How a track star becomes a criminal

Imagine one morning waking up to this headline plastered over the Metro Section of your hometown newspaper.

"Suspect in six area bank robberies in one month confesses to five."

Then imagine that same headline is about you, regardless of all your accomplishments from the past.

Living the life of a superstar athlete suddenly comes to a halt. All your athletic efforts are now tarnished by this dark cloud that dubs you as an offender of the state.

It does not matter anymore that you once competed with the best in track and field -- legends like Carl Lewis, Edwin Moses and many others who are enjoying the fruits of their labor.

All you can see is a six by nine cell engulfing you in its confinement and stench.

In 1997, I found myself on the wrong side of the law like so many other athletes before and after me who thought invincibility was a rite of passage.

I was cornered late that December night by a band of F.B.I agents who raided a Houston crack house after being tipped off that I was the suspect they were looking for. After being booked on suspicion of felony bank robbery, I ultimately confessed to the errors of my ways and served six and a half years in a hot Texas prison until I surrendered to the terror of my actions.

The craziness of it all is that many athletes share these common denominators -- drugs, sex and irresponsibility.

The stories of Tim Montgomery, Marion Jones, Barry Bonds, Michael Vick, OJ Simpson, and mine are not exclusive but common in the athletic world. Many, like me are placed in this box of unrealistic expectations and we adopt a Superman attitude not realizing that man cannot fly without help from a source of some kind.

It is difficult breaking that mindset until tragedy takes its toll. By then it's too late. The damage has been done and the course is set on destruction mode.

Many are baffled when they attempt to conceive the reasoning behind our actions. Is it arrogance? Some may think so, but I beg to differ.

Truth is, many athletes are not connected with the rest of the world. In most cases we are pressured to do better than most and adopt a thinking error. Thinking we are 'better-than', even though we are all from the same cloth.

Yes, we are cut from the same cloth of the human race, yet we still believe, wrongly, that we are totally different.