FREDDIE PRINZE JR - PRINZE JR FOUGHT TO STAY AWAY FROM GANGS

PRINZE JR FOUGHT TO STAY AWAY FROM GANGS

FREDDIE PRINZE JR was constantly fighting to stay out of trouble as a child and had to beg a gang boss to ask his heavies to stop trying to corrupt him. The Latino actor grew up in New Mexico and mowed lawns for a high-ranking local gangster. Determined not to let his mother down, young Prinze Jr turned his back on a life of crime - but was always tempted to become a bad boy by his bosses' thugs. He recalls, "There was this whole pachuco, which is a Spanish term for old time gangster, who lived on my block and I would cut his grass for him. "His guys would always try to rope me in the gang and I was just trying to stay out of trouble. I was doing three jobs and paying a lot of my family's bills because they weren't able to work at the time. "I went to the boss and said, `Look, I'm just trying to stay out of trouble and I never asked you for anything but these guys are trying to rope me in and I'm fighting for my life every single day. I'm not trying to join a gang. My mom'll kill me!' "It worked, those guys never bothered me ever again after that... They never even looked at me."