The Reformed Kingpin That Inspired ‘The Wire’
Melvin Williams was the basis of a main antagonist of the show
“This isn’t a war against drugs. This is a war against Black folks.” — Melvin Williams, “The Heroin King of Baltimore”
One of my favorite minor characters in The Wire, my favorite show ever, was the Deacon. He was incredibly insightful and devoted himself to being a community leader who helped ex-convicts adapt to life outside prison. In real life, the Deacon’s actor was Melvin Williams, a former drug kingpin turned actor, a role he took after he himself got out of jail himself. Williams and his story inspired the character of Avon Barksdale, a narcotics kingpin and a main antagonist in the early parts of the show.
This is the story of Melvin Williams’s rise, fall, and redemption as a Baltimore City heroin kingpin and actor.
History
According to Derick Prince in the documentary The Heroin King of Baltimore, before Melvin Williams got into drug trafficking, he sold newspapers on the street as a teenager. As a kid, he invented a form of early gambling, and then he played dice games with men on the street. He observed how they would exchange money and got into dice, teaching himself the odds on how to best play dice. He started practicing so the dice would…
