Inside the Nickerson Gardens Projects with Rapper Jay Rock: 'They can call anyone a terrorist, a gangbanger, and put cameras in your neighborhood.'

Inside the Nickerson Gardens Projects with Rapper Jay Rock: "They can call anyone a terrorist, a gangbanger, and put cameras in your neighborhood."

By Sam Slovick Thu., Feb. 17 2011 at 9:00 AM

Sam Slovick

Jay Rock

Papa Dad didn't make the big Martin Luther King Jr. Parade on MLK Boulevard. He was shot dead on Jan. 3 at 103rd and Crenshaw. Jay Rock and Punch didn't attend, either. It's a turf thing. They want to stay alive. So on the day of the parade, they hung out in Nickerson Gardens, outside Jay Rock's mom's place, where they grew up.

William Nickerson Jr. defiantly won't be at the MLK Day Parade. He died in the 1940s, but if he were alive to see the Watts public housing complex that bares his name, it probably would kill him. The creator of the biggest black-owned business west of the Mississippi unwittingly loaned his name to the biggest public housing project west of the Mississippi.

Today it's a Tudorbethan ghetto fortress where trees struggle to thrive and building numbers, stenciled on whitewashed cinder blocks, read like cell block IDs. The people here are held hostage. Community policing is an offensive campaign slogan in the home of the Bounty Hunter Bloods.

Shot on Flip Mino at Nickerson Gardens and the Crenshaw District.

"Right now we live and direct in the Nickerson Gardens projects, on the east side of Los Angeles, you feel me?" Jay Rock asks, wiping the sleep from his eyes, in the parking lot. Tall and lean, in a black T-shirt, jeans and sneakers, he's a little older than when the XXL cover boy got hood-famous after releasing his first CD a few years back.

"All a nigga gonna do is handle his business as a man, and as a father," he says as his 2-year-old daughter rests her head on his heavily tattooed forearms.

Sam Slovick

Jay Rock and his daughter

Sam Slovick

Jay Rock

Punch twists the brim of his backward baseball cap. "I know what they think ... a bunch of animals," he says. "They can call anyone a terrorist, a gangbanger, and put cameras in your neighborhood."

An iron door clatters, announcing two 20-something girls as they greet the day. One is a big girl in a tank top, with tattoos, shocking-blue Bettie Page bangs and a pretty smile. She shies away, "Ooooo. Get away from me. I didn't do my hair yet."

Kids play and gangsters take some sun as an unmarked cop car chases someone around the corner. "There go the jump-out boys," Jay Rock says. "You talk about the City of God ... well, here it is. I done been to so many funerals."

Sam Slovick

Jay Rock and Punch

He's thinking about his friend Papa Dad. "One of my big homies. But I don't really too much wanna talk about that, cuz it's still fucked up."

Jay Rock's getting restless. He launches into a practiced pitch about his debut studio album: "Follow Me Home. May 17. I'm going to put you in my state. Y'all can hit me up on Twitter, backslash jayrock."

The album drops in three months on Top Dawg Entertainment/Strange Music.

Over his shoulder, a camera watches from the top of a telephone pole. "I don't know if you ever took notice of those cameras right above you," he says. "It's kinda got us, like, under surveillance. Who knows who's watching? The government, the police, the FBI."

Phil Tingirides is captain and area commanding officer at the LAPD Southeast Division. An autographed publicity photo of the actors from Adam-12 hangs in his small office. He offers to show a reporter what's on the other end of the surveillance cameras.

Sam Slovick

Phil Tingirides, LAPD Southeast Division

In another room, flat-screen monitors are mounted on the walls, and a pamphlet from the International Society of Krishna Consciousness, titled Reincarnation: The Cycle of Death and Rebirth, sits on the desktop, where a cop mans the mouse, scanning the feed from the cameras that chase the cats around Nickerson Gardens. Polarized, symbiotic twins, the cops and the Bloods each have their own secret language. Encrypted and deciphered, they understand each other with pristine clarity.

"The cameras give us the ability to monitor what's going on without having officers in there, agitating people," Tingirides says as the camera zooms in on a photo of Papa Dad memorialized on the back of a large, white T-shirt worn by a young black man.

"Papa Dad was connected to a lot of rap musicians and singers, sports world figures ... he was very well-connected and connected in this community," Tingirides says respectfully.

Pull back to reveal rows of rented tables with red tablecloths set up for a re-pass, a sort of ghetto memorial.

Sam Slovick

Martin Luther King parade porch party

"He was over at Popeyes Chicken with his girlfriend, and a suspect came up to him and challenged him from the gang perspective. He saw that the suspect had a little girl with him and he said, 'Do you really wanna do that with your daughter here?' So the guy went and put his daughter back in the car and came back and they had a physical altercation, and the suspect lost. The suspect left and came back with a gun and approached him and shot him."

Papa Dad, now an undying crime stat. The L.A. Times rendered an empty still life:

"Louis Smith, a 33-year-old black man, died Tuesday, Jan. 4, a day after he was shot in the 1500 block of East 103rd Street in Watts, according to Los Angeles County Coroner's records. On Jan. 3 at about 3:50 p.m., Smith was approached by a male and got into a fight, said Ed Winter, spokesman for the coroner's office. After the altercation, the male left the area and returned with a gun. He then shot Smith several times, Winter said. Authorities were called and Smith was taken to a hospital in Lynwood, where he died the next day at 11:15 a.m."

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Screwu

you all commenting and do'nt even have a clue! oneday soon you all will see the value of it all. Remember cops are an organized gang that kill and break the same laws they enforce, so what makes gangs so wrong? Stereotypes! The 1st amendment allows people the right to gather and assemble! The 14th amendment allows people the right to bear arm! Now ask yourself what's it all about?

Jermalakins

Yea man PD is a real street soldier I love and respect that dude ShawLot 4 Life...

Bautry

Sorry, you can play the "victim" all you want, but I grew up on central ave an 92nd street. People WANT law and order- the problem they have is when the police DON'T respond in a timely manner ,or "get it wrong" because they don't know the "players" from the honest folks- Sadly, due to political correctness, Officers are being RUN OUT of the Gang units becuase some civilian management type who doesn't deal in the wold of gang violence, thinks checking a cops credit and bank accounts will somehow make them "less corrupt" and a BETTER cop( what "criminal" do you know puts his/her ill gotten gains in the bank???!!!)

Now the folks In "south central" ( Yes, I'm old school- "south Central") will be stuck with less focussed, less experienced LAPD officers, who don't know how to deal with ,control, or have communications with street thugs. Nickerson Gardens and the neighborhoods that surround it, have been a PROBLEM for at least the 30 yrs I've been around to see them as that. The good folks are still terrorized by ANIMALS who are proud, and ARROGANT in their criminal lifestyle,yet claim they are victims of persecution and abuse. .

sorry , L.A. Weekly, you need to stop the bleeding heart B.S. I doubt if any of you have ever lived in so.Central L.A.( like I grew up) so you don't really have a clue on how miserable it is to live with gunfire, seeing kids you grow up with dead on the side walks of Avalon, or Central ave, being "jacked" for your money at gun point, or watching your dad wait on the porch with a gun in his hand at night to make sure your mom can walk up the sidewalk without being robbed or intimidated. I have moved as an adult and live in Redondo Beach. the police are nearly non existent ,except at the mall or on a car stop,when they ticket people- I don't see helicopter, and don't hear gun fire. I also don't see roving bands of unemployed young men ,heavily armed, and actively selling drugs or bullying local folks . many people in south Central, and in particular the nickerson Grardens, DESERVE to live like I currently do. If CLOWNS like J Rock or Punch would STOP "justifying" their piss poor prior ( and current) dirty behavior, maybe the "oppressive" LAPD wouldn't need to act accordingly.............

Lupe

I agree with you completely on everything!!! I grew up down the street from Imperial Courts. Lived in Watts for 24 years so I know how it is. Unless you're from there, you won't ever understand. People do have choices, as hard as they are. I've known lots of people who have CHOSEN the gang life and have ended up dead or incarcerated and have tried to play the victim game all along. It's BS!!! Cuz I have equally known lots of people who have chosen a different path and are successful (even some whose whole family were gang members). How is this possible when we all grew up in the same hood? Personal choice!!

Chacon86

It's incredible how everyone on here is talking shit, but you have NO idea what really goes on in these neighborhoods. I live by the jordan down projects and I can tell you one thing for sure, the POLICE are the enemies. There the ones that keep us caged in the these neighborhoods, and when they see you trying to do good what do they do they try to find a way to keep you from doing good. I work at a law firm now, and the police tried those stunts on me, but it's not going to happen. All I can say is that if your not from the hood, don't speak.

Merlo

If you shut it down, where do they go? Your neighborhood? Open arms.

Bautry

No ,Merlo, they'd have to act like "responsible citizens", or end up back in jail- like a lot of them already do !! THERE are alot of honest, hard working people, who don't have the financial means to get better than the Nickersons, and need the support- if the economy were better, you best believe ALOT would take advantage of the jobs from a better economy and get the HELL out of the "Nicks"- the Punches, Pappa Dads and J- rocks, though , are human wastes!

Dude

Where "they" will go, is based on their income and choices. (Just like the rest of us).

Aycock01

Why did they interview this guy?! He obviously has no idea how to talk and is oblivious to what is going on. THEY (thats right I said THEY) all think they are the good guys and police are the bad guys. Get a life, job, some kind of taxable income, prioritize you life, and stop talking like a "hood nigga" lol.

Antmarjack

First off he pay's more taxes than you and he also has a full time job. And as far as the police being the good guy's it's been proven their just ass bad ass the others gang. They just have more funding. You only learn what your taught. So before you speak about something you've never had to go through try to see booth sides of the story. I grew up in the Nickerson Gardens and gang banged. But that was then and this is now. I pay taxes, have a job, own a house and some more things that a productive citizen should do. Me and my kids go back to visit.How would they know where the're going if they don't know where they came from. Their's a lot of haters but very few motivators. And I think you fall into the later.

Poopoo

if you closed the places youd be considered racist but only to the mongrels and hippies

Dude

Why should taxpayers subsidize housing for others who are able-bodied adults that can work? Shutting this place down will lower the neighborhood crime rate and save money on police, health and welfare costs.

Kimala Carter

Sorry Dude who seems to be a republican, that's not how it works. Not everybody in this neighborhood is bad and deserves to suffer. There are many beautiful families that reside in this neighborhood. But because so many law makers don't care about this area of Los Angeles County, it makes it difficult for others to care like you. One day this community will rise. So, be mindful. Word of advice: It is easy to fall into this community, BUT is very difficult to move out. So, as long your little tax dollars are benefiting the kids and their families, be happy and thank God..

Screwu

actually shutting it down will add to homelessness and create more criminals. what else would these people do without this housing project. take away the projects and release more crime homelessness and hunger for the state.

xuajihui

ta.gg/50h sssssssssss

TrangoZango

lol, hey, if the shoe fits....

www.being-anon.tk

TrangoZango

LOL, hey, if the shoe fits.....

www.being-anon.tk

Robert

Why didn't you speak to the residents who love the presence of LAPD because these hard core, violent gangsters have them terrorized with intimindation and threats. Its about time they cleaned up this housing projects of the gangsters. They should evict them, and take away their personal property if they don't know how to abide by laws and live accordingly. There's been more gang shootings in this area and when the police protect the hard working residents the gangsters get all up in arms. Why the media continues to glamourize and make these gangsters look like the victims is beyond me.