Detroit's OG King of Cons: Detroit Riots and Drug Epidemic w/Tyrone Stephens

Tyrone Stephens lived a life most people wouldn’t survive — arrested at 9 years old, tried as an adult at 17, shot at work, and knee-deep in the con game from Detroit to New York. In this raw and powerful conversation, he opens up about growing up in violence, the streets that shaped him, and how crime evolved before and after the government flooded Black communities with drugs.

Growing up in Detroit as the middle child of six, Tyrone calls himself the “problem child,” but behind that title were deep emotional struggles and a household filled with weekend violence. By 15, he stopped going to school. By 17, he was in prison serving a 2.5–15 year sentence for robberies.

After nearly two years behind bars, Tyrone tried to rebuild — working in a factory — until he was shot over a bet that a man refused to pay.

What followed in the 60s and 70s was a wild, dangerous, and calculated hustle: the New York con game. Tyrone and his circle went from making $700–$1500 a week to running scams that pulled in over $10,000 per hit once they started targeting white-collar victims.

But everything shifted after the 1967 Detroit riots.

Tyrone shares how the government’s decision to flood Black neighborhoods with drugs destroyed communities, businesses, families, and an entire generation of Black wealth and potential.

This is a story about survival, systems, and street smarts — and the cost of it all.

00:00 Intro

00:53 Growing up

14:14 Robbing & hustling

25:00 From juvi to prison

30:00 Changed man

34:30 Con game & gambling

43:00 Government drops the drugs

48:25 After effects

57:25 How to get $1M

01:03:40 How the con game works

01:09:00 Can anybody do it?

01:15:20 Why he stopped?

01:27:15 Closing

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