Allen Iverson Wins Lawsuit Again St Post Malone

This story originally appeared in the Aug. 25 upshot of Sports Illustrated. You can subscribe to the magazine here.

On May 28, Curtis Malone's friends and family shoehorned into the four rows of wooden benches in U.S. District Courtroom 23 in Washington, D.C. Amidst the 2 dozen supporters were a onetime NBA lottery pick and the man who was the highest-paid assistant in college basketball game. Some wore tailored suits, others baggy warmup pants and lime-green Under Armour sneakers. Some had on designer sunglasses that hid their tears. They came to show allegiance to a man they knew as a loyal son, caring stepfather, tough-dear double-decker and basketball power broker. They also came to moving ridge goodbye to a human they learned 9 months before -- when DEA agents busted him with big amounts of cocaine and heroin -- they hardly knew at all.

Malone's background didn't propose that ane solar day about every NCAA bus in the country -- from Mike Krzyzewski to Baton Donovan to Bob Huggins -- would accept his calls. He grew upward in a modest home in Palmer Park, Md., outside Washington and didn't play much brawl across high school. He had no college degree and had pleaded guilty to possession of crack cocaine with an intent to distribute in 1991. He worked in the moving business organisation in the early '90s, merely for more than xv years Malone ran the vaunted D.C. Set on AAU program, producing three NBA lottery picks, helping hundreds of players country Partition I scholarships, and receiving millions of dollars from dress companies. "He was the godfather of D.C. basketball," says Gwynn Park (Medico.) High charabanc Mike Glick, who has been a coach in the area for 21 years. "If you were a college coach and wanted to recruit in the D.C. area, you had to become through Curtis Malone."

Below the vaulted ceiling of Courtroom 23, Malone'south drug and basketball empires both officially crumbled. Courtroom documents and recordings from police wiretaps reveal ii illicit -- and booming -- operations: a large cocaine and heroin band that police force enforcement officials approximate generated $lxxx,000 per month in profits, and an AAU program that operated through favors, threats and backroom deals.

In an orange jumpsuit and white prison slippers, Malone sat solemnly before Approximate Ellen S. Huvelle while awaiting his sentencing. He wore thick-rimmed glasses, his mustache neatly trimmed, and his vocalism quavered every bit he explained his guilty plea. "I stand in forepart of you with no excuses," Malone said. "20 years later I'chiliad back to what got me in problem earlier."

Celebrity lawyer Billy Martin, who has represented Michael Vick, Allen Iverson and Monica Lewinsky'due south female parent, gathered 75 letters in support of Malone. Many shut to Malone still view him every bit a benevolent mentor who sold drugs just to pay rent for needy players' families or to help out downtrodden friends from his childhood. Says his stepdaughter, Sydney Smith, "It's like the most dysfunctional Robin Hood story e'er."

Assistant U.S. Chaser Stephen J. Gripkey and law-enforcement- officials dismiss this notion. They admit Malone'southward work in the community but paint his motives equally unproblematic greed. "This isn't a Robin Hood situation," says DEA Special Agent in Charge Karl C. Colder. "He used those kids. In 1 [sense] he's helping immature men. But at the aforementioned fourth dimension he could exist poisoning their parents or relatives. Information technology's impersonating a cause."

Judge Huvelle sentenced Malone to 100 months in jail. And as Malone, 45, winked to the gallery before existence sent off, he left friends, family and the basketball earth to figure out whether he was an AAU passenger vehicle moonlighting every bit a drug dealer or a drug dealer masquerading as an AAU coach.

"It's a lot easier being a drug dealer than an AAU jitney," Malone said earlier this calendar month in an interview at the federal prison in Lewisburg, Pa. "At least you know what you're dealing with every day when you lot're a drug dealer."

*****

The scope of Malone'south drug performance may exist best characterized by the number of constabulary enforcement officials information technology took to grab him. The yearlong investigation included the DEA, IRS and the ATF. Land, local and county police were involved. Information technology took lx to 70 men, wiretaps, a pole camera outside Malone's half-million-dollar home in Upper Marlboro, Physician., in-person surveillance and a few drug-sniffing dogs to track and arrest him and his network of codefendants.

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D.C. police officer Joe Abdalla first received a tip from an informant in 2007 that Malone was moving large quantities of cocaine. By 2012, DEA officials judge that he was handling an average of x kilos per month. Co-ordinate to court documents, Malone bought the coke for $28,000 a kilo and sold information technology for $xl,000. "It took us a very long time to arrest him," says DEA Supervisory Special Agent Pete Kim, who led the Malone investigation. "The people he had employed in his organization -- they were conscientious and street savvy and astute to law enforcement. He knew the game."

Malone'south mastery of the drug earth extended from his national network of connections to the lawmaking he used to stymie wiretaps. He went past the aliases of White Boy and Daddy. Malone's shut childhood friend Micah Bidgell, a career criminal and i of Malone'south drug connections, used "new Nike" to refer to a fresh shipment of cocaine; "size-42 pants" meant a sale of a kilo for $42,000.

"It'south a lot easier being a drug dealer than an AAU omnibus," Malone says. "You know what yous're dealing with every twenty-four hour period when y'all're a dealer."

Court documents show that by 2013, Malone had an established cocaine operation and appeared to be setting up a steady heroin operation. "Cocaine buys cars, and heroin buys houses," says Abdalla, repeating a police force-enforcement- aphorism he learned during his 28 years investigating narcotics. Abdalla, who recently retired from the force, called Malone an "upper-tier" dealer in the D.C. area.

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A person using Malone'south phone is heard on a wiretap in August 2013 complaining well-nigh the poor quality of a batch of heroin that wouldn't sell in the Baltimore market. "Information technology'southward like molasses," the person said, adding that he didn't desire to become a bad reputation past selling it.

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Five days after that call, police force-enforcement officials arrested Malone in his four-bedchamber business firm and found nearly a kilo of cocaine and 84 grams of heroin subconscious in a small ottoman in his basement. Police likewise found strainers, digital scales and plastic bags with white residue within. Abdalla estimates the combined street value of the drugs to be $150,000. Hours earlier, Stephen Williams, Malone'southward cousin, had been arrested as he left Malone's house with $20,000 in cash and nearly a kilo of cocaine in a -detergent box, which was within a blackness Under Armour bag.

"From my knowledge of his instance, we missed his money," says Abdalla. DEA officials say the financial portion of the investigation is ongoing.

Three of Malone's codefendants pleaded guilty. A fourth, Bidgell, who wasn't institute until May thirty, hasn't pleaded yet. None of those arrested provided the police force with pregnant information about the source of the drugs. "He surrounded himself with a trusted group of individuals," Abdalla says, "and they were very loyal to Curtis Malone."

*****

Let's start with the obvious: It is, of course, preposterous that a convicted crack dealer could get a ability broker in youth basketball. But Malone simply adjusted his skills from dealing drugs -- charisma, street savvy, discretion and organization -- to AAU and grassroots hoops.

Malone'due south basketball empire began in 1993 with a travel team at the Columbia Park (Medico.) Customs Center, which he ran with four friends. By the time Troy Weaver left in '96 to take an assistant coaching job at Pittsburgh, handing off leadership of the squad to Malone, D.C. Set on had evolved into a national business organization.

Malone quickly grasped that in the substantially unregulated youth basketball game world, the central is to acquire talent, because talent provides exposure, credibility and leverage, including access to college coaches, sneaker companies and NBA agents. "I ran my program as an amateur plan," says Rob Jackson, who oversaw the rival DC Blueish Devils. "He ran his every bit a concern. He sold kids to schools, sold kids to agents." Malone denies ever selling a player.

Non long before Malone took over D.C. Attack, he discovered a 6-pes-8 loftier school freshman with a guard's shooting touch at the Watts playground in Northeast D.C. Recognizing DerMarr Johnson's potential, Malone bought him Air Hashemite kingdom of jordan sneakers, Timberlands and a leather jacket. "I was like, Damn, this is my guy correct here," says Johnson.

Malone just adjusted his skills from dealing drugs -- charisma, street savvy, discretion and organisation -- to AAU and grassroots hoops.

Johnson had been living with his sister, merely in 1996 he moved in with Malone. His play surged. After Johnson's strong operation against Lamar Odom in an AAU tournament, boxes of Adidas gear showed upwards at Malone'southward apartment.

D.C. Assault had plenty cachet past the summer of 1996 that information technology pulled off a rare feat: appearances in signature summer events for both Adidas (the Big Time Tournament in Las Vegas) and Nike (the Peach Jam in Northward Augusta, S.C.). Assault'south roster, assembled largely by Malone, featured 4 futurity McDonald'south All-Americans: Johnson, Kevin Lyde (Temple), Mark Karcher (Temple) and Keith Bogans (Kentucky). With Johnson and Bogans rated by some scouting services as the country'southward top two players, Adidas executive Sonny Vaccaro signed Malone and D.C. Assault to an exclusive contract -- both Vaccaro and Malone think it existence for $50,000 per yr -- that cemented Assault's status as a national power.

Before meeting Malone, Johnson wasn't even eligible to compete in high schoolhouse basketball for academic reasons; Malone not only helped him study simply also guided him through iv schools in five years, using Johnson's case every bit a pattern for his future mentees. He became then close to the players -- traveling with them, giving them gear and even taking them in -- that they didn't mind if he tried to make coin off them. Malone did not coddle them; he sent Johnson for his final twelvemonth of high school to MaineCentral Found in a rural part of the state against Johnson's wishes. Malone steered Johnson to Cincinnati to play for Huggins, then encouraged him to declare for the NBA draft later on his freshman twelvemonth. Johnson signed with agent Dan Fegan before the 2000 draft considering, he told Sports Illustrated, "it was [Malone'due south] decision."

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Johnson told SI that his relationship with Malone happened organically, and that it was not exploitative. He considers Malone family. Malone discovered him, gave him a basketball game platform, sheltered him and fed him. "Regardless if he fabricated money off agents or Adidas or anyone else," Johnson says, "I know what he did for me."

And Johnson did enough for Malone. The Hawks chose the 6-9 Johnson with the sixth pick, and he gave Malone a Mercedes, paid him an allowance of $vi,500 per month and, over his showtime few years in the league, donated $15,000 per year to D.C. Assault. Subsequently his second flavor in the league, Johnson was in a motorcar blow, breaking four vertebrae. He played only 194 more games over the next five seasons.

A few months before Johnson was drafted, The Washington Post ran a story that referred to Malone's 1991 felony conviction for dealing crack cocaine and a '93 guilty plea for eluding law in a late-night machine hunt. But by so Malone had accumulated so much power that an arrest most a decade before didn't stop the college coaches from calling or the parents from sending their kids to Assault. His telephone never stopped ringing. "I'll purchase you a car, chain or sentinel," Johnson in one case told Malone, "but I'm not paying your cellphone bill."

Afterward he went pro, DerMarr Johnson (holding ball) gave Curtis Malone and D.C. Assault thousands of dollars.

Washington Post/Getty

*****

Michael Beasley played in just four playoff games for the Heat this twelvemonth, a garbage-fourth dimension reminder that he's hanging on in the NBA despite himself. Barely. In six seasons the half-dozen-nine forward has been arrested for marijuana possession, in rehab and out, benched repeatedly and waived.

After beingness called with the No. 2 pick out of Kansas Land by Miami -- ahead of Russell Westbrook and Kevin Love -- Beasley remains an All-Star talent with D-League reliability. Says Beasley of Curtis Malone, "He's my male parent. All the stuff that I accept been through, he'due south been at that place for me."

Is Malone a patient mentor who raised Beasley as a son and guided him through six high schools in v states? Or is he an opportunistic hustler who got close to Beasley to make something off him? Or both? "He invested in [Beasley]," says Dalonte Hill, who coached Beasley for Assault and later at Kansas State. "That's what investments practice: They pay off."

Hill remembers the day Beasley'south mother, Fatima Smith, called Malone and asked him take in her son, and then an eighth-grader. She told Malone that she could no longer handle him. "You lot accept to come become him," Hill recalls her maxim, "to save his life."

Around 2003, Malone tells SI, he brought Beasley to live with him and his married woman, Monica, and his ii stepchildren, Nolan, who was and so fifteen, and Sydney, 17. (Malone also has 2 daughters from previous relationships.) Monica is the widow of Derek Smith, a erstwhile Louisville and NBA star who died of a heart attack in 1996, at 34. Beasley played for Assault and settled into the basketball game-axial family. Nolan went on to win ACC player of the year equally a senior guard at Knuckles, in 2011, and is at present with Galatasaray in Istanbul. "We consider Mike to be our blood brother," says Sydney, pointing out their matching tattoos.

Malone pushed players such equally Michael Beasley (higher up) to colleges and agents of his choosing.

Jamie Squire/Getty

Malone stuck past Beasley afterwards he was kicked out of prep power Oak Hill Academy for several incidents, including auto-graphing an ambassador'south vehicle with a Sharpie, and he helped Beasley gain eligibility to college. Beasley commencement committed to UNC Charlotte when Hill, a former Set on player and i of Malone's closest friends, was an assistant in that location. After Colina moved to Kansas State, Beasley inverse his commitment and headed at that place too. His commitment to Kansas Land stuck only after the schoolhouse bumped Hill'due south annual salary to $420,000 from $105,000, making him the highest-paid banana in the country. The rural school turned out to exist a expert fit for Beasley, who stayed out of trouble under double-decker Frank Martin and every bit a freshman averaged 26.ii points and 12.4 rebounds.

Trouble came when Beasley was preparing to enter the draft. Beasley says that Malone bundled for him to be represented by Joel Bell, a mid-level amanuensis in the D.C. area whose two sons played for Assault. A lawsuit filed by Beasley contends that Bell gave Malone "benefits for his D.C. Assault program" and money "in commutation for [Malone] at to the lowest degree attempting to manipulate prospects like -Beasley" into signing with Bell. The conform was dropped, and no evidence emerged to support the claims. When reached by SI, Bong declined to comment.

Agents have long used brokers to deliver athletes to them from AAU programs. Martin, at present with South Carolina, says he knew of an arrangement between Malone and Bong. "I won't tell y'all I didn't know about information technology," he says. "Of course I knew about it. Agents run the NBA, agents run grassroots basketball."

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Still, Bong and Malone made an unlikely pair, the B-list agent and the street-smart youth coach with a cleft confidence. Malone told SI he aspired to work with Bong, although his past felonies and lack of college degree would accept made him an unlikely agent. Malone said that he had discussions with Bell about coming upwardly with some organisation to eventually go him out of the AAU game, and Bell overtook Fegan every bit the go-to agent for former D.C. Assail players. Former Villanova forward Dante Cunningham, Georgetown baby-sit Austin Freeman and Nolan Smith, who would exist picked by the Blazers in the first circular, all signed with Bell between 2009 and '11. The connection with Malone and Beasley helped Bell sign middle DeAndre Hashemite kingdom of jordan, now with the Clippers, in '08. DerMarr Johnson says he switched to Bell belatedly in his career at the urging of Malone. "Joel was his guy, and Curtis was my guy," says Johnson.

Beasley fired Bong before he played an NBA game because he felt he wasn't getting enough endorsements. Bong sued, and Beasley filed the counter-conform, naming Malone as a third party. At present Hill and Beasley no longer speak. Neither practice Beasley and Malone. "I really retrieve that was [Malone'due south] breaking point," says a friend of Malone's. "The Beasley affair rattled Curtis, bankrupt his middle and got him off track. That was going to exist his ticket, he was riding off into the sunset."

*****

Drug dealers often court prissy-guy reputations. They pick up the tab for kids when the ice cream truck rolls by, and they put up basketball rims on the blacktop. They endear themselves to the same neighborhoods they poison.

Through D.C. Attack, Malone appeared to exist someone committed to helping kids. A fake mag cover with a photograph of Malone, artillery crossed, under the headline success, hung on a wall in his home function. He controlled so much talent that coaches recruited his players, hired his coaches and overlooked his by indiscretions. Three of ten recruited scholarship players on the Duke roster in 2010–11 were from D.C. Assault. "I think anybody was shocked," says Blue Devils coach Mike Krzyzewski of Malone's drug-dealing career. "How would y'all know that? I feel bad for the family. He'southward been a smashing father to Nolan."

But some weren't shocked. When he was omnibus at Maryland, Gary Williams refused to bargain with Malone, telling his administration that he wasn't going to deal with a drug dealer. "I know what he is," Williams, who declined to annotate for this story, told The Washington Mail service in 2009.

To get access to Malone's players, a college would frequently have to hire Assault coaches, and this only extended Malone's power and reach. Nearly a dozen Assail coaches have joined higher staffs in the final decade. Mark Turgeon, who replaced Williams with the Terps in 2011, immediately hired Hill from Kansas State. Turgeon declined to comment to SI, but this gave Maryland, Under Armour'south flagship Division I basketball program, access to Under Armour's tiptop AAU program. "You can telephone call information technology dingy business," says longtime Maryland loftier school coach Bob Wagner, "or you can telephone call it commercialism."

Business hasn't gone well in College Park. Colina stepped downwards at Maryland final yr afterwards his 3rd DUI arrest became public, and Turgeon'south job is in danger after three years without making the NCAA tournament. "It makes Gary Williams look pretty good," says former Georgetown motorbus Craig Esherick, now a professor of sport management at George Mason.

Was Curtis Malone interested in coaching basketball and helping immature players or simply furthering his wealth and influence?

Washington Post/Getty

As the bear witness against Malone piled upward, law enforcement wondered how people close to him could not have suspected something. True, he had a $500,000 Under Armour contract, but he says that $300,000 of that went for equipment and the balance for expenses. Nevertheless he drove a Jeep Cherokee SRT8 that police enforcement officials say was worth nearly $90,000. Before that he drove an $lxxx,000 Range Rover. (Malone says the Cherokee was worth only $70,000 and that it was a gift from Monica.)

Malone also had expensive habits, including daily eating house visits that frequently resulted in $1,000 tabs. Law enforcement became familiar with his routine. He'd starting time effectually xi a.grand. at the Sometime Towne Inn in Upper Marlboro, movement to Outback Steakhouse or Jerry'southward Seafood around dinner, and and so to Jaspers, a bustling bar-restaurant, at nighttime. He drank Bacardi mixed with Diet Coke, attracted large groups and commonly picked up the check, in cash. The staff at Jaspers knew him well. During a phone conversation from a D.C. jail with a friend, the friend handed the phone to a Jaspers bartender. "The bottles of Bacardi are not being touched," she told Malone.

Both Malone and constabulary-enforcement officials say that he never used cocaine or heroin. Alcohol was his drug of choice. When asked if he is an alcoholic, Malone told SI he was a "functional alcoholic" and smiled. Malone had a dominion that he never collection with drugs in his motorcar, and he brash i of the runners in his drug operation how to handle questions when his significant other asked about his "second job." He was asked the aforementioned questions by Monica. "But mind your business," he'd tell her. "What you don't know, y'all can't tell."

Even as Malone veered toward drug dealing -- Abdalla says it started effectually 2007, Malone says around 2010 -- he connected to run one of the country'due south most prominent AAU teams. Malone couldn't actually coach the teams anymore; the AAU has since instituted a policy preventing people with criminal records from coaching, so Malone became a GM.

"I know a lot of kids whom he's really, really helped," says Jones. "Which makes the story that much sadder."

Malone grew the programme to 17 teams with dozens of coaches. Former Assault passenger vehicle Eric Skeeters, now an assistant at George Mason, says that Malone made a phone call to Virginia Tech jitney Seth Greenberg that changed his career. Says Skeeters, "[Malone] said he told Seth Greenberg, 'You can get whatever you desire, any you need from our programme.'" Two days later Skeeters flew to Blacksburg to interview with Greenberg. He was offered the job on the spot, and he accustomed. "Eric did a corking job in the interview and Curtis'south call had an impact," says Greenberg. "Recruiting is about relationships." Malone followed through, as Assault forward Deron Washington, one of three Virginia Tech players drafted since 1999, shortly committed to the Hokies. "Curt was a businessman," Skeeters says. "He understood the business of basketball."

Those effectually Malone say his benevolence extended beyond coaches and stars. Onetime Assault backup Devin Sweetney, who played at St. Francis (Pa.) from 2006 through 2010, says that Malone paid his mother's $1,500 rent one month when she came up short and he too pushed him to amend his grades. "You're not going to hear me say a bad thing about him," says DeMatha Catholic High coach Mike Jones. "I know a lot of kids whom he'southward actually, really helped. Which makes the story that much sadder."

*****

The rolling HILLS of central Pennsylvania, Curtis Malone's home for the next 99 months, are more reminiscent of Salzburg than of Shawshank. The verdant properties, bocce courts and able-bodied facilities at the minimum-security annex of Lewisburg prison draw this comparison from Malone: "Summer camp."

He appears for a three-hr interview without shackles or handcuffs. The most distinctive office of his compatible is the black Nikes poking from the cuffs of his drab tan trousers. "Isn't that funny?" says Malone, an Adidas or Nether Armor man for nearly twenty years. "They would love to encounter me wearing these."

It may not be hard fourth dimension on the rock, but Malone'southward life is different now. He's lost 12 to fifteen pounds in barely a month, from exercise and from non drinking alcohol. He has thought plenty nigh his prototype. He has held on to his charm and charisma, and when asked questions, he denies some allegations, dodges others and rationalizes the rest. "Did I accept care of people with my drug money?" Malone says. "Admittedly!"

Malone downplays his trafficking, maxim it was a side chore he dabbled in when he needed cash. He brags of making $5,000 to $10,000 a day selling crack in the early 1990s simply says he just trafficked drugs in recent years as "a mode of taking intendance of Curtis." What almost the $fourscore,000 monthly turn a profit that police-enforcement- officials estimates he made? The junkies whose habits he fueled? The families he destroyed? "You don't look at who it's harming, yous get defenseless up in what you tin exercise [to help other people]," he says. "I can look in the mirror."

One minute Malone claims purity in how he ran D.C. Set on: "In 20 years of doing this I take never sold a kid in no kind of way or fabricated $1 off him. Nosotros did it from the bottom of our hearts." A few minutes afterwards he mentions the vi-figure salary he made as a consultant to agents and claims college coaches accept received agent kickbacks for years, and so why shouldn't he? "When a guy like me learns the business," Malone says, "information technology screws it all up."

He withal speaks as if he's running Set on, which is at present called D.C. Premier and is overseen by Damon Handon and Mike Sumner, 2 of Malone'southward quondam aides. (For reasons neither volition share, Malone and Handon practice non speak.) He brags that if he weren't in jail, McDonald's All-American guard Romelo Trimble never would have "stepped pes on Maryland's campus" unless Turgeon hired an Assault coach.

Malone was well-nigh emotional when discussing Beasley. He resents that after taking Beasley in and spending thousands of dollars on him, his mother reemerged as the master influence in his life -- just when he was virtually to reap NBA millions. Malone believes that if he had connected to advise him, Beasley would be on target to make $300 1000000. By firing Bell, Beasley derailed Malone'southward plan to leave the AAU world and enter the amanuensis game. "Information technology was time for me to accept things to another level and make good coin," he says.

When asked about his fiscal arrangement with Bell, Malone smiles and says, "The details volition exist in the book."

Malone says he'd like to open up up a business or ii when he's released, but says he'd similar to avoid the hustle of either of his former professions. "One matter I learned," he says. "You can't have i human foot in and i human foot out. That was always the problem."

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Source: https://www.si.com/college/2014/08/20/curtis-malone-aau-basketball-drug-arrest

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