I was dropped off at the Van Nuys jail by my Parole Officer and his supervisor. By a weird coincidence, my uncle Mitchell had called me from that same jail only a few weeks earlier. His life had been a skyrocket up and a plummet down: he had become a real-estate multimillionaire, settled into a mansion in Bel Air, which is way more upscale than Beverly Hills, a number-one address in all of LA. But then he had discovered cocaine, which led to heroin, which—old story—led to the loss of house, fortune, honor, and self-respect.