Player Season: The Pickup Artist Who Hacked Nike

by Brad Stephenson

  Jamaica & Willie Jigba

  My flight landed in Montego Bay, and from there, a bus awaited. However, this bus was the antithesis of modern, the kind you would expect to see transporting hippies across town during the 70's.

  A winding voyage along the northern and western coast of Jamaica spoke a different reality than a land deceitfully advertised as paradise in the brochures. Most structures were poorly built and most families were on the street struggling in blistering heat; I actually felt bad for being there.

  Upon my arrival at Sandals Negril Beach Resort and Spa, the scenery largely transformed into the utopian landscape I anticipated.

  Scott was lounging on the beach at a table grounded in white sand with his fiance Brooke when I finally converged with them. They were happy to see me; after all, I was the reason they met.

  It was during my first semester at VCU. Scott and I were armed with a 12-pack of beer, yet nothing to do. I asked if he wanted to sit in front of the freshman dorms and wait for girls to walk out, and he said yes. Brooke and her friend exited soon after, and like always, I approached them. We both got of their numbers, but each led down a different path; I talked to her friend for a week and Scott continued courting Brooke for the next four years.

  There we were. In a way, my role remained the same as the first time they'd met because I was still interested in Brooke's friends, and there were a lot of them. Unfortunately, on the first night, my only partners were Jamaican rum and the soothing melodies of reggae music.

  Day two arrived and only a few hours remained until the wedding bells rang, so I decided to put my Nike income to good use by renting out jet-skis for Kyle, Scott and his Detroit Tigers teammate Casper.

  The four of us cruised along the beach line like Kenny fucking Powers, in honor of Scott's last moments as a free man. It was truly the best way for him to go out; there's no feeling more magical than shredding the Caribbean current on a jet ski. I didn't want this moment to end, so when they retired back on shore, I kept riding into the sunset.

  Eventually I parked next to an island off the coast, turned off the engine and sat on my Yamaha; completely mesmerized. The water was exceptionally clear and it was captivating being able to see every speck of corral on the ocean floor; the sight alone was powerful.

  A beautiful ceremony on the beach followed; Scott officially became a married man. Seeing my first wedding gave me a new perspective on marriage, and I began to question my player lifestyle. Sure, my world was entertaining, but rarely did it ever result in lasting happiness.

  However, there was no time to meddle with my conscience indifference. A tent was being set up, drinks were being stored in coolers, a DJ was preparing his playlist and more than a handful of Brooke's friends were marinating for what would surely be a memorable night.

  "All single guys to the middle of the tent," the Jamaican DJ announced, after an hour or two of intoxication.

  "It's time to show the ladies your best dance move," the DJ declared.

  In 2009, when I invented my own dance move, 'The B-Walk', I never thought it would pay off so fortuitously. There were five of us in line, me being the last, and I already knew it was over before it even started; I was looking down on my opponents with the confidence of Yao Ming.

  Brooke's little brother went first, yielding nothing but yawns. Kyle was third in line, accruing nothing but crickets. Then it was my time to bring the house down.

  I stepped out, throwing interchangeable heel clicks in front of my body with a grace only comparable to Enrique Iglesias. Then I froze, leaving one heel out with my toe pointing towards the heavens, leaving the crowd paralyzed. To bring them back to life, I swooped my right arm down like a pendulum, and promptly wiped the sand from atop my seemingly electric shoe; pure polish. Spectators no longer encircled me; cheering fans surrounded me (slight exaggeration).

  The rest of the night, however, didn't go quite as planned. My sights were set on a curly haired photographer named Carly, and she was almost as flawless as my dance routine. I don't know what changed; maybe my mental intervention about my lifestyle subconsciously began taking shape. All I can remember is waking up the following morning on the floor of my room with a severe hangover.

  "Dude, do you even remember what you did last night?" my roommate Kyle queried from his bed, with a girl on his arm.

  "No, not at all," I replied, with true amnesia.

  "Oh my god dude, it was fucking hilarious! You grabbed the DJ's microphone and told all of the girls to remove their clothes and jump in the ocean, I was literally in tears," Kyle energetically explained.

  Well, so much for my theory about altering my lifestyle. I was in another country with close to ten readily available girls, and I played the friend role for the first time ever .

  Then, while I was entering the airport to go home, I received another unusual experience.

  "Heyyyyyyyyy Brad!" six of Brooke's friends hollered from a distance, and then ran up for to me hugs.

  I was not used to this treatment. My entire flight home was spent wondering if they liked me because I was entertaining, or because I didn't sleep with any of them. The only other time I could recall a group of girls running up to hug me was in front of the casino in Tampa, and I didn't sleep with them either. What a paradox.

  Up until this point, my only freight experience was shipping packages. When I returned to Virginia, I was shipping crates. Transporting two hundred boxes of shoes across the country doesn't come cheap.

  I got out of my lease the day I arrived in Arizona, then pulled the trigger on my plan to occupy the penthouse condo in Tempe. The building was called North Shore and my new place was on the top-floor with two bedrooms all to myself. The best feature of all was how it overlooked Tempe Town Lake, with a scenic view of the mountain wedged just beside ASU's football stadium.

  Even though I didn't have an elevator installed inside my unit like Justin, I felt like I was keeping up for once. I never thought it would happen, but I was actually satisfied. It probably helped being centered in a campus with, arguably, some of the most enticing female students our country has to offer.

  Surprisingly, I was more exited to open boxes of shoes than I was exploring the school grounds for prospects. In particular, I was eager to see how well my custom made Nike ID shoes turned out post-production.

  Piece by piece, I designed ever minute detail of these shoes to my own specifications; there were a total of 5. One pair was black and gold Kobe Bryant basketball shoes with 'P1ay3r' stitched on the inside of the tongue, but my best work was showcased in the other pairs of Nike Dunk Low's.

  There were four different color schemes: black/gold, white/gold, black/silver and white/silver.

  By far, my favorite pair were the white and gold's. The overlay was outfitted with white calfskin leather, black lining, white laces, black midsole, white outsole and a crusted shiny gold swoosh. The ID, on the outer half of the heel, was stitched with 'B500'...as were the other three pairs.

  The 'B' was for Brad, and the '500' was a motivational symbol to eventually own a fortune 500 company (unfortunately, the exact models I produced are no longer available on Nike's website, but you might be able to buy them on my website).

  I moved in on a Monday and I was exhausted after hauling all those boxes, so I took a nap and woke up around 2am on Tuesday morning. With no food in my condo, I walked across the bridge to a gas station on campus to get a Snickers bar and some snacks. It was on my way back when I encountered something interesting, and rather strange.

  Just before I reached the bridge, I spotted two guys on bikes, at the apex, standing motionless in the center of the walkway. It didn't strike me as unusual, until I got much closer.

  The first guy was either Asian or Mexican and he wore a dark colored hood. The second guy wore a cutoff t-shirt and he was Caucasian with sideburns and a tattoo on his arm. Their appearance wasn't too out of the ordinary, but the manner in which they were staring me down definitely was.

  Simil
ar to an animal's behavior in the wild, the bigger you make yourself; the lesser chance you have of being attacked. So I puffed my shoulders out wide and went into 'Bulldog Mode'.

  When I came near the first guy, he quickly turned his head and looked towards the lake, as if he didn't want me to see his face. The second guy, however, was a different story. He looked me dead in my eyes with a cold and deep stare. His gaze and the apparent salivation around his mouth made me assume he was on drugs. I was weary of being mugged, so I turned my head back after making it past them, and the second guy was still staring me down even harder than before.

  I made it home safely, and thought nothing more of this encounter, until the following week...

  After lacing up my B500's, I adjusted my desk against the window so I could work on the computer while also being able to enjoy the lake and mountain view.

  I was on Google chat with Dave and by chance, or fate, I looked out the glass window and noticed cop cars, two fire trucks, a police camper and three news trucks were lined up on the edge of the lake.

  "There's a bunch of cop cars and news trucks at the lake," I typed to Dave.

  "What's it for?" he asked.

  "No clue, I'm going to look online," I told him.

  A quick search revealed that a young black kid named Willie Jigba went missing the previous weekend, and they were searching for his body in the lake.

  "Some kid went missing, they think he's in the lake," I reported to Dave.

  "You should take pictures of it," he told me.

  Like many times before, I took his advice and grabbed the high-powered camera resting on my kitchen counter. From there, I stepped on my balcony and snapped picture after picture like a seasoned journalist.

  I continued watching from my perch for the next hour, with an eagle's eye view. To the casual bystander, it appeared as though the police were relentlessly searching for this kid but the more I watched, the more I was bothered by their effort, or lack thereof.

  So I loaded the pictures onto my computer and began examining each one. All of them captured the same disturbing image; masses of people walking around on shore and just two of the officers in a small boat on the lake.

  It wasn't my business, but for some reason it still affected me. I wanted to know more, so later that night I logged onto 'TheDirty.com' to see if there were any further details.

  There were. Apparently Willie Jigba attended a party on Saturday night and never returned home. After missing his first day of work on Sunday, one of his friends called the police out of concern. It was unclear at the time how all of this led the cops to Tempe Town Lake.

  Then I visited the comments section, and read on until one of them jumped off the page. Willie's parents joined the conversation and made a desperate plea, crying for help. I was deeply moved and overwhelmingly sympathetic.

  Instead of airing out my thoughts in the comments, which I almost did, I decided to take it a step further by sending the website owner, Nik Richie, a detailed message about the troublesome spectacle I witnessed during the search; with pictures included.

  Here is what I wrote:

  "Nik,

  I started to write a comment on the Willy Jigba post from the 24th, and then I remembered the comment someone had left in that post about how keeping the news fresh will put more pressure on the police. So instead of commenting, I'm hoping you will do a new post to keep the story in the news. I watched this "search" of Tempe Town Lake for at least two hours the other day. It was an absolute joke...and was one of the most staged events I have ever witnessed. It appeared as if their cause was to be seen by the public, instead of actually attempting to find the guy. There was one boat in the water the entire time, and the boat never made it to the left side of the bridge. This was a small boat too, so there couldn't have been more than a few people on board. (back end of the boat is in one of the pictures). There were 28 vehicles on the scene and 12 police officers just standing around, doing nothing. Then I saw two officers walk along the sidewalk to the top of the bridge, and they were walking with a purpose. What was this purpose? To stand at the top of the bridge and look down in the water. Last time I checked, the water in Tempe Town Lake looks nothing like the water in the Caribbean...so I seriously doubt they could have managed to see anything beyond one foot of depth. I checked the news...they are supposed to continue their search of the lake today. If you blast them this morning for their lack of effort the other day...it may cause them to step their game up when they go back out again today. I do not want anything out of reporting this to you...I actually want the opposite, because I would prefer and nicely ask you to keep this email private. I simply want them to do the right thing by showing more effort. Thanks."

  The email was sent at 8:10AM on Thursday, and I went to sleep sometime later in the day. When I awoke on Thursday night, I went on TheDirty and discovered the search for Willie Jigba was called off just hours earlier, but Nik Richie didn't posted the email I wrote to him – at least not yet.

  I genuinely felt my words would make an impact, so I wrote him another email at 4:25AM on Friday. There were no words this time, simply a link to a YouTube video from the movie 'Finding Forrester'. In the video, Sean Connery famously yelled to his apprentice "Punch the keys for Christ's sake! Yes! Yes! You're the man now dog!"

  Although Nik was far from being my apprentice, I thought the video was a clear representation of the message I was trying to get across.

  He posted my email on Friday morning, and I was right.

  In a shocking series of events, the police decided to continue their search, which was called off the day before, a few hours after he published what I wrote.

  My email was anonymous, but this fact didn't stop me from being stricken with anxiety while I read over hundreds of comments on what became a wildly popular post. On top of this, the police were outside searching the lake again, and I assumed the only reason they returned was to fan off the negative press my words created, but they will never tell you that. In fact, the reason they gave to various news outlets was so dishonest it was sad; apparently they resumed the search because of a 'gut-feeling'.

  Bullshit.

  Once again, I went on the balcony to watch their (re-launched) search effort, and I was baffled by what I saw; in a good way. When I looked down, the landscape was much different this time around. There were no news trucks and not a single person was just standing around. Interestingly enough, every last one of the officers was huddled up next to the boat. Even though I was worried about being pointed out, I couldn't miss the opportunity to snap another picture.

  I sent the picture to Nik in an email, and he quickly responded.

  "I just posted old one... I will get this up this afternoon. They need to drain the lake!" his email read.

  "I like your attitude!" I replied.

  I pulled up both pictures on my computer screen, the before and after, and was enamored by the stark contrast between the two. Not only was I already convinced the police continued searching because of what I wrote (and Nik published), but I was also fairly certain they changed their conduct during the search from what I photographed.

  Then the unthinkable happened – the police found Willie Jigba's body in the water...

  I was immediately capsulated with every human emotion at once. I was grieving, happy, sad, proud, nervous, honored, anxious, appreciative and fearful. I didn't know what to think or feel, and to be honest – I've never been the same since.

  On one hand, I never knew words could be so influential to the point where it caused a real change and drastically affecting other people's lives. On the other hand, overall it was a sad event; no one wants to hear his or her son's body has just been found. Personally, I took solace in knowing that if I were one of Willie Jigba's parent's, I would rather know something over nothing at all.

  I took a break for the next few days and spent most of my time playing Dave or David Price in online FIFA, just to get my mind off everything that happened.

&n
bsp; Then, on Sunday, it dawned on me. What if those two guys I saw on the bridge had something to do with it? Most people who commit murders often return to the scene of the crime, according to the show The First 48. Their behavior was certainly odd, so I sent Nik an email about it, but never heard back from him.

  On Monday, I witnessed another abnormal scene. Two city workers who wore orange shirts were cleaning the walkway on the bridge with a leaf blower and a shovel. Without the autopsy being complete, I imagined they would treat this area as a potential crime scene. To make matters even more peculiar, they only cleaned one side of the bridge – the same side the two guys were on.

  Seeing potential evidence being destroyed was aggravating, so I stepped onto the balcony, for the third time, and took more pictures. For the third time, I forwarded the pictures to Nik.

  He was slow to act, so I impatiently plastered the pictures on my own website. Soon after I did this, he emailed me and said he would publish them the following day.

  As promised, he posted a story suggesting there was a cover-up and furthermore, that there was some "dirty cop shit going on."

  This is the moment I began worrying about retaliation. If you know anything about Arizona, then you've probably heard of Sheriff Joe Arpaio. He titles himself 'America's Toughest Sheriff', nationally known for making inmates wear pink boxers, but locally known for cracking down and raiding anyone who dares to criticize him.

  I grew paranoid when I began seeing cop cars 80% of the time I looked out my window. Either it was a coincidence, or I was next.

  So I decided to lay low for a while and put my activism on the shelf, after all, it wasn't smart for me to criticize the police when I was in the middle of hacking Nike's website.

  People can say what they want about Nik Richie and TheDirty.com. Personally, I don't agree with a lot of the stuff he does. However, there is no doubt in my mind he was the only person who had enough balls to publish this story, and I will forever respect him because of it.