Deep Dive
Shownotes Transcript
Hi, it's Phoebe. We're heading back out on tour this fall, bringing our 10th anniversary show to even more cities. Austin, Tucson, Boulder, Portland, Oregon, Detroit, Madison, Northampton, and Atlanta, we're coming your way. Come and hear seven brand new stories told live on stage by me and Criminal co-creator Lauren Spohr. We think it's the best live show we've ever done. Tickets are on sale now at thisiscriminal.com slash live. See you very soon.
At that time, it was just kind of like, you know, just underground artists that weren't really, like, you know, signed to labels, but, like, were doing stuff on, you know, like, whatever beats they wanted to do. You know, just kind of like a, just like an underground scene, you know what I mean? This is Trevelle Coleman. When he was in his early 20s, in the mid-90s, he was a rising star in the underground rap scene in New York. He was known by his stage name, G-Depth.
Travell had always loved music. When he was younger, he'd make his own cassette mixtapes. He had a dual cassette recorder that allowed him to record snippets of songs and beats on top of each other, and then he'd record himself singing along, sometimes other people's songs, or songs he'd make up. Travell would play the songs for his mother, and she eventually bought him his own keyboard and sampler. His mother loved music, too. She always had something playing when Travell was a kid.
My mom, my mother, you know, she was a young mother. She, you know, she used to play music a lot. And, you know, I used to, I remember just sometimes needing it to go to sleep. Like, you know, like if she had it on really loud, the louder the better, you know what I mean? And I could lay there and just, you know, just go to sleep. It was kind of soothing to me.
Do you remember some of the people that she liked? What music she liked to play? Yeah, she used to like Kool and the Gang. You know, Luther Vandross was one of her favorites. You know, Michael Jackson. Did you like the music too, or did you just like the fact that there was music on? Or did you like Michael Jackson? Did you like Luther Vandross?
I mean, it was a little bit of both. I really didn't understand what was kind of playing until after a while. When we started watching TV a little more and I was able to associate who was who. "Oh yeah, that's Michael Jackson right there." She had albums of, I don't know if you remember the Michael Jackson "Off the Wall" album where he was standing on the wall. So I knew what he looked like. So I was kind of familiar with music.
Did you ever think when you were young, maybe one day I'll be a musician, I'll get into music myself? I mean, not when I was really, really young. You know what I mean? When I was really, really young, I thought I was going to be like a bodybuilder or something. You know what I mean? I'll never forget that, man. I was a little kid on Ripley's Believe It or Not.
I don't know if you remember that show. And the kid was about eight years old. He was like a super, super buff. And I always looked up to that as a youth. I was like, wow, man, I want muscles like that. But, you know, I didn't really, you know, follow up with that. But, you know, that was my first aspiration, you know, to be a bodybuilder. Travell remembers he spent a lot of time outside with his friends. They liked to play basketball. Like, we would cut like a crate.
the bottom out of the crate tied to the fence and play basketball, you know stuff like that, you know normal stuff. Travell went to a performing arts school. He took a lot of drama classes and was in a few plays. He learned how to play the trumpet and he took a class in acrobatics. They came one day and they were like, "Yo listen, we need some acrobats for this opera. It's gonna be in Lincoln Center, so who's your best
you know acrobat so they pointed at you know myself and two other people but nobody like it was only they pointed out like four of us but only two of us wanted to do it everybody else i ain't doing that you know and they say we're gonna pay you 75 a show so you know i was like wow that's great i'm telling you this is i was in eighth grade you know 75 hours i was you know pair sneakers or whatever you know whatever you know so my grandmother
I told her about it when I went home. And she was like, "I'll take you." You know? So she used to take me every Saturday. It was just a fun memory of me and her. Tell me about your grandmother. Were you close to her? Yeah, that was my girl, man. We-- she was--
You know, she was, when I was younger, she was like, you know, kind of harder, like the traditional grandma, you know, don't get grandma upset, you know. But as I got older, you know, I started to get to know her, and, you know, I started to really understand who she was, and I fell in love with her even more, you know. Travelle remembers his grandmother had a good sense of humor. He says she was always laughing. He eventually moved in with her in Harlem after his mother got married and moved to New Jersey.
And he says it was around this time, when he was 13 or 14, that he started selling drugs. It was just one of those things where, you know, believe it or not, it was kind of like a status symbol where I lived at to, you know, sell drugs. You know, you were kind of like, you were in the in crowd, you know what I mean? So, you know, that was kind of just, it was everywhere. All I had to do was just come outside, you know what I mean? And what were you selling? Oh, I started selling crack at first. Were you making money?
Yeah, I was making a nice amount of money. I mean, for a kid, $20 was a nice amount. I just wanted to go to the store and buy some candy or whatever. I wasn't really worried about how much I was making or whatever. I just was doing it. At that point, it seemed like that was all I had. I really didn't...
see any other, like, option, you know what I mean? Travell spent a semester at college, just outside the city, before dropping out. He told his mother he wanted to try to become a rapper. He and a friend would pool their money to pay for a few hours here and there at a recording studio. They'd record a handful of songs, and then they'd try to play the songs for people who might be interested or know someone in the industry.
Sometimes they'd stand outside record labels' offices, Def Jam and Atlantic, and try to get people who work there to listen to their tapes. He was still selling drugs. He says that's where he got the money for the recording studios. Travell also decided to buy a gun. He says it felt like something he was supposed to have, just in case. It was like an accessory, you know what I mean? You got your keys, your wallet, you know what I'm saying? It was just something...
It was an excess of you. He says he never used it. Until one night in October 1993. I'm Phoebe Judge. This is Criminal. We'll be right back. Support for Criminal comes from ritual. I love a morning ritual. We've spent a lot of time at Criminal talking about how everyone starts their days. The Sunday routine column in the New York Times is one of my favorite things on earth.
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Get 25% off your first month at ritual.com slash criminal. Start Ritual or add Essential for Women 18 Plus to your subscription today. That's ritual.com slash criminal for 25% off. In October 1993, Travell Coleman was 18 years old. Late one night, he was riding around Harlem on his bicycle. And I didn't plan on actually doing anything. I just had a gun.
And I was riding around, and, you know, I happened to see a guy, you know what I mean? And I was like, okay, well, you know, I could just rob this guy, you know. He remembers seeing a man smoking underneath some elevated subway tracks. He says he got off his bike and pointed his gun at the man and asked for money. And then, he says, the man reached for the gun. You know, I wound up, you know,
doing something that I didn't mean to do. I wound up shooting the guy. And we kind of struggled for the gun. And like I said, I wound up shooting the guy. Trevelle says he quickly got on his bike and left. And after that happened, I came back around the block just to see what actually happened because I kind of ran. I came back around.
And it was like that fast. There were already people on the scene, and I kind of looked, and I saw people kneel over him. And so I kind of just, you know, then I started seeing sirens and flashing lights. So I just, you know, jetted into the projects. But I never knew what happened, though. You know what I mean? I wasn't sure what happened that night. What happened when you went home after that?
Did you, were you thinking to yourself, I wonder what happened to him?
Yeah, you know, it was kind of like mixed emotions. It was like, what did I just do? Like, what happened? You know, like, I hope nothing happened. And like, no, this didn't happen. And then I just kind of just went, you know, just fell out with those thoughts. When you woke up the next morning, did you tell anyone what went on the night before? Nah, nah, I didn't talk about it after that. The next day, did you hear anyone talking about a shooting that had happened?
Yeah, actually, when I came out, I was riding the same bike, and some officers kind of, like, pulled me over. And it was, like, weird. Like, I was like, oh, here we go. You know, I really, I was like, you know, I was like, how could they have known, you know, something like, you know, to that extent? So I was like...
But I was nervous. So they asked me, they said, "Do you know anything about the shooting that happened last night?" And I was like, "Nah." But by them saying shooting, I kind of felt like, I thought maybe he was like, "All right." Because they didn't say murder or anything like that. So I was like, "Okay."
And that kind of eased me, eased my, even though I know it was still bad, but I was still like, well, he didn't die. You know what I'm saying? So I kind of eased my mind a little bit. You must have been so nervous seeing those police come up to you. Yeah, I was nervous. I was riding a bike. I'll never forget, I was riding the same bike and they just pulled up in the street.
And I just happened to catch their eye and he just like, come here. You know what I mean? And then he was like, yo. And I said, I don't know. And they let you go? Yeah, they just let me go. What did you do with the gun? Well, I had it for a second and then I went and threw it. I had it in a box and then I went and threw it in a river. I saw that in the movies sometimes.
You know, so I said, "All right, let me do that." You know, just get rid of it. So that's when I went there. Did you think in the days later, kind of the following days, were you always thinking to yourself, "At any minute, I'm going to be arrested. The cops are going to show up. They're going to stop me." Yes. Ten days after the shooting, Trevelle was walking around with friends when a police car pulled up. He was handcuffed and taken to the police station.
He kept asking what was going on, and remember someone said something about a gun. He kept waiting for the police to say something like, we got you. But they didn't. And then he was released. It didn't have anything to do with the shooting. Later, he was arrested again for selling cocaine, three times in two months in 1996, and ended up serving seven months in prison. Were you ever thinking, if they found out that I shot someone,
I could be in here for a lot longer. Yes. Yes, that's what I thought a lot. You know, it was like a grave fear. It was a grim feeling.
to think about that. And I used to look around and see the older guys and you see if, you don't know their situations, but you just think they've been in there forever. You know what I mean? So you're like, wow, I'm going to be one of these guys that just been in jail all his life. And the fear used to be really, really heavy and intense.
Because I can imagine that, you know, they've got you in prison right now. So I'm in prison right now. All someone needs to do is figure this out, and I'm never walking out. They've taken the first step away of getting me in here. You hit it on the nail, Phoebe. I'm not really going to lie. That's actually...
exactly the feeling like I'm never going to get out of here. You know what I mean? Like, I'm feeling like it's a possibility that I'm not going to walk out of here, you know, and then I'm going to have to be in here for years. You know, when you young, you can't fathom years. And you know what I mean? So it's like, I was like, you know, it was, it was, it was bad, you know, but I just kind of just got around, you know, I just got through the time and came home.
When he got out of prison, Travell decided to try to focus on his music. By this time, people were starting to know who he was. You know, I had a song that I did, and somebody had heard it from the industry called Gangstar. I don't know if you remember Gangstar, but they heard it. And so one of the guys, the way they heard it was a guy from my neighborhood was in their group.
And he told me that they shouted me out and put me on the back of their album. You know how they put the credits and they put my name? So that was like my first taste of the industry. So I'm like, wow, people know my name. But that was a little bit before I got locked up. So when I came home, I kind of had that motivation because of that. I was like, well, I felt like I was part of the...
the culture at that point. So I kept doing mixtapes and stuff like that. And I did a demo in a song called "Dollar Bill" and Black Rob, I don't know if you know who Black Rob is, he was signed to Bad Boy Entertainment at that time. And he heard the song. He was like, "I like this guy. I want to meet him." And I met him. Long story short, he wound up putting me on his album.
In 1998, he said, yo, I want you to get on my album. He really called me and said, yo, you ready? And I was like, wow, really? He was like, yeah. When Travell got to the studio, someone from Bad Boy Records, the label founded by rapper Sean Combs, was there too. They was like, yo, look, would you want to sign to Bad Boy? And that's just how that went. In 1998, I got signed.
You know, at that time, that was the biggest label, biggest rap label probably in the world. You know what I mean? They had Biggie, Biggie Smalls, they had Mase, they had Black Rob, they had Craig Mack, Total, Puffy, you know what I mean? So it was like, that was the label to be on, you know what I mean? So it was like, you know, when they asked me to sign, it was like a dream come true. I was like, wow.
They were just huge, man. They were everywhere. So it was definitely an honor to be, you know, considered, you know. Travell remembers his grandmother was very proud of him when he told her the news. I used to walk in the door, she used to be like, bad boy. Tell me about how life changed once things started happening. Well, it kind of, you know... Did they give you a lot of money? Yeah, I got a significant amount of money, especially, you know, for my...
You know, at the time, you're talking about 1998, you know, I signed for like $350. He remembers he got a nice apartment for his girlfriend and their new baby. I just took care of my family, you know what I mean? You know, we moved and I just had a daughter. So that was just right on time. It was definitely a blessing because I just had a daughter. By the time he was signed to Bad Boy Records, it had been five years since the shooting.
You know, the euphoria of me and Synt, when it wore off, that's when I, you know, started, I was right back to, you know, how I thought again, like, okay, now, you know, this would be terrible if they come down, you know what I mean? Like, you know, so that's when...
I think I started like using heavy drugs a little more. Like not heavy, but I just, you know, I had, I just started using drugs even more, like more weed, more liquor, you know what I mean? I wasn't doing anything else but that, but it was like, you know, I was trying to kind of like
you know, just, you know, forget, just be on autopilot. Like, you know what I mean? Because I felt like, you know, whatever's going to happen, it just needs to happen, you know, but I'm not going to, you know, I can't think about it right now. You know what I mean? You know, I just, it was one of them things. That must be such a horrible way to live, worried all the time. Yeah, yeah, it was because you're never, you're never really in your right state. You know what I mean? You kind of always...
You know, you're kind of like an animal, kind of like, you know what I mean? That's kind of just like, you know, erratic and, you know, not really thinking. You're not really being and functioning the way you should be functioning. So that's kind of how I was, you know? I was just kind of like, you know, just existing, you know, just taking whatever came my way, you know what I mean? In 2001, Travelle's first album was released under his stage name, G-Depth.
The singles from the album Let's Get It and Special Delivery both made it into the top five on Billboard's Hot Rap Songs chart. Vibe magazine gave his album 4.5 out of 5 stars. And the website Rap Reviews wrote, G-Dep is the latest protege of rap's royal family. Travelle was featured on songs with other artists, including Missy Elliott, Snoop Dogg, and Genuine.
He was invited to appear on Soul Train, the very famous variety show that had hosted stars like James Brown, Aretha Franklin, and Michael Jackson. And then, in 2003, Travelle's grandmother died. She was 73. You know, she was kind of sick. I didn't know she was sick. You know, she was the type of person that she didn't really tell you, you know, what was going on with her health. Like, she would, like, insinuate, like, you know, I'm not going to be here forever, you
One of them things, but when she passed, it was kind of like, I didn't really understand how much she was, how big of a part that she played in my life until she left. I was like, I kind of got hurled into really, really,
being responsible for my life when she passed. And I think that had a lot to do with, you know, the way I started thinking, you know what I mean? 'Cause it was like, you know, there's no buffer between you and reality anymore, you know what I mean? You're, you know,
And I think that's what, you know, when family members pass, I think that's what happens. You kind of get more and more in touch with, you know, reality, like who you are, what you've done, you know. So, you know, when she passed, that's kind of what I went through. I kind of started realizing that I had to, you know, step up to whatever I had to step up to deal with, you know.
After Travelle's grandmother died, he says he started doing even more drugs. Then I started smoking PCP. I started smoking dust a lot, you know. This is probably about 2003, 2003-ish, you know. As soon as she passed, I started, you know, I was kind of indiscriminate. I didn't really care, you know, as far as like, you know.
trying to uphold some type of discretion or anything. I was like, it doesn't matter. What happened with your music career? Was it starting to kind of fizzle out because you were
just not able to be there and be doing it in the best way you could? Right, yeah. That's actually what happened. You know, after a while, the label started, you know, they started seeing that I wasn't as serious as I should have been, you know? So, you know, after a while, you know, people can only, you know, they tried to...
get me to go the right way. "Yo, listen man, you know, you should maybe try to clean yourself up." They didn't really know what was going on, but after a while they started being apparent. Like, "Well, yo, listen, you're going to either have to go to a rehab or..." And then sooner or later they just backed up. They were like, "Listen, you can get yourself together. Call us." You know what I mean? It was one of them things.
About a decade had passed since that night in 1993. By now, Travelle had met a woman named Crystal Sutton. They had twin boys together, Tyler and Travelle Jr., and they got married. In those years, was that night still coming in kind of your lowest points? Were you still thinking about that night? Would it hit you in the middle of the night or, you know, worried about it?
Yeah, you know, around that time, like I think I was just coming to a point, you know, in my life, I was getting older and, you know, I started really appreciating life a lot more, you know what I mean? Life in general, you know, not really my life, but just like, you know, like kind of like the whole, you know, blessing of life. And I started really reflecting on what might have happened, you know, and I was like, wow, well,
You know, what if this guy had, you know, kids? And what if this guy, you know, I used to just compare my life to his always. It was like a parallel, like, you know what I mean? Like, wow, well, what would he be doing right now? Or what would, you know, Christmas time, like, I would think, like, well, you know, I wonder, you know, if he would, is he going to see his mother right now? You know what I mean? Would he be going to see, you know? So it was one of them things. Like, I just started, you know, just thinking more and more about that night, you know? We'll be right back.
Did you ever go by where the shooting happened? Yeah, all the time. All the time. I lived in that neighborhood. That was where I was from. So I remember looking out the window at the spot, you know, and just be like, I just couldn't escape it. Travell Coleman says by this time, he thought about it every single day, sometimes right before he fell asleep, or sometimes it would pop into his mind out of nowhere.
He remembers one time he was staying in a hotel and taking an elevator down to breakfast. He says it just hit him. Suddenly it felt like the people in the elevator were the man's family, just looking at him. Travelle started trying to talk about what had happened. He remembers that his mother's response was, that was a long time ago, that was in the past. He says he doesn't think she believed what he was telling her. He tried to talk about it with Crystal, too. You know, I definitely trusted her, you know.
So we spoke about that situation a couple of times. And I actually told her that I might, I said, I didn't tell, she was probably the only person that I said this to. I said, yeah, I'm thinking about, I might turn myself in for that. She was like, what would I do? What do you think that would do? She wasn't really looking at it from the standpoint I was looking at it from. She was kind of looking at it like,
Well, you know, that would just take you away from everything. It's just your kids, your sons, they're going to miss their father. You know, that's the kind of thing she was thinking about. I just said, yeah, I'll just think about it sometime. And I just kind of brushed it off. Did it feel like when you would talk to Crystal about it or anyone else,
Right, that's what I mean. Like, they weren't really, like, kind of grasping the whole thing, you know what I mean? They were like, you know...
Well, look, it was a long time ago, you know? I mean, you know, they couldn't understand. I didn't expect them to. I just wanted to talk about it and, you know, kind of bounce it off somebody. I wanted somebody to say what they said, you know what I mean? Don't worry about it, you know? Look, listen, you know? That was what I was kind of looking for. I wanted somebody to say, look, man, nothing happened. Nah, that didn't happen, you know what I mean? Like, I kind of was still in denial, you know what I mean? But, you know...
I knew what I needed to do, you know what I mean? I started thinking about it more and more. I'm like, "Well, look, if anything did happen, that would be..." I just felt like that was the only way
you know, I can resolve it. You know what I mean? Like, I've been... You understand, if something's been on your mind for the past 15 years, you feel like you want to do anything to get to the bottom of it. Like, okay, look...
What can I do about this? You know what I mean? And I just thought about it. Well, if I turn myself in, I can find out what happened to him. And if something did happen, then here we go. You know what I mean? And then I can kind of move on, whatever happens after that, you know? Because you didn't know if he was alive or dead. No, I didn't. I didn't know. You know, after a while, you know, I told myself he was all right, you know?
But I still didn't know. You know, I didn't know for sure. Did it get to a point where, even though if he had died, you knew that you would be going to prison for a very long time, it didn't matter anymore? Nah, it didn't matter. It was like, it is what it is at that point. That's how I looked at it. Like, whatever happens, you know, this is it. By this point, it was 2010. It had been 17 years. I went to the precinct, and they, um...
They, you know, I told them about it. They kind of like laughed me out of it. What did you say? I said, look, I wanted to talk about a murder that I think happened. I said, I actually said murder. I said, I think I want to talk about a murder that I think happened a few years ago. They was like, where? And I said, it was a few years ago on Park Avenue. And he was like...
He was like, "What do you want to tell me about it?" "I just wanted to tell you that I was the guy that shot somebody." He was like, "Wait, you said when?" I said, "A few years ago. It had to be in the early '90s." He was like, "All right, you know what?" He was like, "Take my card and give me your number." I gave him my number.
And he was like, "I'll call you. If we hear about anything, if I'm going to look into it, and if I hear anything, I'll call you." And I said, "Okay." I said, "All right." So I just left, you know? And then, you know, I had a phone at that time, and I lost it, right? So I was like, "Well," you know, and then he said, "I'm going to call you in the next couple of weeks," something like that, right? So that was in the back of my mind. So I said, "You know what? Let me go back and check."
And after this, I'm just going to leave it alone. You know what I mean? What happened when you went back? Well, they, you know, the guy kind of took me more serious. It was a different, it was a different guy. And he was like, he was like, when did that happen? I said, I said, I don't know, maybe about 99, 93. I kind of remembered the year. So I said, I said, 93, it was in the winter. I said, it was like in the fall, kind of.
You know, he was like, he was like, he was like, hold on. He's like, wait right here. Sit down right there. You know, he was kind of cordial. He was like, he was like, all right. He said, all right, I'm going to look into that. He was like, wait right here, though. So he went in, you know, he was taking kind of long, you know, I was like, wow. So then he came back out. He said, look, I want you to step in here for a minute. You know, I want to talk to you for a minute. And then they put me in a room like this.
You know, and then that's when I kind of knew something had happened, you know? Travell signed a confession about what he remembered from that night. And then someone came in and told him what had happened. Next time, the rest of Travell's story. You know, I've heard of people turning themselves in, but it's usually soon thereafter the crime, or it's somebody who knows law enforcement is looking for them.
What makes this entirely unique is that Travelle was never a suspect in the first place. So no, I've never experienced anything like someone coming forward 17 years after the fact. So no, this is absolutely extraordinary. Criminal is created by Lauren Spohr and me. Nadia Wilson is our senior producer. Katie Bishop is our supervising producer. Our producers are Susanna Robertson, Jackie Sajico, Lily Clark, Lena Sillison, Sam Kim, and Megan Kinane.
This episode was mixed by Veronica Simonetti, engineering by Russ Henry. Julian Alexander makes original illustrations for each episode of Criminal. You can see them at thisiscriminal.com. And sign up for our newsletter at thisiscriminal.com slash newsletter. If you like the show, tell a friend or leave us a review. It means a lot. We hope you'll join our new membership program, Criminal Plus.
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Criminal is recorded in the studios of North Carolina Public Radio, WUNC. We're part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Discover more great shows at podcast.voxmedia.com. I'm Phoebe Judge. This is Criminal.