Media
Epiphany
by Patrick Kelly
As I stepped out of the elevator I looked to my left down the hall to see a room filled with chairs lined in 7 horizontal rows. This room was to be where part of the community would meet together and have a fun, festive night, but this was still half an hour away. At the first row sat Cedric Davis. I walked up to greet a very humble, polite, and experienced man beyond his years. After some small talk he told his very motivating story with a few interruptions from me. Before I begin to describe just what it is Cedric Burns-Davis is doing, I want to give you a brief history on this man and the events that led up to where he is today and what brought him to be the man he is today.
Cedric Burns-Davis, born June 20, 1985, grew up in Middletown, Ohio to a single-parent mother who worked 16 hour shifts at numerous jobs to support her family. Cedric didn’t meet his father, a heroin addict who had served eight years in a Federal Penitentiary, until age eleven.
Cedric was a very intelligent young man going through school, but he realized he could use his intelligence to his advantage. At around his sophomore year of high school Cedric began smoking pot. His junior year would be a pivotal part of his life; this is when he learned how to breakdown and sell crack cocaine. Because he was able to maintain his good grades, he could academically afford to be suspended from school for ten days and it not affect his grades too drastically, allowing him to do whatever he wanted on the streets. This enabled him to continue to sell drugs while not flunking out of high school. He would eventually graduate and go to college at Kentucky State at age seventeen being one of the youngest in his class and having a 4.0 GPA. During his time at Kentucky State, Cedric joined the student government and helped those in need by holding fundraisers, which eventually got him on TV with Governor Ernie Fletcher. He continued the trend of using all of these positive actions to continue to do negative things.
The year 2005 proved to be another pivotal year for Cedric. It all started when his good friend Jon Michal Gary died and, losing hope, he dropped out of college and began to hit the streets harder until he was busted for a drug possession. He took this opportunity to refine his methods by lying and saying he was a drug addict so he would get sent to rehab. While in rehab Cedric learned how to be a better criminal by learning how drug addicts behave and how to avoid being caught by the police. After being released from rehab he was put on probation, which he violated in 2006 due to the fact the he couldn’t get a ride to take a urine test. The court offered him a deal; one year in Butler County jail and CCC (Community Correctional Center) which is located in Lebanon, Ohio. He waited eight months before finally accepting the deal. After his release he tried to work a steady job, but he just couldn’t get used to that kind of life, so he went back to selling drugs. Eventually he tried to give the steady life another chance by getting another job, which he eventually quit. After being harassed by his Probation Officer he just told him that he’d had enough with all the stupid technicalities and wanted to be done with it. He went to prison for three months. After he got out he had his first daughter, Amaria.
Because he had a daughter he tried working again, but he still couldn’t get the hang of living an average life, so he quit and went back to selling drugs yet again. His house was raided by the police not long after and he was busted with almost $10,000 worth of drugs. After being busted his license was suspended for two years, he was given 1000 hours of community service, sent to an anger management program, and served three months in jail. Ever since then he’s been on the straight and narrow, turning his life around and trying to help others turn their lives around.