"White Boy Rick" Wershe [To be Released July 20]

**DaveyM** · March-23-15, 02:24 PM

An interesting read that should appeal to most Detroiters [[and former Detroiters). http://www.thedimedroppers.com/2015/...an-youngs.html

**DaveyM** · March-23-15, 02:57 PM

An interesting read that should appeal to most Detroiters [[or former Detroiters).. http://www.thedimedroppers.com/2015/...an-youngs.html

Vince Wade, a former investigative TV reporter in Detroit, has launched a blog that will initially focus on the wrongful, ongoing imprisonment of [[former) teenage drug dealer Richard Wershe. - http://www.deadlinedetroit.com/artic...g#.VQt-dWbD_cc

**T.Low** · March-23-15, 11:31 PM

Gee, let's glorify another drug dealer...have we learned nothing?

**Django** · March-24-15, 09:21 AM

Who is glorifying a drug dealer? This was a kid who made some mistakes and has spent 27 years behind bars. This is not about glorifying anyone but about wrongfull imprisonment. Read the story before you get your panties in a bunch.

**rex** · March-25-15, 10:17 AM

fact that he told on anyone and everyone to save his own skin doesn't exactly endear his cause to me. Seems like an asshole tbh and an extraordinarily selfish one at that. Now that said he was a kid being manipulated by master manipulators. People who manipulate occupationally. Fact that he was arrested for being a drug dealer at 17 is just convenient for the courts. He was groomed by feds for that shit. What other possible outcome could they expect. He should have been punished when he went off the reservation but to the tune of IDK 5 years. Im surprised nobody got to him in prison

**Bobl** · March-25-15, 11:50 AM

Reads like an Elmore James novel, but this is not fiction. Vince Wade has had a long career as a journalist, and knows this town well.

**DetBill** · March-25-15, 10:43 PM

Kalliope , a.k.a. Kay Resh, the lady referred to in Vinces blog, is a very close personal family friend, almost a second mother.
She was very glad to be involved in this. The stories Kay has told us over the years about past mayors , chiefs of staff, department heads, would melt ice in 1 second. The corruption going on was unbelievable, even for Detroit . What Vince writes is very credible.

**T.Low** · March-25-15, 11:30 PM

Originally Posted by Django

Who is glorifying a drug dealer? This was a kid who made some mistakes and has spent 27 years behind bars. This is not about glorifying anyone but about wrongfull imprisonment. Read the story before you get your panties in a bunch.

Are you kidding me? I was a kid who made some mistakes. He was a major player in an industry that took this city to hell. With all the issues this city has, how is anybody paying attention to him.

**DaveyM** · March-26-15, 09:17 PM

Originally Posted by T.Low

Gee, let's glorify another drug dealer...have we learned nothing?

As Django already stated, no one is trying to glorify the mistakes Rick made as a juvenile. That's also the last thing Rick himself wants to happen.

"But if they want to glorify this white kid in the ghetto who sold all these drugs, then I don't want anything to do with it." - http://deadlinedetroit.com/articles/...l#.VRS9Q9xV06w

**DaveyM** · March-26-15, 09:20 PM

Originally Posted by Bobl

Reads like an Elmore James novel, but this is not fiction. Vince Wade has had a long career as a journalist, and knows this town well.

True. He has a lot more interesting things in store for his blog.

**DaveyM** · March-26-15, 09:24 PM

Originally Posted by T.Low

Are you kidding me? I was a kid who made some mistakes. He was a major player in an industry that took this city to hell. With all the issues this city has, how is anybody paying attention to him.

Rick dealt drugs [[on his own) for 11 months before he was arrested for the charge that sent him to prison for life. That "industry" came to his neighborhood and that's why a drug task force recruited him at 14 years old. To go after a drug gang that had moved into his neighborhood. Rick was small time compared to the real "major players" in the drug game in Detroit at the time. The media and others over hyped his case and helped create the myth known as "White Boy Rick".

"Criminal defense attorney Steve Fishman wrote this column in response to a column by Deadline Detroit's Allan Lengel, who insisted that the Michigan Parole Board is committing a crime by keeping Richard "White Boy Rick" Wershe Jr. behind bars for 26 years. Wershe was convicted of cocaine trafficking as a teenager and was sentenced to life without parole under a law that mandated the unparolable sentence if caught with more than 650 grams of cocaine. The law was later changed and he was re-sentenced to life with the possibility of parole.

Fishman authored a letter to the administration of Gov. Jennifer Granholm on behalf of a group of people pushing for clemency for Wershe. Wershe was never a client, and Fishman did not know him while he was on the streets. Fishman said it was just the right thing to do to advocate for his release.

By Steve Fishman

To my knowledge, Rick Wershe is the only person in Michigan still serving a life sentence for possession of over 650 grams. Everyone else, including at least one of my clients who was also a teenager at the time of the crime, has received parole since the drug statute changed.

Those of us who are old enough can recall the media hoopla when a 17-year old white kid with the media-friendly nickname "White Boy Rick" was alleged to be the capo di tutti capi of all the drug lords in Detroit in the mid-to late 80s.

As a lawyer who represented many of the guys who were in fact the top dogs in the drug business in those days, the notion that a 17-year old kid - black, white, or purple - could have been the boss of those grown men is so ridiculous as to deserve no further comment. And to suggest, as the Parole Board spokesman did in the article, that Rick Wershe's situation is comparable to other lifers - most of them serving sentences for violent crimes - is an insult to our collective intelligence.

Given the number of people supporting parole for Rick Wershe, including police officers, federal agents, prosecutors, and lawyers, the only possible explanation for his continued incarceration is a lack of guts on the part of the Parole Board.

It is long past time for the Board to recognize, as so many people involved in law enforcement already have, that the time has come to grant him a parole." - http://www.deadlinedetroit.com/artic...k#.VJNVpWYo7IU

**T.Low** · March-27-15, 02:32 PM

Many times I was the only white guy on a any given basketball court in the city. I was called "The Fall Guy" because I drove a brown lifted 4x4 pickup truck like the Lee Majors character, or White Boy Rick, for obvious reason that I was the only white guy in the game. This would inevitably lead to comments and conversations about him, a lot of first hand experience. I knew more than the media frenzy.

**DaveyM** · April-09-15, 12:39 PM

Last Sunday's blog post from former Detroit TV news investigative reporter and special projects producer Vince Wade's blog. A passage from the post:

"The Curry organization was cruising along selling cocaine and raking in piles of cash. Then the FBI discovered that a white kid in the Curry’s neighborhood was friendly with them, and was trusted. That kid was Richard J. Wershe, Jr., later to be known as White Boy Rick.

For the FBI Rick was a gold mine of information about the Currys. There was just one problem. He was 14 years old. Recruiting a 14-year old to be an FBI confidential informant was dangerous business. The feds did it anyway.

Wershe went on to become a prolific FBI informant about Detroit’s drug underworld. Retired Detroit FBI agent John Anthony says Rick Wershe is arguably the most productive informant the FBI’s Detroit office has ever had in terms of convictions made with his help. Yet, Wershe remains in prison, denied parole for vague and mysterious reasons.

Future posts on Informant America will use law enforcement’s own documents and files to show the claim that Richard Wershe Jr. was a drug lord, a drug kingpin and a menace to society is totally false." - http://www.thedimedroppers.com/2015/...f-detroit.html

**T.Low** · April-09-15, 04:22 PM

Personally, I don't trust either of the three sides to tell me the truth: The press, the FBI, or the Drug Dealers. Once a person enters into the illicit drug world all bets are off.

**DaveyM** · June-09-15, 08:07 AM

"The story of Richard Wershe Jr., aka the infamous White Boy Rick, is convoluted to say the least. But the facts of the case that remain true are that he has been in jail since 1988 for a nonviolent drug offense committed while he was still a juvenile. Convicted under Michigan’s 650 Lifer Law, which has since been repealed, he is the only person still imprisoned under the old law. And everyone keeps asking: Why is this man still in prison when murderers, rapists, drug kingpins and even the corrupt cops and drug dealers that he helped to put away are out?" - http://www.thefix.com/content/white-...h-ferranti0515

**DaveyM** · June-09-15, 08:11 AM

This latest film project that has been announced will be the one to tell the real story [[the truth). The hope is that these planned movies can help Rick gain his release.

http://michiganradio.org/post/detroi...ll-behind-bars

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/new...ck-film-791276

http://www.thewrap.com/darren-aronof...s-cooperation/

Please consider signing and sharing this petition if you think Rick deserves a 2nd chance. -> http://www.change.org/petitions/free...oy-rick-wershe

p.s. R.I.P. Django. I'm sorry we never got to meet in person. Rick received your book soon after your passing.

**Meddle** · June-09-15, 02:53 PM

Please consider signing and sharing this petition ...

Not a chance.

Not really wishing ill will, but in a way, I'd almost wish someone would shank this punk in prison. If for no other reason than to end threads like this.

**subsidized** · June-09-15, 03:13 PM

Originally Posted by Meddle

Not a chance.

Not really wishing ill will, but in a way, I'd almost wish someone would shank this punk in prison. If for no other reason than to end threads like this.

Ha, that is definitely wishing ill will. But I'll support it.

**Scottathew** · September-03-15, 07:23 AM

http://www.freep.com/story/news/loca...iday/71610430/

Richard Wershe Jr., a convicted drug dealer and former police informant known as White Boy Rick, is scheduled to appear in a Detroit courtroom Friday morning.

His attorney, Ralph Musilli, filed a motion in Wayne County Circuit Court asking a judge to vacate the life sentence Wershe is serving and re-sentence him. A hearing will be held Friday on it.

Wershe, 46, was sentenced to life in prison without parole when he was 18 after being convicted of possession with intent to deliver more than 650 grams of cocaine, worth about $5 million.

...

**Hypestyles** · September-03-15, 11:59 AM

So who is paying for his legal defense, if his money assets were seized years ago? Is it Kid Rock?

**Dan Wesson** · September-12-15, 06:53 AM

Another interesting read about Wershe. Worth it....

https://read.atavist.com/white-boy-rick

**DaveyM** · September-19-15, 11:13 PM

Originally Posted by Hypestyles

So who is paying for his legal defense, if his money assets were seized years ago? Is it Kid Rock?

His long time lawyer Ralph has been doing what he does for free. Rick is penniless and has been since he was locked up decades ago. Bobby [[Kid) has nothing to do with Rick's case.

**DaveyM** · September-19-15, 11:16 PM

Originally Posted by Dan Wesson

Another interesting read about Wershe. Worth it....

https://read.atavist.com/white-boy-rick

That piece by Evan is the more complete and accurate overview of Rick's case that is out there. The author, Evan Hughes was just interviewed on CNN recently.

http://www.cnn.com/videos/justice/20...ed-intv-lv.cnn

A MUST READ piece from Vince Wade's blog! http://www.thedimedroppers.com/2015/...ds-do-not.html