Money Rock: A Family's Story of Cocaine, Race, and Ambition in the New South

by Pam Kelley

Overview

“An ambitious look at the cost of urban gentrification.”
—Atlanta-Journal Constitution

“Kelley could have written a fine book about Charlotte’s drug trade in the ’80s and ’90s, filled with shoot-outs and flashy jewelry. What she accomplishes with Money Rock, however, is far more laudable.”
—Charlotte Magazine

“Pam Kelley knows a good story when she sees one—and Money Rock is a hell of a story. . . like a New South version of The Wire.”
—Shelf Awareness

Meet Money Rock—young, charismatic, and Charlotte’s flashiest coke dealer—in a riveting social history with echoes of Ghettoside and Random Family

Meet Money Rock. He's young. He's charismatic. He's generous, often to a fault. He's one of Charlotte's most successful cocaine dealers, and that's what first prompted veteran reporter Pam Kelley to craft this riveting social history—by turns action-packed, uplifting, and tragic—of a striving African American family, swept up and transformed by the 1980s cocaine epidemic.

The saga begins in 1963 when a budding civil rights activist named Carrie gives birth to Belton Lamont Platt, eventually known as Money Rock, in a newly integrated North Carolina hospital. Pam Kelley takes readers through a shootout that shocks the city, a botched FBI sting, and a trial with a judge known as "Maximum Bob." When the story concludes more than a half century later, Belton has redeemed himself. But three of his sons have met violent deaths and his oldest, fresh from prison, struggles to make a new life in a world where the odds are stacked against him.

This gripping tale, populated with characters both big-hearted and flawed, shows how social forces and public policies—racism, segregation, the War on Drugs, mass incarceration—help shape individual destinies. Money Rock is a deeply American story, one that will leave readers reflecting on the near impossibility of making lasting change, in our lives and as a society, until we reckon with the sins of our past.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781620973271
Publisher:	New Press, The
Publication date:	09/25/2018
Pages:	288
Product dimensions:	5.60(w) x 7.80(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

A former reporter for the Charlotte Observer, Pam Kelley has won honors from the National Press Club and the Society for Features Journalism. She contributed to a subprime mortgage exposé that was a finalist for the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for Public Service. She lives in Cornelius, North Carolina.

Table of Contents

Prologue xi

Map of Money Rock's Charlotte xv

1 Money Rock and Big Lou 1

2 Showdown 11

3 Carrie Platt and the American Dream 17

4 Candy Kingpin 35

5 The Dealer's Mother 53

6 What Went Wrong with Piedmont Courts? 61

7 State of North Carolina Versus Money Rock 73

8 Convictions 85

9 Heavy in the Weight 95

10 Going Down 109

11 United States Versus Money Rock 119

12 Coming of Age in a World-Class City 131

13 The Christian Inmate 147

14 Sentencing a Generation 161

15 Lost Boys 173

16 The Love of His Life 187

17 Freedom 199

18 Trying to Make a Change 209

19 Susan and Mashandia 215

20 Homecoming 227

21 Life on the Outside 233

22 Uprising 241

23 Southside Homes 249

Epilogue 259

Where They Are Now 265

Acknowledgments 267

Notes 269

Editorial Reviews

10/15/2018
In 1986, journalist Kelley covered the trial of Belton “Money Rock” Lamont Platt for his role in a shoot-out in Charlotte, N.C., and here she expands that narrative to tell, unevenly, the story of “one of the city’s flashiest drug dealers and his striving African-American family, three generations swept up and transformed by cocaine.” His mother, Carrie, grew up in Charlotte chafing under Jim Crow and wanting to make a difference, Platt became a kind of avatar of the 1980s crack dealer, and four of his seven children died young or spent time in prison. Kelley attends to the minutiae of the Platts’ lives (Platt’s elementary school candy business, Carrie’s aversion to relaxed hair, the day-to-day routines of prison life, Platt’s liaisons and children). She also spins larger narratives about the cocaine in the U.S. and Charlotte’s 20th-century socioeconomic history (recounting, for example, that local white and black leaders shared lunches in the city’s upscale restaurants to usher in integration). Another major thread is of Platt’s Christian conversion in prison, becoming Apostle Platt of the Rock Ministries Church International. Though Kelley approaches individual lives with compassion and accessibly lays out larger historical trends, somehow they don’t quite connect to form a coherent whole. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly

Praise for Money Rock:
“An ambitious look at the cost of urban gentrification.”
—Atlanta-Journal Constitution

“A gripping tale . . . . Kelley weaves a textured narrative.”
—National Book Review

“Thoroughly investigative and delightfully readable.”
—The Charlotte Observer

“This book would pair well with Richard Rothstein’s The Color of Law. . . . Incisive. . . . Highly recommended.”
—Library Journal (starred review)

“Kelley could have written a fine book about Charlotte’s drug trade in the ’80s and ’90s, filled with shoot-outs and flashy jewelry. What she accomplishes with Money Rock, however, is far more laudable.”
—Charlotte Magazine

“With solid journalism, dogged research, perceptive observation, colorful interviews and memorable characters, Money Rock tells a memorable and timely story.”
—Shelf Awareness

“A diligent exposé . . . . A fascinating and hard-hitting story about drugs, crime, faith, and retribution.”
—Kirkus Reviews

“Extends the work of such classics as Code of the Street and The Corner with curiosity, economy, thoroughness, and a deep feel for the nuances of human life. . . . Kelley places the remarkable story of her remarkable protagonist, Belton 'Money Rock' Platt, in a larger narrative that is too often elided, illuminating, in the process, the difference between justice and mere judgment.”
—Garth Risk Hallberg, author of City on Fire

“Compelling. . . . Kelley's captivating account bears witness to people and places simultaneously striving and stuck; to the redemptive power of women; and to faith that a better way might be possible, for ourselves and our cities.”
—Susan Burton, author of Becoming Ms. Burton: From Prison to Recovery to Leading the Fight for Incarcerated Women

“A powerful and unforgettable story of ambition, the failed War on Drugs, and those places where policies have failed to keep up with the human experience.”
—Wes Moore, author of The Other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates

“Eye-opening and moving. . . . An honest and absorbing chronicle of the social and emotional devastation of 'law and order' and essential reading for anyone who cares about racial justice and the health of American cities.”
—Matthew Horace, author of The Black and the Blue: A Cop Reveals the Crimes, Racism, and Injustice in America's Law Enforcement

“A bracing tale of love and hope, despair and redemption, civil rights and wrongs.”
—Byrant Simon, author of The Hamlet Fire

From the Publisher

★ 09/01/2018
Former Charlotte Observer reporter Kelley's first book examines the Platt family and the trials of living in the projects of Charlotte, NC. Kelly is introduced to the family as a trial reporter writing about the conviction of Money Rock, or Belton Lamore Platt, a drug dealer living in public housing. What begins as an interview with Money Rock over a drug turf war unfolds into a novel-style case study of the effects of historical, national, and local politics and policies and its direct impact on an urban family and their choices to better their circumstances. The Platts' decisions reflect broader societal issues, from using civic engagement to make changes to busing and housing opportunities to the frustration over the lack of change and ultimately resorting to the drug trade to obtain economic empowerment outside of the system. This book would pair well with Richard Rothstein's The Color of Law as a study of the effects of segregated housing. VERDICT An incisive take on uncovering causal analysis into the often overlooked criminal headlines. Highly recommended for those interested in urban or black studies.—Tiffeni Fontno, Boston Coll.

Library Journal