An ex-con shows others how to live life outside prison walls

Before the coronavirus outbreak forced the cancellation of gatherings, 2nd Call met every Thursday night in a church basement in South Los Angeles. John “Big John” Harriel Jr. led the meetings to teach other former convicts how to live life outside prison walls.

By Cindy ChangStaff Writer

April 17, 2020 3 AM PT

You can’t hide in the back. You can’t sneak in late. Big John will make you answer.

Your name. How you’re feeling. Where you’ve been. Where you’re headed.

Kyung is one of the first to speak. He is electrified. Everything is going right. He has an important interview tomorrow.

Big John howls in appreciation. Then he asks, “Ever been in that special place?”

“Yes, sir, I have. Altogether, about 10 years.” Kyung’s face is weathered, as if marked by the troubles he has seen.

“Ten years, all right,” Big John says. “And you’re about to become an electrician.”

Until the novel coronavirus hit, anyone who needed a job, some encouragement, or a way to avoid past mistakes, was welcome Thursday nights in this church basement at 35th and Normandie in South Los Angeles, an area plagued by gang violence, a lack of well-paying work, the revolving prison doors.

Many have been to what Big John calls that special place, that gated community. By his calculations, the 50 or so people in the room on this night have collectively logged about 400 years behind bars.

Many at 2nd Call have served prison time and are now working as union electricians or carpenters.

As part of a program called 2nd Call, they learn how to become union electricians or carpenters, how to keep those jobs, how to confront trauma and depression, how to be good fathers and mothers, spouses, sons, daughters and friends.

Big John, whose full name is John Elliott Harriel Jr., taps one person after another, eliciting snapshots of their lives with a quick patter of questions, as he does on this night, before social distancing kicked in.

Exams passed, careers made — it is a mantra of success, relished again and again. If he can do it, so can you.

“How you feel, Sal?” Big John asks.

Sal feels blessed. He will finish electrician boot camp on Sunday.

“OK, how’d you get that?” Big John says.

“Right here at 2nd Call,” Sal responds.

“You ever been to prison?”

“Yes, sir.”

“How much time you do?”

“Just finished doing 14.”

“Man, your life is about to change, buddy.”

The gray floor is pockmarked. Fluorescent lights illuminate the faces of the people seated around a large square table, against the walls, in rows stretching to the back, most of them men, most of them African American, some clad in work boots and long-sleeved T-shirts bearing the logos of construction contractors.

As the nickname implies, Big John, 50, fills out his black Local Union 11 sweatshirt, his direct manner more intimidating for his bulk. But he is quick with a joke or sympathetic word to leaven his bluntness.

And he has been there.

Topics at 2nd Call meetings include forgiveness, leadership and self-esteem.

“My name is John,” he says. “I feel excellent that I ain’t dead or in jail. Have I been to jail? Yes. But I keep those things behind me. I try to look in that rear-view mirror just for a reference, that’s it, to make sure I don’t put myself in no situations.”

After serving seven years for drug offenses in the 1990s, Big John was determined not to go back. A fellow inmate had taught him basic electrical skills, and he found work in the trade. Eventually, he met Skipp Townsend, who had started 2nd Call with Kenny Smith and was trying to get jobs for gang members.

Big John became a conduit to highly paid union jobs. He knew what kind of work ethic and interpersonal skills it took to thrive in those jobs — hence, the Thursday night meetings, which he has led since 2009, every week except Thanksgiving, in a space lent by a sympathetic pastor. The small stipend 2nd Call could offer pales compared to what Big John makes as a supervisor at the electrical contractor Morrow Meadows, so he accepts no payment.

Townsend, the bald and bespectacled eminence of the Los Angeles gang intervention world, is 2nd Call’s executive director and is usually at Big John’s side on Thursday nights, though he is absent tonight.

“My name is John," John Harriel Jr. says. "I feel excellent that I ain’t dead or in jail. Have I been to jail? Yes. But I keep those things behind me."

Big John has put his own touch on a format pioneered by 2nd Call, drawing on a repertoire of topics key to life and work: forgiveness, leadership, self-esteem, excuses. He quickly schools newcomers in the lingo. Careers, not jobs. Speak only for yourself — no “we’s” or “you’s.” The 2nd Call wolf pack takes care of its own.

Until the pandemic, some people came by every Thursday, week after week, year after year, long after establishing themselves in their careers. Others sought out the meetings when they were in a rut.

For the most part, they introduce themselves using first names only: Sal, Tak, Deontae, Vince. Next is Nikia.

“This program, I’ve been through so many of them, so you know,” Nikia begins.

Big John cuts him off.

“First of all, throw the word ‘program’ out of your vocabulary. It’s not a program. It’s a way of life. Ain’t no beginning, ain’t no end.”

Nikia is back from 22 years in the penitentiary.

“Hoooh-oooh,” Big John marvels. “Welcome home.”

Something troubling happened the night before, Big John says, hinting at a disagreement at a job site involving people from 2nd Call.

Column One

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