Many of our favorite musicians, actors, and athletes came to fame in the '80s, and some are still living the good life. But 40 years leaves a lot of time to go bad, get caught, and wind up in prison, sometimes for life.
Category
🛠️
LifestyleTranscript
00:00Many of our favorite musicians, actors, and athletes came to fame in the 80s, and some
00:05are still living the good life.
00:07But 40 years leaves a lot of time to go bad, get caught, and wind up in prison, sometimes
00:11for life.
00:12Melvin Hall Jr.'s professional baseball career, which started with the Chicago Cubs, ran from
00:181981 until 1996.
00:21In 1987, Hall led the league's left-fielders in both fielding percentage and range factor.
00:26By the early 90s, he was raking in more than $1 million a year.
00:30After playing a few seasons with the Yankees, Hall left for Japan in 1993, playing for a
00:35couple teams there.
00:36The last year he played, Hall had an abbreviated stint with the San Francisco Giants and the
00:40White Sox minor league team.
00:42Hall retired in 1996.
00:45In 2009, Hall received a 45-year prison sentence for raping a 12-year-old girl.
00:50During the trial, a decade of horrific sexual misconduct against at least three girls, the
00:55oldest of whom was 15, came to light.
00:58He said it was destiny, I'm gonna marry you."
01:01The family of that 15-year-old girl allowed the nearly 50-year-old Hall to move into their
01:05home for a time.
01:07Hall assaulted his other two victims while he was their basketball coach.
01:10For these crimes, he was convicted of three counts of aggravated sexual assault of a child
01:15and two counts of indecency with a child.
01:17His earliest possible parole date is in 2031.
01:21Nathaniel Glover, a.k.a. the Kid Creole, made a name for himself as one of the original
01:26members of Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five.
01:29The group released their first hit single, Freedom, with Sugarhill Records in 1980 and
01:33another in 1981, establishing themselves as early icons in the hip-hop genre.
01:38The Furious Five split into two groups that continued making music for several years.
01:43As the rap genre developed, OG acts like Glover's gradually went out of style until he was no
01:48longer able to sustain a music career.
01:50By the mid-'80s, he was working odd jobs despite being a hip-hop pioneer.
01:54In 2017, Glover killed an unhoused man with a kitchen knife.
01:58While defending his actions to the police, Glover explained that he believed the victim,
02:0355-year-old John Jolly, was soliciting him for sex.
02:07At his trial in 2022, Glover's attorneys argued that he acted out of fear, but Glover was
02:12convicted of first-degree manslaughter and sentenced to 16 years in prison.
02:16If he serves his full sentence, he'll be 78 years old upon release.
02:21David Meggett exploded onto the New York Giants lineup in the late 1980s.
02:25In his first season as a running back, he led the league in punt return yards, punt
02:29returns resulting in a touchdown, and the season's longest punt return.
02:33Meggett helped the Giants win Super Bowl XXV before joining the New England Patriots for
02:37three seasons.
02:38He returned to New York as a Jet in 1998 and retired at 32, leaving the league with a then-record-breaking
02:453,708 punt return yards.
02:48But while his NFL career was impressive, Meggett's activities off the field brought him a lifetime
02:53of shame.
02:54In 2010, Meggett was convicted of robbing and raping a college student and sentenced
02:59to 30 years.
03:00And he hasn't been a model prisoner.
03:02According to his inmate record, Meggett hasn't participated in any enrichment programs, and
03:07he's racked up a series of penalties for illegal possession of a cell phone.
03:10He is currently serving out his sentence in a South Carolina prison with no possibility
03:15of parole.
03:16His projected release date is 2034.
03:19Jamaican dancehall became one of the many defining musical movements of the 1980s, and
03:23one of its most charismatic voices was Desmond Ninja Man Ballantyne.
03:27In 1988, when he was only 22, Ballantyne released his first hit single, Cover Me, a duet with
03:34Tinga Stewart.
03:35His intensity and theatricality made him an icon in the dancehall scene.
03:39By the late 80s, he'd earned the title The Don Gorgon, marking him as one of the kings
03:44of the genre.
03:45Don Gorgon talk, remember Don Gorgon.
03:48He carried his hot 80s start into sustained success in the 90s, a decade that included
03:53a highly publicized feud with a fellow DJ and a brief appearance in Third World Cop,
03:58then Jamaica's most successful action film.
04:01But in 2017, Ballantyne, his son, and a co-conspirator were convicted of shooting a man to death
04:06after an argument in Kingston, Jamaica in 2009.
04:10He was sentenced to life in prison, with the possibility of parole after 25 years.
04:14In 2023, six years into his sentence, Ballantyne proposed a series of reforms to the Jamaican
04:20Department of Correctional Services, including better education programs and potential work
04:24service programs.
04:26DCS replied by pointing out the system's already existing options.
04:31Mark Gator Rogowski was one of skateboarding's first icons.
04:34Rogowski was only 14 when he turned pro.
04:37He won a series of high-profile competitions, turned his nickname into a lucrative branding
04:42opportunity, and appeared in the iconic music video for Tom Petty's classic Free Fallen.
04:47The closest comparison to Rogowski would be Tony Hawk, with whom he shared the spotlight.
04:51But while Hawk remains one of the most famous athletes of his era, Rogowski fell from grace.
04:56In 1992, Rogowski pleaded no contest to the rape and murder of his ex-girlfriend's best
05:02friend.
05:03The skateboarder made no attempts to deny the charges, instead offering apologies with
05:07references to his newfound faith.
05:09Despite the victim's father's call for a harsher punishment, the former skater received 31
05:14years to life with the possibility of parole.
05:16That parole could have come as early as 2010, but Rogowski remains in prison.
05:21California Governor Gavin Newsom twice reversed the parole board's decision to let Rogowski
05:25out, and in November 2024, the state's parole board found Rogowski unsuitable for release.
05:32Dennis Roldan began his career as a pro basketball player in the Philippine Basketball Association.
05:37He became an actor, probably most notably in 1983's Hot Property, after which he again
05:43changed careers, becoming a politician, representing Quezon City's 3rd District from 1992 to 1995.
05:50In 2014, Roldan was sentenced to life in prison for his role in the kidnapping of a 3-year-old
05:55boy for ransom.
05:56Two co-conspirators were charged alongside Roldan, but both died before they could be
06:01sentenced.
06:02Roldan denied the charges, but messages were found on his phone in which the victim's mother
06:05pleaded with him to accept a smaller ransom because she couldn't afford what he demanded
06:09of her.
06:10The boy was safely recovered, and Roldan was incarcerated at the New Bilibid Prison, one
06:15of the toughest in the world, where he'll remain for the rest of his life.
06:19If you or anyone you know has been a victim of sexual assault, help is available.
06:23Visit the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network website or contact RAINN's National Helpline
06:29at 1-800-656-HOPE or 673.