Jacksonville Jaguars Community Report 2016-2017 | Page 11

MARQISE LEE
Growing up in Long Beach, California, gang
wars, violence, poverty and drugs were an
everyday setting for most of us. We lived
in a constant battle of good and evil, with
evil unfortunately overpowering the good in
most cases.
As a child, I saw things happening around
me that I didn’t completely understand,
and as time passed I started to believe
that it was just the way of life. I had two
older brothers who were members of one of
the most prominent gangs in Long Beach
and always in and out of trouble. There
was a perceived benefit of love, financial
opportunity and the sense of belonging
that gang life offered, and if at home you
lacked any of these, chances are you ended
up selling yourself in. There was a time I
considered this life and the one thing that
stopped me were my brothers who protected me against making the same decisions
they had.