Richard Cabral

Just like the rest of the world, I became a product of my environment, and this environment was gang culture.

Being an artist, being an actor, it's about telling stories that could heal, that could open up discussion that could make the community better.

Nobody succeeds on their own. Someone has to be there to show them the way, and if you give that experience to a person on the street - a gang member, a prisoner - he might succeed. That's how it was for me.

There's comes a point when people who have lived a life of crime get tired and want to change.

I believe God talks to us in mysterious ways. I knew if I did not pay attention to His message, I was going to do life in prison, or I was going to end up dead.

I spent my life behind bars, and what people don't know is getting out of prison is really nerve-racking - you're not used to society; you're not used to the world going by so fast - so to step on that lot was quite overwhelming.

In society, you are taught to belong. You have to belong to something.

If you grow up on the good side of the tracks, you're going to belong to something over there. If you grow up on the bad side of the tracks, you're going to belong to something over there. It's not rocket science.

If we grow up in these communities where we have gangs, well, what do you think we're going to belong to? That's what happened to me and what's still happening to hundreds of thousands of other individuals.

Homeboy Industries is a healing center for broken children. I was a broken child, and they showed me how to put all those pieces back together. It's not about being a gangster. It's about being a man or a woman trying to recover and live better.

It's about being a voice in the community. There's so many ways to be a voice, and that's what I'm figuring out.

I think 98% of gang members in Los Angeles would agree that being a gang is just like being part of a community.

When you're in a gang, you go through life like any other individual. You have certain obligations, but you are not forced to do anything.

Your only true obligation in a gang is to be committed and be there when your brothers need you.

As an actor, I draw from myself.

There are many things in common with my life and my character in 'American Crime.' My upbringing has definitely helped me out in this role.

I never became an actor for people to want to take pictures with me or wanting my autograph. I feel I am nothing more special than the next living soul, but I understand that I work in entertainment, and this attraction comes with the territory.

Audiences are more drawn in to what they can relate to, so it would be stupid not to have great Latino films for the Latino audience.

I didn't grow up with any brothers, but I have my cousins, and I had my good friends, so I know what it is to have that bro relationship.

My father figures were all gang members.

Art saved my life.

I didn't know that I could be an actor until I was 25 years old, and now I continue to go back to the prisons and probation camps and the inner city to say that you don't have to go through the violence, through the trauma like I did.

I was one step away from getting my life taken away, whether it was life in prison or being dead on the streets. But I was saved.

The lifestyle that I grew up in, it was passed on to me. I didn't know there was another world.

I remember my first thing was 'CSI: Miami.' I played a Cuban gangster. And that was it. I was like, 'Wow, I don't have to clean toilets.' I could actually dress up and get paid equivalent to that. So that was my introduction into the Hollywood industry.