June 17, 2024 • 20 mins
On this episode of Our American Stories, meet Carlos Colon, a Chicago man who joined a gang as a teenager, murdered a man, found salvation in prison, and now has a family and a new life.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:23):
This is our American stories, and as you know, some
of our favorite stories and some of your favorite stories
on this show are redemption stories, come back stories about
people who turn their lives around, which brings us to
our next story. It comes from the documentary The Father
I Never Knew, a movie that tracks the lives of
former gang members that were raised without a positive father figure,
(00:46):
which you can find on Amazon Prime. The director Don
Albert graciously gave us the interviews to tell these stories,
and now we bring you the story of Carlos Cologne.
Speaker 2 (01:01):
I was born in Chicago, Illinois, being Humble Park from
the seventies on through the nineties. It was pretty drastic
growing up with a single mom. You know, the gangs
was pretty bad in the neighborhood and poverty was at
its worst. I would think about it now, I think
(01:22):
about my upbringing and there was a lot of empty lots.
Speaker 3 (01:26):
So there wasn't no playgrounds.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
There was just empty lots, no you know, where no
buildings were and where they used to be. So a
lot of times, you know, we turned to the streets,
and you know, you come from a dysfunctional home where
you see drug abuse from different men. In my mom's
lives and domestic abuse.
Speaker 3 (01:48):
I would turned to the streets.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
I spent most of my life in prison from juvenile
on through my adulthood. Single mother, never knew my dad,
and my mom was in two abusive relationships, so that
had its toe. I was missing the father's love, you know,
for her son, and not only that, but a complete
(02:12):
family something you know, A father's supposed to be, you know,
sense of security.
Speaker 3 (02:17):
He's supposed to be the one to provide, and we
didn't have that in my house. So I never knew
what it was like to grow up a man.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
I pretty much was playing the guessing game and going
off of a lot of bad examples in my life
ahead of me, and so the.
Speaker 3 (02:33):
Streets from my father.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
In my teen years, I joined a gang, you know,
and I clung to that. And what attracted me to
the gang was actually just the unity. We all had
something in common. A lot of us were miserable. We
had no fathers in our lives, and so it's like
a pack of dogs, you know. They we hung together,
and we clung together, and I.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
Spiraled real fast.
Speaker 2 (03:02):
We would steal a car in the city, a beat
up car, go to O'Hare Airport and look for a
nice car, something with rims and speakers and sound system,
and we would try to bring it back to Chicago
and sell it. So we were doing this for a
while now and we got caught. And when they caught us,
it seemed like they were investigating.
Speaker 3 (03:23):
So there was like.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
Six or seven cars that they charged us with, which trust.
Speaker 3 (03:28):
Me, we did take.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
But I ended up going fighting the case out as
best I can, and I ended up getting probation.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
The rules were too much for me. I couldn't handle.
They had house arrests and I had to do all.
Speaker 2 (03:40):
These crazy things just to stay out of jail, which
I violated. So I eventually ended up going to juvenile
detention center, which is like juvenile.
Speaker 3 (03:48):
Prison, and that's where I spent.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
A lot of time in and out of until you know,
I got out at about I think I was seventeen
when I got out, So from fifteen to seventeen, I
spent most of my time in and out of juvenile detention.
And once I went into juvenile I was being trained.
Speaker 3 (04:07):
For when I got out. To be worse, we were.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
A small gang, so by being a small gang, we
had more to prove than these big gangs. You know,
it's not like, oh, you know, we were well established
in Chicago. No, we were a small gang. We had
one corner, and in that corner, it was only if
there were fifty of us, which some people might think
fifty is a lot of people, but there's hundreds and
(04:35):
thousands of gangs out here. There could be no war
going on, because a lot of times we'll go into
war and we'll fight with each other. I remember I
would be driving with my buddies and we would see
someone's car and would say, Hey, that's so and so's
car from this neighborhood, and it's someone we don't like,
and we would already know, okay, his car's parked here
(04:56):
tomorrow or tonight in the late night, we're.
Speaker 3 (04:58):
Going to burn his car.
Speaker 2 (05:00):
And we would burn cars, break windows, even to the
point where sometimes we would go to other neighborhoods and
jump out on people and jump them and act like
we were a different gang, just because for the thrill
of it, because we wanted to instill damage. And I
would say, even at twenty, it got to the point where, now.
Speaker 3 (05:22):
If we could catch you but no one was around them, and.
Speaker 2 (05:25):
We had a gun on us, we would actually try
to kill you.
Speaker 3 (05:27):
You know, we would see if we could get.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
Away with it, or at least shoot you or something
without you knowing it was us. That's how bad it was,
you know it. It just escalated from you know, stealing
cars in my life to knives, bats, guns and murder eventually.
And I remember getting into a shootout with somebody getting away,
(05:49):
telling a friend of mine about it, and after I
spoke to him about it, shortly afterwards, they came back.
Speaker 3 (06:00):
I got shot.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
I got shot in the hand and in the leg,
and I did about a month or two in the
hospital recovering, and during that time, the war was still
going on.
Speaker 3 (06:09):
Pretty much.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
It started because I got shot. My buddy got killed,
so that took its.
Speaker 3 (06:15):
Toll on me too. You know.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
He's a friend of mine who he his dad passed
away and got killed, so he grew up without a father,
and so I was.
Speaker 3 (06:23):
Bringing him up into the gangs, and next thing, you know,
he's dead.
Speaker 2 (06:26):
So I thought that was my responsibility, and I wanted
to take I wanted revenge, you know, for so much
it was like just a pot of so much boiling
and brewing, and I wanted to get revenge. So I
got out of the hospital, and you know, when I.
Speaker 3 (06:42):
Got shot, I got shot because I ran out of bullets.
So I didn't want that to happen no more.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
And I remember saying, well, I'm gonna buy two guns,
and I keep one on me, and when I'm walking
with somebody, I let them hold the other one just.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
To be safe.
Speaker 2 (06:57):
And as I was healing and recuperating, and you know,
I couldn't run, I was still walking with Caine, I
ran into one of the guys who was involved in
my shooting. I shot him five times, and shortly afterwards
they pronounced him dead at the hospital and the cops were.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
Looking for me. It's funny because he was his only witness.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
But what happened was the cops actually grabbed one of
the guys from my neighborhood, and instead of being a
stand up.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
Guy, he actually ratted me out.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
And so once I knew that the cops were looking
for me, it was over with for me.
Speaker 3 (07:34):
I had to leave the neighborhood. Chicago wasn't an option
no more.
Speaker 2 (07:41):
So I fled and I ended up from you know,
to Ohio, to Florida, Puerto Rico, Ohio back to Florida
for about about eleven months I was a fugitive. I
was working at this furniture warehouse under a different name.
I just made the union and everything. So I was
meeting a lot of people, the big wigs from the
(08:01):
warehouse corporate and I remember my supervisor walking up to
me with this man, and I'm thinking, Okay, I'm going
to meet another supervisor. And when I shook his hand,
he actually was an Orlando police offerer, Sir that the
extradition came over, and they actually the warrant came and
they arrested me there, and then the Chicago police came and.
Speaker 3 (08:23):
Got me and took me back to Chicago.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
And it wasn't easy because I had a child on
the way myself from a previous relationship, and so this
will be my.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
First my first born. It was my son.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
That was crazy because I grew up without a father.
Speaker 3 (08:43):
Knowing who my real father was.
Speaker 2 (08:45):
I found out he grew up without a father, and
now I'm going to have a son who's going to
grow up without a father, and I wanted I didn't
want that to happen. So that's pretty much how I
ended up getting caught. Because as I try to keep
a relationship with him.
Speaker 1 (09:05):
And you're listening to Carlos Cologne, and my goodness, as
he said about life in Humboldt Park in Chicago from
the seventies to the nineties, it was pretty drastic. What
a tragic story thus far. When we come back more
of Carlos Cologne's story here on our American stories and
(09:39):
we continue with our American stories. In Carlos Cologne's story,
he had joined a Chicago gang at a young age,
killed a man and was on the run from the cops.
Let's get back to Carlos with the rest of his story.
Speaker 2 (09:55):
They sentenced me to do twenty years in prison. I
had to do twenty years straight.
Speaker 3 (10:00):
You know.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
During that first ten years, all I would think about
is trying to occupy my time, try to make it
up the hill and over the hill to get home.
And you know, we would make homemade wine and smuggle
in drugs and smoke reefer or weed, however you want
to call it. And I remember when I was twelve.
I want to make sure that you guys know this.
(10:21):
When I was a kid, I got saved. I found Jesus.
The problem was I would go home and Jesus was
not preached to me because my home was domestic abuse,
struck violence, and so we were poor. It wasn't like
God was in the house. But no seed returns voids,
so the.
Speaker 3 (10:38):
Seeds were in me.
Speaker 2 (10:39):
I get to prison, and you know, they say blessings
and curses come out the mouth, and I would always
speak these curses, like if I ever see this one person,
I'm going to try to kill them, I'm going to
try to do this and that. And one of them
was the guy that actually killed a friend of mine,
my buddy Frado, and he ended up in the same
(11:00):
prison as me, and like he was in a big gang,
but his game turned down him and now the numbers
are in my favor. So I wanted this guy and
we got into a big fight, just me and him,
and it got really bad where we ended up going
to segregation, which is like a prison in the prison,
and he actually witnessed to me, believe it or not,
(11:21):
he actually shared the word with me, and you know,
I didn't take him as serious. But no seed returns void,
so the seeds were planned again. So that's when I
said enough is enough. You know, I just wanted something different.
You know, I talked about the void in my life. Well,
you know, I went to prison with a void in
(11:42):
my life. I figured it out. I realized it. It
was Jesus. I was missing God in my life, even
though he was always there. I never willingly recommitted myself
to him. I never willingly said, okay, Lord, I need
you to go through this with me.
Speaker 3 (11:58):
You know I needed him as my father. I was
looking for a father and he was always the one.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
So I remember making a prayer in segregation and I
started praying and I asked God, listen, Lord, I know
I'm in trouble.
Speaker 3 (12:10):
I know I'm going to go to a worse prison.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
I'm not trying to give you one of these prayers
where if you get me out of this, I'll be good,
because a lot of times we say that prayer and
it's never the case. I just asked God to go
with me and to you know, watch over me, and
to surround me with believers, and to make it where
I can convince my wife to change her life and
(12:35):
I can have a home at home when I get
home ready for me, a church waiting on me. And
you know, I wanted to totally change my life.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
I just wanted to turn away from.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
Who I was and become something new. And so that
started the next ten years, which were the best ten
years of my life. In prison, I was able to
not only recommit my life to the Lord, but you know,
God was.
Speaker 3 (13:05):
Preparing me to come home.
Speaker 2 (13:10):
I was raised with bitterness and rage and anger, and God.
Speaker 3 (13:17):
Was showing me the root of it.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
And God reminded me that if you want to be
truly forgiven, and I've done some things, I was in
jail for murder, if you really want to.
Speaker 3 (13:29):
Be forgiven, you have to forgive.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
And so that's when I was saying, Okay, Lord, I released.
Speaker 3 (13:34):
That unto you show me how to forgive.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
And so no longer am I mad at the abusive
men in my mother's life or my mom for the
way she raised me, even though times were tough. You know,
she probably could have learned how to do things better.
The past is the past. So I got to the
point in my life I said, Okay, no more bitterness,
no more anger, no more raise. Let's let's fill that
(13:59):
with peace and joy and happiness. And I was hoping
that He can make a way in my life. You know,
to be forgiven by the families that I had took
their son away, their brother away, their father away. You know,
that was my prayer for the next ten years. God
was really spiritually getting me ready and motivating me for
(14:24):
life outside of prison, a new life.
Speaker 3 (14:28):
There was this one man I remember, he was bold.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
His name was William Flores, and I would see him
lead Bible studies.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
And you know I knew him. Okay, God sent me
here to meet this man.
Speaker 2 (14:40):
And you're gonna always run into two people in your
life at certain times in your life that were real influential.
Speaker 3 (14:49):
And this was a key moment because this was.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
The beginning, and it looked like I was going to
become a closet Christian. I seen his boldness. I needed
that boldness. And I know what boldness was about because in.
Speaker 3 (15:00):
My life before Christ I was always trying to be bold.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
So I seen this boldness, true boldness, by the way,
no shame in speaking about Jesus.
Speaker 3 (15:11):
And I started attending.
Speaker 2 (15:12):
His Bible studies whenever we would get recreation time, and
I started picking his ear and he would pray with
me and teach me things of the Bible. And we
would have prison Bible studies where people from outside of
the prison would come in and freely spend time volunteerly
by the way, fellowship with us, share the Word with us.
And we even had a Spanish preacher that would come
(15:36):
and be bilingual and speak the Word in English and Spanish,
just so more people could attend his Bible studies. These
are people who have different personalities, and they fed into
my heart, into my life, where now I could pick
their brains and figure out how to install these good
qualities in my life in.
Speaker 3 (15:56):
My walk when I come home.
Speaker 2 (16:02):
Now I'm back in Chicago, and I worked for my church.
Not only do I work for my church, I'm in
the same community that I did damage in it. I
remember going to many mills in Glen Ellen. It's called
Radical Timeout, and it's a time where everyone gets together and.
Speaker 3 (16:22):
They pray radically.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
It's a place where they can pray and fellowship together
and break bread together and hear the Word together, worship together.
Speaker 3 (16:29):
And I remember going that.
Speaker 2 (16:32):
You know, I had to go there to must I
went there, and I've been going there every chance I get,
and I gave my testimony there. I remember I had
spoke about forgiveness and I wanted God to restore what
the enemy had broken. And shortly after my testimony. I
spoke to nepht Ali, who he was pretty much many
(16:52):
mials right hand man, and I found out that somebody
was there giving their testimony who happened to be Nelson Vargas,
the father of the man.
Speaker 3 (17:03):
That I killed.
Speaker 2 (17:05):
And I spoke to nepht Ali about that, and I
let him know, Hey, you know, you just had a
man here recently and he just gave his testimony.
Speaker 3 (17:14):
I I want you to know that that's the man
whose son I killed.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
And nepht Ali went and through prayer, he spoke to
Nelson and he set up a meeting where we met
at Midwest Church with Pastor David and him his family,
met me and my wife, and he forgave me, you know.
And this is something that was in my heart for
(17:37):
the last ten years in prison.
Speaker 3 (17:39):
Not only did he forgive me, but we have.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
A relationship and he's wonderful, you know. And he tells me,
now I'm your father, you know. Now you're my son,
he tells me. And knowing that I killed this man's son,
he would say that. And I think we both are
embracing that that relationship that's going to grow and mature
and nurture between him and I and both our families actually,
(18:04):
you know, and so I thank God because nothing is
impossible for the Lord. And you know, if he can
restore this between me and Nelson, just imagine what else
he's going to do, you know. Since I've been out,
I work for my church now and I'm working on
(18:25):
trying to visit the prisons as well, because I want
people to see life beyond the walls. But how it's
possible through Christ, you know, to maintain a relationship with
Him and to have a life after jail.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
You know, other than prison. I want people to see hope.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
I don't deserve nothing, but God is good that He's
given me. So I've been involved with my church now,
working for the church. I do maintenance for my church,
and it's actually me and one more guy.
Speaker 3 (18:55):
We have all these properties that we have to maintain.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
And I didn't know nothing about construction and plumbing. And
my boss, Joey, he's the best. He's younger than me
and he's a great teacher. That's Jesus, you know, And
so I've learned a lot. My life now is just
trying to live for the Lord, but be better than
(19:18):
who I was. And I'll never make up for all
the wrong that I've done, But at least we can
make a difference today, and every chance that we can
get from now on, you know, we can try.
Speaker 3 (19:31):
So that's what I'm going for and not in my life.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
And what a story. And special thanks as always to
Joey Cortes for getting this story and getting it out
to you, and a special thanks to Carlos Cologne for
telling this story and for Don Albert graciously sharing these interviews.
The name of his movie is The Father I Never
Knew and go to Amazon watch it with your family
(19:59):
and friends, whatever your religious beliefs.
Speaker 3 (20:02):
This is his.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
Testimony, and it's his story, and it's countless tens, if
not hundreds, of thousands of inmates, and that God turned
their life around, the story of so many young men
and women without deads roaming the streets. Here on our
American stories.
This is our American stories, and as you know, some
of our favorite stories and some of your favorite stories
on this show are redemption stories, come back stories about
people who turn their lives around, which brings us to
our next story. It comes from the documentary The Father
I Never Knew, a movie that tracks the lives of
former gang members that were raised without a positive father figure,
(00:46):
which you can find on Amazon Prime. The director Don
Albert graciously gave us the interviews to tell these stories,
and now we bring you the story of Carlos Cologne.
Speaker 2 (01:01):
I was born in Chicago, Illinois, being Humble Park from
the seventies on through the nineties. It was pretty drastic
growing up with a single mom. You know, the gangs
was pretty bad in the neighborhood and poverty was at
its worst. I would think about it now, I think
(01:22):
about my upbringing and there was a lot of empty lots.
Speaker 3 (01:26):
So there wasn't no playgrounds.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
There was just empty lots, no you know, where no
buildings were and where they used to be. So a
lot of times, you know, we turned to the streets,
and you know, you come from a dysfunctional home where
you see drug abuse from different men. In my mom's
lives and domestic abuse.
Speaker 3 (01:48):
I would turned to the streets.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
I spent most of my life in prison from juvenile
on through my adulthood. Single mother, never knew my dad,
and my mom was in two abusive relationships, so that
had its toe. I was missing the father's love, you know,
for her son, and not only that, but a complete
(02:12):
family something you know, A father's supposed to be, you know,
sense of security.
Speaker 3 (02:17):
He's supposed to be the one to provide, and we
didn't have that in my house. So I never knew
what it was like to grow up a man.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
I pretty much was playing the guessing game and going
off of a lot of bad examples in my life
ahead of me, and so the.
Speaker 3 (02:33):
Streets from my father.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
In my teen years, I joined a gang, you know,
and I clung to that. And what attracted me to
the gang was actually just the unity. We all had
something in common. A lot of us were miserable. We
had no fathers in our lives, and so it's like
a pack of dogs, you know. They we hung together,
and we clung together, and I.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
Spiraled real fast.
Speaker 2 (03:02):
We would steal a car in the city, a beat
up car, go to O'Hare Airport and look for a
nice car, something with rims and speakers and sound system,
and we would try to bring it back to Chicago
and sell it. So we were doing this for a
while now and we got caught. And when they caught us,
it seemed like they were investigating.
Speaker 3 (03:23):
So there was like.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
Six or seven cars that they charged us with, which trust.
Speaker 3 (03:28):
Me, we did take.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
But I ended up going fighting the case out as
best I can, and I ended up getting probation.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
The rules were too much for me. I couldn't handle.
They had house arrests and I had to do all.
Speaker 2 (03:40):
These crazy things just to stay out of jail, which
I violated. So I eventually ended up going to juvenile
detention center, which is like juvenile.
Speaker 3 (03:48):
Prison, and that's where I spent.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
A lot of time in and out of until you know,
I got out at about I think I was seventeen
when I got out, So from fifteen to seventeen, I
spent most of my time in and out of juvenile detention.
And once I went into juvenile I was being trained.
Speaker 3 (04:07):
For when I got out. To be worse, we were.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
A small gang, so by being a small gang, we
had more to prove than these big gangs. You know,
it's not like, oh, you know, we were well established
in Chicago. No, we were a small gang. We had
one corner, and in that corner, it was only if
there were fifty of us, which some people might think
fifty is a lot of people, but there's hundreds and
(04:35):
thousands of gangs out here. There could be no war
going on, because a lot of times we'll go into
war and we'll fight with each other. I remember I
would be driving with my buddies and we would see
someone's car and would say, Hey, that's so and so's
car from this neighborhood, and it's someone we don't like,
and we would already know, okay, his car's parked here
(04:56):
tomorrow or tonight in the late night, we're.
Speaker 3 (04:58):
Going to burn his car.
Speaker 2 (05:00):
And we would burn cars, break windows, even to the
point where sometimes we would go to other neighborhoods and
jump out on people and jump them and act like
we were a different gang, just because for the thrill
of it, because we wanted to instill damage. And I
would say, even at twenty, it got to the point where, now.
Speaker 3 (05:22):
If we could catch you but no one was around them, and.
Speaker 2 (05:25):
We had a gun on us, we would actually try
to kill you.
Speaker 3 (05:27):
You know, we would see if we could get.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
Away with it, or at least shoot you or something
without you knowing it was us. That's how bad it was,
you know it. It just escalated from you know, stealing
cars in my life to knives, bats, guns and murder eventually.
And I remember getting into a shootout with somebody getting away,
(05:49):
telling a friend of mine about it, and after I
spoke to him about it, shortly afterwards, they came back.
Speaker 3 (06:00):
I got shot.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
I got shot in the hand and in the leg,
and I did about a month or two in the
hospital recovering, and during that time, the war was still
going on.
Speaker 3 (06:09):
Pretty much.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
It started because I got shot. My buddy got killed,
so that took its.
Speaker 3 (06:15):
Toll on me too. You know.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
He's a friend of mine who he his dad passed
away and got killed, so he grew up without a father,
and so I was.
Speaker 3 (06:23):
Bringing him up into the gangs, and next thing, you know,
he's dead.
Speaker 2 (06:26):
So I thought that was my responsibility, and I wanted
to take I wanted revenge, you know, for so much
it was like just a pot of so much boiling
and brewing, and I wanted to get revenge. So I
got out of the hospital, and you know, when I.
Speaker 3 (06:42):
Got shot, I got shot because I ran out of bullets.
So I didn't want that to happen no more.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
And I remember saying, well, I'm gonna buy two guns,
and I keep one on me, and when I'm walking
with somebody, I let them hold the other one just.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
To be safe.
Speaker 2 (06:57):
And as I was healing and recuperating, and you know,
I couldn't run, I was still walking with Caine, I
ran into one of the guys who was involved in
my shooting. I shot him five times, and shortly afterwards
they pronounced him dead at the hospital and the cops were.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
Looking for me. It's funny because he was his only witness.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
But what happened was the cops actually grabbed one of
the guys from my neighborhood, and instead of being a
stand up.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
Guy, he actually ratted me out.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
And so once I knew that the cops were looking
for me, it was over with for me.
Speaker 3 (07:34):
I had to leave the neighborhood. Chicago wasn't an option
no more.
Speaker 2 (07:41):
So I fled and I ended up from you know,
to Ohio, to Florida, Puerto Rico, Ohio back to Florida
for about about eleven months I was a fugitive. I
was working at this furniture warehouse under a different name.
I just made the union and everything. So I was
meeting a lot of people, the big wigs from the
(08:01):
warehouse corporate and I remember my supervisor walking up to
me with this man, and I'm thinking, Okay, I'm going
to meet another supervisor. And when I shook his hand,
he actually was an Orlando police offerer, Sir that the
extradition came over, and they actually the warrant came and
they arrested me there, and then the Chicago police came and.
Speaker 3 (08:23):
Got me and took me back to Chicago.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
And it wasn't easy because I had a child on
the way myself from a previous relationship, and so this
will be my.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
First my first born. It was my son.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
That was crazy because I grew up without a father.
Speaker 3 (08:43):
Knowing who my real father was.
Speaker 2 (08:45):
I found out he grew up without a father, and
now I'm going to have a son who's going to
grow up without a father, and I wanted I didn't
want that to happen. So that's pretty much how I
ended up getting caught. Because as I try to keep
a relationship with him.
Speaker 1 (09:05):
And you're listening to Carlos Cologne, and my goodness, as
he said about life in Humboldt Park in Chicago from
the seventies to the nineties, it was pretty drastic. What
a tragic story thus far. When we come back more
of Carlos Cologne's story here on our American stories and
(09:39):
we continue with our American stories. In Carlos Cologne's story,
he had joined a Chicago gang at a young age,
killed a man and was on the run from the cops.
Let's get back to Carlos with the rest of his story.
Speaker 2 (09:55):
They sentenced me to do twenty years in prison. I
had to do twenty years straight.
Speaker 3 (10:00):
You know.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
During that first ten years, all I would think about
is trying to occupy my time, try to make it
up the hill and over the hill to get home.
And you know, we would make homemade wine and smuggle
in drugs and smoke reefer or weed, however you want
to call it. And I remember when I was twelve.
I want to make sure that you guys know this.
(10:21):
When I was a kid, I got saved. I found Jesus.
The problem was I would go home and Jesus was
not preached to me because my home was domestic abuse,
struck violence, and so we were poor. It wasn't like
God was in the house. But no seed returns voids,
so the.
Speaker 3 (10:38):
Seeds were in me.
Speaker 2 (10:39):
I get to prison, and you know, they say blessings
and curses come out the mouth, and I would always
speak these curses, like if I ever see this one person,
I'm going to try to kill them, I'm going to
try to do this and that. And one of them
was the guy that actually killed a friend of mine,
my buddy Frado, and he ended up in the same
(11:00):
prison as me, and like he was in a big gang,
but his game turned down him and now the numbers
are in my favor. So I wanted this guy and
we got into a big fight, just me and him,
and it got really bad where we ended up going
to segregation, which is like a prison in the prison,
and he actually witnessed to me, believe it or not,
(11:21):
he actually shared the word with me, and you know,
I didn't take him as serious. But no seed returns void,
so the seeds were planned again. So that's when I
said enough is enough. You know, I just wanted something different.
You know, I talked about the void in my life. Well,
you know, I went to prison with a void in
(11:42):
my life. I figured it out. I realized it. It
was Jesus. I was missing God in my life, even
though he was always there. I never willingly recommitted myself
to him. I never willingly said, okay, Lord, I need
you to go through this with me.
Speaker 3 (11:58):
You know I needed him as my father. I was
looking for a father and he was always the one.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
So I remember making a prayer in segregation and I
started praying and I asked God, listen, Lord, I know
I'm in trouble.
Speaker 3 (12:10):
I know I'm going to go to a worse prison.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
I'm not trying to give you one of these prayers
where if you get me out of this, I'll be good,
because a lot of times we say that prayer and
it's never the case. I just asked God to go
with me and to you know, watch over me, and
to surround me with believers, and to make it where
I can convince my wife to change her life and
(12:35):
I can have a home at home when I get
home ready for me, a church waiting on me. And
you know, I wanted to totally change my life.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
I just wanted to turn away from.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
Who I was and become something new. And so that
started the next ten years, which were the best ten
years of my life. In prison, I was able to
not only recommit my life to the Lord, but you know,
God was.
Speaker 3 (13:05):
Preparing me to come home.
Speaker 2 (13:10):
I was raised with bitterness and rage and anger, and God.
Speaker 3 (13:17):
Was showing me the root of it.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
And God reminded me that if you want to be
truly forgiven, and I've done some things, I was in
jail for murder, if you really want to.
Speaker 3 (13:29):
Be forgiven, you have to forgive.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
And so that's when I was saying, Okay, Lord, I released.
Speaker 3 (13:34):
That unto you show me how to forgive.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
And so no longer am I mad at the abusive
men in my mother's life or my mom for the
way she raised me, even though times were tough. You know,
she probably could have learned how to do things better.
The past is the past. So I got to the
point in my life I said, Okay, no more bitterness,
no more anger, no more raise. Let's let's fill that
(13:59):
with peace and joy and happiness. And I was hoping
that He can make a way in my life. You know,
to be forgiven by the families that I had took
their son away, their brother away, their father away. You know,
that was my prayer for the next ten years. God
was really spiritually getting me ready and motivating me for
(14:24):
life outside of prison, a new life.
Speaker 3 (14:28):
There was this one man I remember, he was bold.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
His name was William Flores, and I would see him
lead Bible studies.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
And you know I knew him. Okay, God sent me
here to meet this man.
Speaker 2 (14:40):
And you're gonna always run into two people in your
life at certain times in your life that were real influential.
Speaker 3 (14:49):
And this was a key moment because this was.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
The beginning, and it looked like I was going to
become a closet Christian. I seen his boldness. I needed
that boldness. And I know what boldness was about because in.
Speaker 3 (15:00):
My life before Christ I was always trying to be bold.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
So I seen this boldness, true boldness, by the way,
no shame in speaking about Jesus.
Speaker 3 (15:11):
And I started attending.
Speaker 2 (15:12):
His Bible studies whenever we would get recreation time, and
I started picking his ear and he would pray with
me and teach me things of the Bible. And we
would have prison Bible studies where people from outside of
the prison would come in and freely spend time volunteerly
by the way, fellowship with us, share the Word with us.
And we even had a Spanish preacher that would come
(15:36):
and be bilingual and speak the Word in English and Spanish,
just so more people could attend his Bible studies. These
are people who have different personalities, and they fed into
my heart, into my life, where now I could pick
their brains and figure out how to install these good
qualities in my life in.
Speaker 3 (15:56):
My walk when I come home.
Speaker 2 (16:02):
Now I'm back in Chicago, and I worked for my church.
Not only do I work for my church, I'm in
the same community that I did damage in it. I
remember going to many mills in Glen Ellen. It's called
Radical Timeout, and it's a time where everyone gets together and.
Speaker 3 (16:22):
They pray radically.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
It's a place where they can pray and fellowship together
and break bread together and hear the Word together, worship together.
Speaker 3 (16:29):
And I remember going that.
Speaker 2 (16:32):
You know, I had to go there to must I
went there, and I've been going there every chance I get,
and I gave my testimony there. I remember I had
spoke about forgiveness and I wanted God to restore what
the enemy had broken. And shortly after my testimony. I
spoke to nepht Ali, who he was pretty much many
(16:52):
mials right hand man, and I found out that somebody
was there giving their testimony who happened to be Nelson Vargas,
the father of the man.
Speaker 3 (17:03):
That I killed.
Speaker 2 (17:05):
And I spoke to nepht Ali about that, and I
let him know, Hey, you know, you just had a
man here recently and he just gave his testimony.
Speaker 3 (17:14):
I I want you to know that that's the man
whose son I killed.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
And nepht Ali went and through prayer, he spoke to
Nelson and he set up a meeting where we met
at Midwest Church with Pastor David and him his family,
met me and my wife, and he forgave me, you know.
And this is something that was in my heart for
(17:37):
the last ten years in prison.
Speaker 3 (17:39):
Not only did he forgive me, but we have.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
A relationship and he's wonderful, you know. And he tells me,
now I'm your father, you know. Now you're my son,
he tells me. And knowing that I killed this man's son,
he would say that. And I think we both are
embracing that that relationship that's going to grow and mature
and nurture between him and I and both our families actually,
(18:04):
you know, and so I thank God because nothing is
impossible for the Lord. And you know, if he can
restore this between me and Nelson, just imagine what else
he's going to do, you know. Since I've been out,
I work for my church now and I'm working on
(18:25):
trying to visit the prisons as well, because I want
people to see life beyond the walls. But how it's
possible through Christ, you know, to maintain a relationship with
Him and to have a life after jail.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
You know, other than prison. I want people to see hope.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
I don't deserve nothing, but God is good that He's
given me. So I've been involved with my church now,
working for the church. I do maintenance for my church,
and it's actually me and one more guy.
Speaker 3 (18:55):
We have all these properties that we have to maintain.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
And I didn't know nothing about construction and plumbing. And
my boss, Joey, he's the best. He's younger than me
and he's a great teacher. That's Jesus, you know, And
so I've learned a lot. My life now is just
trying to live for the Lord, but be better than
(19:18):
who I was. And I'll never make up for all
the wrong that I've done, But at least we can
make a difference today, and every chance that we can
get from now on, you know, we can try.
Speaker 3 (19:31):
So that's what I'm going for and not in my life.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
And what a story. And special thanks as always to
Joey Cortes for getting this story and getting it out
to you, and a special thanks to Carlos Cologne for
telling this story and for Don Albert graciously sharing these interviews.
The name of his movie is The Father I Never
Knew and go to Amazon watch it with your family
(19:59):
and friends, whatever your religious beliefs.
Speaker 3 (20:02):
This is his.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
Testimony, and it's his story, and it's countless tens, if
not hundreds, of thousands of inmates, and that God turned
their life around, the story of so many young men
and women without deads roaming the streets. Here on our
American stories.
Host
Lee Habeeb
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