Dude, I think if you look back just a bit further, you see the root of the problem. Absent dad, desperately alcoholic mother, horrible environment. He admits in the title, text, and Peter Pan theme of the story that he didn’t connect behavior with consequences. In that context, given his past, he’s not really making decisions as much as he is caught in a flow. Yes, it would be a bad decision to be dealing crack, but he was never shown any option to that, which is one thing parents are for. He didn’t give up his life- he didn’t really have much of a life to give up. The system failed him over and over, especially the prison industry. I would have done no better, except that I am white. What he needs now is an art dealer that gives him 95% of the commission, instead of the usual 50%. He has paid his dues.