino speaking to a rally in Foley Square in downtown Manhattan:
This is the crowd chanting in response:
This is more of Chino’s speech:
This is one of the girls Chino was mentoring in the Bronx (I was asked not to use her name):
This is one of the boys Chino was mentoring (I was also asked not to use his name)
This is Chino saying that the drug war is not natural:
This is Chino explaining how different things would be if drugs had not been criminalized:
This is Chino reflecting on what humans are capable of:
This is Chino describing how his gang dwindled after he stopped dealing:
This is Chino explaining how the violence against his mother, and addicts like her, was normalized:
This is Chino talking about how his mother might have lived under a different system:
This is Chino talking about alternatives to the drug war:
This is Chino discussing whether he is angry with his mother:
This is Chino talking further about his mother:
This is Chino describing what he said to some people at a Narcotics Anonymous meeting about their mother:
This is Chino talking about his father:
This is Chino talking about his campaign to shut down the youth detention center he was detained in:
This is Chino talking further about that:
This is Chino describing how that succeeded:
This is Chino elaborating:
This is Kyung Ji Kate Rhee, Chino’s friend and boss, putting his story in context: