by Joy, E. n.
He continued doing it for a few more weeks until his business took an unexpected turn. Kris called him and asked him, “Do you have the Internet?”
“The Internet?”
“Yeah.”
“No, why?”
“Somebody at work told me that you could get free music from the Internet.”
“What? Fo’ real? Did he tell you how?”
“No. He said he didn’t know how, but I thought maybe you did since you’re all into this computer stuff.”
“Naw, I don’t know how either. But I’m gonna check it out though.”
“If you do, you can download music, burn them onto CDs and sell them to make some extra money.”
“Naw, I can’t do that.”
“Why?”
“I don’t mind messin’ with big movie theater companies, the government or whatever, but I like music and those cats already get jacked by their companies. So I couldn’t do some stuff like that.”
“Yeah, I feel you.”
“But I would get some music for us though.”
“Alright, just let me know when you get that running and hook me up with some tunes.”
“Alright, I will.”
They then hung up and Kemo wasted no time in getting informed about this free music thing that Kris had told him about. He called the office supply store and asked them how he would be able to get Internet service to his home because he was clueless when it came to that. They told him that he would have to call his phone company and order through them. Kemo thanked them for the info, hung up, and called his phone company. A few days later, they sent someone to his home to hook up the Internet. Kemo asked the installer if he knew how to get free music.
“Yeah, it’s through a program called Napster.”
“Okay. Cool. Thanks.” Kemo couldn’t wait to get started.
“No problem.” The installation guy finished up and said, “Okay, you’re ready to start surfing, buddy.” He clicked a button that launched the Internet. He clicked on a web browser that he had installed himself and began showing Kemo the different sites he could visit. Lastly, he took him to the Napster site and installed the program. Minutes later, Kemo was downloading free song after free song.
Three years went by and Kemo continued working his side hustle of counterfeiting. Over the years he had started getting requests from friends for him to create all sorts of counterfeit documents. It went from request not only from friends, but then from friends of friends or relatives of friends.
The list of documents included Social Security cards, Birth Certificates, Marriage License, Diplomas, I.D cards, car insurance papers and doctor slips. Anything that could be duplicated with paper, Kemo did it with no problem. He even began copying bar codes of cheap products, making labels of them, and sticking them on to expensive items at places like Wal Mart. When the employee would scan the item, the cheaper product would show up on the register instead of the higher costing one. They had to be the same type of product of course.
One of his favorites to do was hair clippers. He would copy a twelve dollar bar code from a cheap clipper and stick the label he made on top of a one hundred dollar top of the line clipper kit. The employee would never notice, especially if it was busy and she or he was elderly. Kemo would mix the labeled item in with groceries he was actually paying regular price for so the worker would just scan it quickly without much thought. He would then hit up the barbershops and sell the clippers for anywhere from fifty to seventy-five dollars.
Everything was going fine with his business. He’d given the gift certificate scam a rest, but then eventually went back to that when the request for counterfeit documents weren’t coming in heavy. But after only a month, one night as he, Jasmine and their friends were doing the movie ticket scam, Kemo noticed the employee at the theater place the certificate under a black light, which was suppose to reveal a logo that could only be seen by a black light. She came back to the window and told Kemo that his gift certificate was no good.
“You’re joking me,” he said, feigning anger. “Some kid comes up to me on the street and asks if I want to buy a gift certificate for half the face value. He said he got it as a gift, but he needed money to buy food for his younger siblings.”
“I’m sorry this happened to you, but someone’s been running a scam and you’re a victim just like us.”
Kemo cursed under his breath and then walked away, his heart beating so fast he thought it was going to explode out of his chest. He thanked God the clerk had bought into his act and the theater didn’t try to question him or anything and figure out that he was the one behind the entire scam.
As he walked back to the car, he looked down at the ground and noticed several tickets scattered across the parking lot that some theater goers had thrown away. He also noticed that they all had a new design. Much more complex than the original ticket design. That’s when he knew that the theaters had figured out what was going on and had redesigned everything. The gift certificate scam was officially scrapped.
Kemo needed a new way of making money to compensate for the loss he was taking on the counterfeit hustle. So he decided to do what he had been thinking about doing for a long time. He was going to attempt to buy dope with the counterfeit money.
A few days later, that’s exactly what he did. Kemo pressed out several twenty dollar bills and began hitting several dope spots. He decided to drive outside of his city to other smaller neighboring ghettos to test the scam out. He bought any drug he could get his hands on. When he returned home, he began counting the money the dope dealers had returned to him in change. He counted out all the different types of drugs he’d purchased as well, and added up in his head how much he’d profit once he flipped those.
It all totaled close to five hundred dollars, that’s if he was able to sell off all the drugs. It was the fastest money he had ever made in the shortest amount of time. He had only been out there hustling for a couple of hours. But now he had to find a way to get rid of the drugs without having to sell it on the streets like the people he bought it from. So he called his friend Kris to see if he could help him get rid of the dope.
“What’s up, Kris? Ay, I need your help with something.”
“What’s up?”
“I got hella dope I need to get rid of. It’s all bagged up already.”
“You bought some dope?”
“Naw, somebody gave it to me for some of that money,” Kemo tried to talk in code. “You know what I’m talking about?”
“Yeah.”
Kemo didn’t want to let anyone know what he was doing because he knew that it could get him in a lot of trouble…deadly trouble. He felt like he could trust Kris not to run his mouth though.
“So do you know anyone who could buy it from us?”
“Yeah, I know a few people who use it and sell it. What do you have though?”
“Everything.”
“Okay. Let me work my hands and we’ll do it tomorrow.”
“Alright.”
They hung up. Then Kemo walked to his closet and pulled out an old shoe box. There he had several rolled up wads of cash that he had been saving since starting his counterfeit business. He added his new roll and also placed the drugs inside. He only had illegal money in that box. The money he earned during the day at his minimum wage job on weekdays he spent paying rent and the bills.
The next day, Kemo and Kris began the task of selling the dope. They had no problem getting rid of it, especially since Kemo was pushing it for dirt cheap. He didn’t care, it was all profit.
Late that night, Kemo returned home from another night of drug buying, this time it was at a rave concert. Rave concerts were the easiest because the dealers were high themselves when they sold. Kemo just handed them the money for the party drugs like acid, ecstasy, and mushrooms and they never suspected a thing. Kemo knew a friend who was well connected to the rave scene, so he would let the dealers know that Kemo was okay to sell to. He of course, didn’t know that K
emo was using counterfeit notes to buy the drugs.
After entering the house, Kemo saw that Jasmine was busy vacuuming, even though it was close to one in the morning. Kemo walked up to Jasmine and shouted over the vacuum, “Why you cleaning so late?”
“It just needed to be cleaned,” replied Jasmine as she lifted her head up to talk to Kemo. That’s when Kemo noticed a white powdery substance on the tip of her nose. He instantly put two and two together and speed walked to the closet. He pulled out the shoe box and began counting the drugs he had inside. When he was done, he realized he was missing a bag of coke and a bag of meth. He walked back to Jasmine and shut off the vacuum. With an intense high tone of voice, he asked her, “Did you take any of my dope, Jasmine?”
“No, I-”
Kemo cut her off and yelled, “Don’t lie to me!” Jasmine then looked away. “It’s all over your nose. I thought I could trust you? You’ve been clean for so long. Why did you mess with it?”
“I’m sorry. I just wanted to try a little for old time’s sake. I just couldn’t stop though. I’m sorry, baby,” said Jasmine without being able to look at Kemo. Kemo felt what he always felt when Jasmine would relapse back to her old ways. He felt a deep disappointment in her that made him reevaluate their relationship. But no matter what, he found it very difficult to leave her because he truly loved the unity of his family… it was all he had.
Kemo simply walked away towards the shoe box and took the bag of dope out. “I’ll be back,” said Kemo.
“Where you going?” asked Jasmine. But Kemo just simply closed the door behind him and drove off to Kris’s place.
Once he arrived at Kris’s place, Kemo asked him if he could leave the dope at his house from now on. Kris agreed. He then drove back home and both he and Jasmine fell asleep without talking about the situation any further. Kemo figured that since there were no longer any drugs in the house for Jasmine to steal from him, then that would no longer be an issue. As long as the drugs were out of sight, he prayed they would also be out of mind.
Days later, as Kemo, Jasmine and Rain were leaving the supermarket, a guy holding several DVD’s approached them and asked if they wanted to purchase any. Kemo and Jasmine began going through them and then soon realized that almost all the titles were from films that were still in theaters. They chose one, bought it and took it home. On the way home, as Jasmine drove, Kemo kept staring at the DVD.
“What are you thinking about, Kemo?” Jasmine finally asked.
“Nothing.”
“I know you are. I can tell when an idea is cracking in that little crazy head of yours.”
“I’m just wondering how much money they make doing this.” He glanced at the DVD.
“I knew it!” Jasmine exclaimed.
“What?”
“You wanna start bootlegging now?”
“Why not? I could do it during the day on weekends, do the money thing at night, and still keep my job. We can get paid! Don’t you understand, Jasmine? All this hustling is our ticket out of here.”
“That sounds like you’re trying to do too much at once, baby. Slow down.”
“Forget all that. I can do it. It would only be for a little while anyway. Once we have enough money to get up out of here, I’m done.”
“If you say so.” Jasmine was doubtful. She knew that once he was on to something, one thing always led to another.
When they made it back home, they watched the movie that they had bought. It was of low quality and barely watchable. But for only five dollars, they couldn’t complain. Afterwards, Kemo began searching the Internet to learn how to create counterfeit DVD’s. He learned that not only was music being traded online, but films as well, including triple X films. He also learned something about video and audio compression, which meant that he could add several hours of video to a single DVD. That also meant that he could charge a bit more per disc.
After learning what he needed to know, he attempted to download his very first movie. He found what he wanted and clicked on the title to begin the process.
Kemo wrote down a list of what he was going to need to get started. First he needed what was called burn towers. They allowed several disc to be recorded at once. He would also need blank disc, mailing labels to print the titles on and sleeves to protect the discs. He knew that it was going to cost him a large chunk of his saved up money, but he also knew that it was an investment and that he would make the money back in no time.
He decided to first check out the competition by visiting several locations where bootleggers were known to sell at. He studied them from afar and quickly came to realize that he didn’t like their technique. It was far too obvious for any law enforcement officer to know what they were doing. They needed to practice any kind of method that made it less obvious as to what they were doing. They just simply walked around with a bunch of cases in their hands, offering it to whoever they could.
Kemo then drove to another spot and saw a slightly different method of selling. These sellers would just simply scatter all their merchandise on the sidewalk hoping people would stop and buy. If some kind of law enforcement officer did show up to confiscate, they would simply just walk away and lose all their merchandise. Kemo felt that he needed a better method than the ones he’d witnessed. It was far too sloppy in his opinion.
Minutes later, he got hungry and decided to go to a drive thru restaurant. When he arrived, he began going through the numbered meals. “Hello,” said Kemo to the speaker when he knew what he wanted to order.
“Yes, what can I get for you?” replied the employee through the speaker.
“Let me get a number one please,” said Kemo. He then had an idea quickly hatch inside his head. A menu, thought Kemo. He could use a book with several pages. Each page would represent a certain disc. Instead of printing out several DVD covers like most did, he would just print out one page. He would number each page like they do in fast food restaurants and match the numbers to the disc.
Kemo got his food and instantly drove to the office supply store and bought what he needed. When he returned home, he quickly checked on the movie he had left downloading. It was complete. So he began the process of transferring it from computer to disc. When he was done, he played it on his player and was very much satisfied with his first recorded movie. He then began opening all the stuff he had just bought from the supply store.
The following weekend, Kemo was ready to get his new venture popping off. He had accumulated a wide variety of films and triple X videos, which he placed in the back of a black binder catalog book. The pages were also protected by sheet protectors to prevent stains and smudges. Each DVD contained up to twelve hours of video, which meant that each page displayed anywhere from five up to eight movies, depending on the film’s length. Animated films were much shorter than live action films. That meant that Kemo was able to fit more of those titles per disc. The triple X films only had four videos because each video was close to three hours each.
He drove around that Saturday morning looking for a spot to open up shop, but most were already taken. Moments later, he found a lunch truck parked in a lot that seemed to have no one selling there. So he parked in the lot and asked them if they minded him setting up shop. They gave him the okay and even became Kemo’s first customers by buying a couple discs from Kemo. Initially, when Kemo showed them the catalog, they couldn’t quite understand.
“Why are there a lot of pictures of the movies in each page and they say five in one?”
“Because each page is one DVD. You get a whole bunch for just ten bucks, but I’ll let ya’ll have whatever you want for just five,” answered Kemo.
“Really?” asked one of the workers. “You can fit that many movies on one DVD?”
“Yeah,” replied Kemo.
The guy then kept flipping pass the pages and stopped when he found the porno section. A smile quickly appeared on his face. “I’ll take these,” he said, grinning from ear to ear.
Kemo gave him half off for
allowing him to leave his catalog for their customers to perhaps flip through while they waited on their order. Not only that, but the man had told Kemo that he could have a free meal whenever he wanted. Kemo thanked them, left the catalog book near the ordering window and walked back to his car, which was parked right next to the lunch truck.
Minutes later, a customer showed up and ordered some food. While waiting on his order, he looked down and spotted the catalog book. He opened it and began going through it.
“Y’all selling what’s in this book?” he asked the truck workers.
They replied by pointing him in Kemo’s direction. The customer continued to flip through the book until his order was ready. He paid for his order, took his food and then walked up to Kemo’s car. Before Kemo knew it, he was buying fifty dollars worth of Kemo’s merchandise. Nobody could pass up the deal once they found out just how many films each disc contained.
Things continued like that all morning. Things got really hectic when lunch time arrived. Kemo had almost just as many customers as the truck did. He knew he was going to need more catalog books so several people could view what he had at once. When things died down, Kemo had a large amount of cash stashed in both pockets. He was going to begin to take it out to count it, but someone else approached his car. It was a homeless man.
“What’s up, dog? You think you could spare some change? I could wash your windows for you,” the homeless man asked, who appeared to be in his early forties.
“Yeah, I got you,” replied Kemo.
He then began cleaning Kemo’s windows with some news papers and a spray bottle of Windex. When he was done, Kemo asked him how much he was going to charge him.
“Whatever you could spare, man,” was his reply.
Kemo handed him seven dollars and the man was very grateful. He quickly ordered some food from the truck and noticed the catalog book as well. “You sell these?” he asked Kemo as he held the open book in his hands.
