Alberto Gonzalez sits in Kennedy Park and watches the kids. He looks into their eyes and pays attention to the way they act. He notices if they scratch the inside of their leg or if their pupils are big or small. 

Gonzalez looks for the signs of drug use. He knows them all too well. “My whole life has revolved around drugs,” he said.

Gonzalez made his first drug delivery when he was in the second grade. His stepfather put drugs in a box, piled cookies on top and sent Gonzalez on his way. 

When he returned, the cookies were picked out of the box and his stepfather lifted the cash. 

“I was 8 years old when I delivered my first cookie box of heroin,” he said.

Gonzalez may not have known what he was doing was wrong, but he knew one thing: “My piggy bank was always full and I had a brand new minibike. I was the kid of the block!”

Like the addicts he delivered to, Gonzalez could not wait until his next delivery. “I was jonesing for the next cookie box.”

The Brooklyn native sold weed through middle school and graduated high school before landing a job building Trident-Class submarines in Groton, Conn.  He “grinded metal” for eight years and made $80,000 a year doing so.

“But what is 80 grand a year when I could make that in one month selling drugs?” Gonzalez said. 

A lifestyle of drugs and wealth came to a halt, when in 1989, the father of two was sentenced to 30 years in federal prison for running cocaine between Connecticut and Portland, Maine.

Gonzalez witnessed killings in prison and learned to never eat in the mess hall where trouble was always brewing. “When you are in prison, it’s like a walking time bomb that is ready to explode at any moment.” He stood in the same line as Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh and talked with American mobster John Gotti through the air vents.

“The day I got out, I walked out and started crying,” Gonzalez said. 

That was April 4, 2011, the day Gonzalez promised to help kids keep from making the same mistakes he did. “That’s my goal. To not have these kids go down the path I did.

“I come out of prison and see these kids on the corner doing drugs … it breaks my heart,” Gonzalez said. 

Gonzalez said dealers act on different terms than when he was involved in the drug trade. “I sold drugs, but not to kids.” But Gonzalez makes no excuses. “I poisoned fathers, mothers, sisters and it really bothers me.” 

That guilt drives Gonzalez’s desire to help children. “I hate what I did. It breaks my heart and that’s why I want to help these kids.” He sees children as young as 12 and 13 on drugs. “I go to the park and start talking to kids. Some of them I touch and some of them I don’t. Sometimes they just give me the finger.”

Gonzalez has found Hope Haven Gospel Mission to be his safe haven, a family that squashes any desires to return to his past. “It’s easy to fall back, but when I see what’s happening to these kids, I don’t want anything to do with it.

“This is a safe environment for me,” said Gonzalez, who is head of security at the shelter. “Pastor John (Robbins) is the big father that I never had. He always has his eye on me.”

Gonzalez has put “Youth For Hope” into action at Hope Haven. The program brings school-aged children, whether troubled or not, into the shelter to experience various aspects of homelessness. The kids help with chores and work their way up to Gonzalez’s dorm-style room to look at pictures of his two sons on the wall, the suit he will wear to drug court graduation in August and the collection of stuffed dogs that were given to him by kids he has guided. “Kids say thank you and reward me. They know I love dogs,” Gonzalez said.

Most of all, the kids listen to his story.

“I had the best job. I got into drugs and it was all over,” Gonzalez said. “I tell them like it is. Don’t take the path I did.

“My goal is to touch one kid’s heart. If I touch one kid, I achieved my goal,” he said.

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