-Hey, what is that?
FABIAN ALOMAR: It's a mirror that I had in prison.
I had this for the last five years I was there.
You've got to smuggle it wherever you go.
I'd be shaving and looking at myself in the mirror.
Then, I could see who's coming or who's going.
When they come and search your cell, they
hit yourself so hard.
And they like to break things and take things.
So this mirror has made it with me most of the time--
more than half of my way in there.
STEVEN CALES: Skating is Peter Smolik said--
there's no coaches.
You're your own boss.
So there's really no structure is the right word-- to be
like, hey, you've got to get up.
You've got to do this.
And we do what we want.
So you've got to live and learn, you
know what I'm saying?
FABIAN ALOMAR: How we even got into skating was crazy.
I stole my first board.
I didn't even know about skating.
I see two oriental kids on the block when we were on bikes.
And we went and told them that we could borrow their
skateboards, because they seen them hopping on the board.
I hit them up, like how much are they?
How much are these boards?
And they told us this price, and it was $49.50 at the time.
$49.50 is a lot of money for my mom and dad.
So where do we go?
We went out towards Beverly Hills, Eagle Rock, Glendale
looking around.
And I hate to say it, but we were looking around for little
white boys to rob them.
JOEY SURIEL: I had seen him skate a few times when he
would come riding around with our other friend, Juan.
And I knew these guys were on top of their game.
They were the best I had seen, so I said, OK, there are the
guys I need to be around.
I wanted to be around the best.
And I knew that being around Fabian was going to help me.
FABIAN ALOMAR: Back in the day, back in '87, '88, we used
to go to this ramp on 23rd and Vermont near USC.
And to get there, you've got to pass through at least three
or four different gang neighborhoods.
-At least, at least.
FABIAN ALOMAR: So to get there and to come
back home was a mission.
-I lived in a gang neighborhood.
FABIAN ALOMAR: Rockwood.
-And I guess a rival gang had come looking to shoot up, and
they actually caught us right when Fabian
was about to leave.
And I was like, all right, man, I'll see you later.
FABIAN ALOMAR: It was a burgundy Regal with a sun
roof.
-And then soon as I look, I was like, yo, these guys are
cruising by real slow.
FABIAN ALOMAR: It was like this.
-All of a sudden, bro, all I remember was some dude coming
out of the roof-- yo, the first time
I've see a real Uzi.
I remember when you are in here, it was like you in a
different world.
You forget that you were in the hood.
You forget.
There'd be I don't even know how many shootouts
we've see back then.
-You think it's a nicer area now?
FABIAN ALOMAR: Now, it's way nicer.
Echo Park all the way up to here at Silver Lake, as of
2002 or 2003, it really changed.
You see a lot more artsy people living in Echo Park
running around now.
Back then--
I grew up, born and raised there--
and you would never seen that.
Yeah, all right in this area right here there's Crazies,
Echo Park, Headhunters and Diamond.
We're on Douglas Street.
If you go two blocks up and to the left,
that's Diamond's street.
This is Headhunters.
-So why is that?
Why don't--
FABIAN ALOMAR: It's just who it is.
A group of kids that grew up on this block didn't get along
with the group of kids that are on that block.
And that's how it started.
Back in the '80s.
And there's always been 18th Street lurking around.
Our whole family was raised right here.
We lived here.
My mom, she was raised right here, too.
-In this house.
FABIAN ALOMAR: In this house, yeah.
If you're talking about gang area, this is Headhunters.
-This is where you started skating?
FABIAN ALOMAR: No, I was too small.
Right here was just me growing up, learning
how to ride a bike.
-Those are bullet holes.
FABIAN ALOMAR: Yeah.
Look, you can see.
Those are bullet holes right there.
If these streets could talk, they'd have a better story to
tell you than what I could--
a way better story.
Like I said, a lot of my friends in skateboarding used
to really trip out on how they would see my dad or my uncles,
my sisters, everybody in my family, were
considered gang members.
And you're guilty by association, regardless.
A lot of the times, they wouldn't even want to drop me
off at home.
Like I said, they would--
two blocks away and let me walk the rest.
GINO IANNUCCI: Well, I remember meeting Fabian.
And the first impression was that he was a nice guy.
He was really cool.
He was just down to introduce himself.
And he was just a good guy.
But I knew that he was real.
I knew that if a time came when he had to throw down or
anything like that, I wouldn't want to fuck with him.
And I knew that his family was all up in it and skateboarding
kept him away from that.
-Were you in a gang or anything like that?
Or just joined what they were doing?
FABIAN ALOMAR: Yeah, I did.
But I never got too deep into it.
I knew it was always there, because I was
born into it, man.
There's no oh, I want to go hang out with these guys.
I'd go home and I'd be with them guys,
you know what I mean?
It's a difference when you've got to go somewhere and be
with your home boys or your gang.
But when you go home and you live with it,
it's nothing to you.
It's just how you are.
-Who would you say, out of the Menace guys was the most
motivated to get tricks?
SOCRATES LEAL: Probably Joey and Fabian.
Those guys were always motivated.
Fabian would call me.
You want to go film?
Like, yeah.
-Were there, though, a lot of other crazy stories, filming
with Fabian?
SOCRATES LEAL: I wouldn't say just crazy, just maybe not
normal for regular skaters.
But Fabian wasn't like your regular skater.
He just didn't take bullshit.
JOEY SURIEL: Since we were kids, Fabian always had a
short fuse.
Not to mention everything was put on a platter for us, from
women to drugs to fame.
So you add that to the formula, and it's a recipe for
destruction.
FABIAN ALOMAR: Skateboarding saved me from getting into
trouble, but at the same time, I think I had a lot of time
and money in my hands.
From not having nothing to have a little something, it
felt pretty good.
And sometimes you think you're invincible.
Oh, man, you know what?
I've got to take you to this house.
It was a drug house.
Instead of having a big pitbull, I
was their guard dog.
They know that I used to skateboard and everything.
They trusted me.
When my money was good, they loved me.
You know what I mean?
When the money was good, I had all kinds of money to buy dope
from them and to give them skateboards when they need it
for their kids or whatever.
And then when my money ran out, guess what?
They didn't like me no more.
FABIAN ALOMAR: I was selling and doing, mostly doing.
But one thing I did and I'm thankful for is I separated
the gang life and my drug use and my skateboarding--
for a lot of reasons, mainly because I was embarrassed and
I didn't want to show my face.
And I was looked at as Fabian Alomar, pro skater.
He's a good skater.
A real ghetto kid, real coming up.
And I didn't want to ruin that.
That image I had was good, because I kept skating and I
produced and I did everything I was supposed to do.
But I felt this weird feeling inside.
I couldn't come around.
I didn't want to burn no bridges.
I couldn't burn my bridges with skateboarding.
I wanted to keep it separate.
So I stood in the hood.
I stood around in the spots where no one will come.
JAVIER NUNEZ: He grew up in the streets, so it was tough
to make a transition to being a full on skate and shit.
You skate and then you go back to the hood, and then you're
dealing with all these obstacles.
It's not like we're going back to the suburbs and it's all
good and we can skate every day.
It wasn't like.
And it caught up to them.
Fabian got locked up.
That's when [INAUDIBLE] was like, you know?
I got to think about making it a real skate company, not
about an image thing.
FABIAN ALOMAR: There were so many things going on in my
life at the time that it was bound to happen.
I showed up to Karim's house to pick up my check one day.
And he's telling me, you know this is probably one of your
last checks right here.
This is it.
I've cut you so low that I can't be-- and now, I don't
see you doing anything.
And I'm telling them--
and it's true-- my ankle was swollen, but
from skating on dope.
Once I got kicked off, things took a whole other turn.
See where that bungalow is?
-Yeah.
FABIAN ALOMAR: That fence where the diamond is, the
baseball diamond?
There's bathrooms right there.
You see?
There they are.
The white bathrooms?
Those were my offices, my [SPANISH].
Anybody who when in there got fucked up while
I was smoking crack.
These dudes playing tennis, these little Filipino dudes
and shit-- they all all go in there in the morning and
they're like, (ACCENT) hey, it's 7 o'clock in the morning.
Let's go play some tennis.
And they go in there and they want to play tennis and they
want-- (ACCENT) hey, why is the bathroom locked and shit?
I could hear them talking.
And they would try to force it open, because I'd locked it on
purpose because I'm in there smoking dope looking at nudie
magazines and shit.
And that's what I did.
I'd do me and do me.
So I'm in there fucking doing my thing.
Wait, that's my church.
So I'm getting loaded in there, and they're fucking up
my high by trying to get into my offices.
And I'd be like, man, what the fuck?
So when they come in, all they did was get robbed.
I'd fuck them up and then I'd end up leaving.
I would say a prayer before I go rob you.
God, please don't let me get caught.
Don't let me get hurt.
I'm sorry for what I'm about to do.
I know it's wrong, but I feel like I have no choice.
And so I would go and rob this person and jack them.
And I'd let them know, hey, straight up, I'm on dope.
I'm smoking crack.
You'd better give me all your money or you're
going to get hurt.
And if you don't give it up, believe me, I'm going to cut
you or I'm going to shoot you.
So you're bound to give it up either way, whether you want
to walk away or me drive away with you laying there.
So most of the time, they would cooperate.
And I was driving people right outside my door.
When you're on cocaine, that stuff really plays a number on
your head, you know what I mean?
So I would do it at all times--
in the evening.
If I catch you slipping, I would get you
and rob you, whatever.
That was my mentality.
Come here, puppy.
Look at these dogs, man.
They've probably been so abused that they don't trust
nobody, dude.
Look, there he comes.
Get it.
I'm not proud of it, man.
I'm not boasting about it.
I'm not trying to put any light on it in a positive way.
It's a negative thing I was doing.
It was bad.
But at that point my life, I didn't care.
I didn't care about nothing.
I didn't even care about myself, so why would I care
about somebody else?
BILLY VALDES: I think with Fabian, too, that might have
been a consequence of adjusting after skateboarding.
The last time I seen Fabian, I was hungover living in
Hollywood, and he came over the next morning.
And I hadn't seen him in a long time.
And he wanted to sell me a pitbull puppy, because he
knows I'm into dogs, or some sodas--
cases of sodas.
And he with some dude in a random band.
So it was a trip for me.
FABIAN ALOMAR: You want to ride down the alley where I
got arrested for my crime?
This is where I got arrested.
They cornered me in here.
There was five cop cars here and a helicopter.
And they caught me right in this alley right here.
They surrounded me.
I was busted right here.
They told me, get out the car.
They were behind me, in front of me, and I was just trying
to make it to my--
my mom lived two houses away from the dope spot where we
were just that.
And I was trying to make it to my mom's, because I knew these
cops were probably going to beat my ass.
That was it right there.
I got locked up.
I was done.
I went to prison for eight years.
I got arrested for carjacking, kidnapping, robbery, with an
11 inch ice pick.
The ice pick had someone's DNA, and it had crack residue,
because I was using that same weapon that I used to
whatever, stab, and I was using it to smoke.
And that's why I had it.
They sent me to Salinas Valley, level four.
I was in the 270 yard there.
And it's nothing but solid lifers.
People got life.
People were just straight killers and drug dealers and
nothing bad at all.
You notice nobody smiles in prison.
So you don't get those smiles.
-You show up the first day and--
FABIAN ALOMAR: You show up, you're new fish.
You're in prison.
You're sketchy on everything.
FABIAN ALOMAR: That's a good question.
If you were raised here and brought up here and you've got
that the southern Hispanic ways, then you're considered
South sider.
You're a homie automatically, and don't try to get out of it
and don't try to fight it, because a lot of dudes try to
deny just to get away and try to hide.
But if you're actually a Puerto Rican native and come
over here and you don't know what the hell's going on, then
they'll give you a pass and you could be an other.
You could be an other.
Other is--
you could be Samoan, Chinese, you could be whatever.
Others is anything.
It's a mix.
All the southern Mexicans-- we all stick together, man.
I got sent to this other person called
California Men's Colony.
It's no good, meaning no good as far as they hold snitches,
rapists, child molesters.
All of my friends told me, hey, man, you know where
you're going.
You're going to have to get off there and do your thing.
You've got 72 hours to handle your business.
That means I have 72 hours to crack someone, stab them, beat
them up, or whatever I'm going to do.
FABIAN ALOMAR: I was mingling and chopping it up and eating
and hanging out with a bunch of rapists.
And I didn't do nothing.
Nobody likes their kids being touched by
another human being--
man or woman.
So all these people deserved to get cut, and I
cut a couple of them.
FABIAN ALOMAR: Yeah, a child molester.
I hit him with a razor.
They brought me the paperwork, and I seen it.
I knew the next day what I had to do, which
was Christmas Eve.
I got added more time to me.
FABIAN ALOMAR: Yeah, he survived, unfortunately.
He survived.
-Well, but if he had died, you would have been still in here.
FABIAN ALOMAR: Oh, I would still be-- there wouldn't be a
story right now.
There wouldn't be a good happy ending to this story.
FABIAN ALOMAR: Oh, yeah.
Yeah, I only told a few.
I only told a couple.
I would get pictures sent to me from the internet--
pictures of me skating and stuff.
And I told a couple of my cellies.
And they were like, wow, that's you?
Inside there, I used to make a little full on skate park.
I would get sent cards, or I'd use old cards that my friends
were trashing.
They were going to discard and get rid of stuff.
So I'd set up and tape and use Koolaid for glue, and I'd get
pieces of tape that come in letters, and I'd make a skate
park-- like a ramp to wall, pyramid ramp.
I put together a little mini ramp.
The boards were hard to make.
I used to pretend just with my hands,
just with my two fingers.
It was always when I go to sleep and lay
down and knock out.
I had so many crazy thoughts of different things-- like
man, what if I would have done this?
Where would I be if I just continued skating and not got
caught up in all this drugs and all this crazy violence
that I did?
And I should've just stood hanging out with this person,
or I should have just continued to skate and not--
why did I-- you know?
All the whys and what ifs.
You've just got to keep going forward, dog.
All those questions--
if you could drive yourself mad with that.
The very same night I got out, I went to
Skatelab in Simi Valley.
FABIAN ALOMAR: I went there just to go, because when it
first opened, I had a board up there.
I wanted to see if it was still there or if they kicked
it out or what.
And it was there.
I called up Jeron Wilson and we talked.
He was like, damn, good to hear from you.
I'm here.
I'm here skating with Guy and Costin.
And I was like, what?
Let me talk to Guy.
Guy was like, dude, I'm going to go get you and
pick you up, man.
Where you at?
So he came.
He picked me up.
And we hung out.
We used to always hang out.
That's my best friend right there.
That's my boy.
Once he scooped me up, I embedded the idea of me
skating again.
And so he started taking me around with him.
And yeah, if anybody got me back into it, I
could say Guy did--
back into the scene period And I'm going to be honest with
you, I didn't think skateboarding was going to
accept back again or have love for me because of what I did.
I got this board out SK8MAFIA.
I'm about to put this shit together tomorrow.
STEVEN CALES: You've got to take advantage of the things
that skateboarding gives you.
If you're getting paid and it's paying your bills and you
ain't got to work, then, man, give skateboarding 115%.
Just stick to skating, you know what I'm saying?
And stay out of jail.
Stay free.
Stay off of drugs.
I did 32 months that one time, and then I got out.
20 days later, I did 24 months.
And then I had done 20 months.
And then I had done a year.
And then I had done six months, which got broken down,
so I did four months out of that six months.
Altogether, I say I did about probably a cool
nine years in jail.
STEVEN CALES: Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
The freedom is so much better, breathing fresh air.
Fresh air to me is the city buses, dirt, you know?
Not in the mountains somewhere.
That's fresh air, but still, out here, it's so much better.
It's better.
-This is your fresh air.
STEVEN CALES: Yeah, it's my fresh air.
No matter how much money you ain't got or how much money
you got, freedom is the best, man.
Nothing is more better.
It's priceless.
Fabian is doing good, man.
I'm proud of him.
He's doing good.
I'm not going to say he picked up where he left off, but he's
doing better than when he left off, even when
he was doing good.
He's doing good.
He's doing really good right now, and I'm proud of him.
FABIAN ALOMAR: I like the struggle.
It makes you want to go for more.
This acting--
it's making me some money.
FABIAN ALOMAR: I'm working with a few, man,
like Mos Def on Dexter.
-You were on Dexter?
FABIAN ALOMAR: Yeah.
It's not something that I can say I'm getting rich
right now from it.
But I can see the yellow brick road.
I'm following it, you know what I mean?
And as long as I say on this road, I'll be OK.
FABIAN ALOMAR: You know what I do miss?
I miss the good people that I left behind in there.
I left a lot of good people-- good, solid people that should
have had another chance.
They deserve one more chance.
But no, I don't miss the place at all.
Hell no.