Crime

'White Boy Rick' Says He'd Love to See Movie on His Life If It's Truthful

October 15, 2014, 4:10 PM by  Allan Lengel

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Convicted drug trafficker Richard "White Boy Rick" Wershe Jr., who is trying to get paroled after more than 26 years behind bars, says he welcomes a movie about his life if it's gets out the truth.

"Listen, if it will get the truth out there,  I'll love it," he told Deadline Detroit during a phone interview from prison on Wednesday afternoon.

His comments came just days after it was reported on Friday that Universal Studios has secured the rights to  a true-crime story about Wershe to produce a movie. "Oblivion" director Joseph Kosinski would direct.

The rights are for an article written by journalist Evan Hughes,  "The Trials of White Boy Rick."

Wershe, 45, who is currently being housed in the Oaks Correctional Facility in Manistee in Northern Michigan, said he hasn't yet been approached about helping the folks with a movie. He says he's willing to help.

"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."

He said the real story is that a task force comprised of the FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration and Detroit Police,  lured him into the Detroit drug trade as a young teenager in the 1980s so they could use him as an informant. Then the task force walked away when it was done with him. He was eventually busted at age 17 and sentenced to life without parole. He was later re-sentenced to life with the possibility of parole, but has been denied parole. 

He says the story comes down this: 

"Law enforcement got me involved in drugs, they left me involved in drugs when I stopped working for them. I was blinded by the money and the women and the lifestyle in general. I was kid. I was impressionable."

Wershe currently has a case in U.S. District Court in Grand Rapids where he's trying to get the court to push for a fair parole hearing before the state, something he feels he hasn't gotten.

Also read:

Studio Buys the Rights to 'White Boy Rick' Story For Movie (Deadline Detroit, Oct. 10)

 



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