Success Stories: Allen Florence 
Allen Florence is a recent U-Turn Permitted graduate who has lived in North Lawndale for all of his life. He is the oldest of eight brothers and sisters and has therefore always felt a responsibility to help his mother provide for and support them. He saw that his relatives would take advantage of his mother and they would continuously take advantage of her kindness. From a young age, about 13 or 14, Allen began to work to earn money for his family by delivery groceries, shoveling snow and selling drugs. Allen had goals of bringing comfort to his family, and initially he told himself that once he achieved his goals he would no longer sell. But it soon became a way of life and more and more difficult to quit. Allen says he was “good at being bad” and he convinced himself that if you are doing the wrong thing for the right reason you’ll have good luck. It also didn’t help that people viewed him as doing well and continually complemented him and his progress.
After settling into this lifestyle, Allen was looked upon as the guardian of his family. His aunts would always come to him when they had a problem. When U-Turn graduate, Allen Florence
Allen was nineteen he got into a conflict with his aunt’s boyfriend, which ended with Allen shooting the boyfriend and a few of his friends. Before Allen turned himself in, he found out that only one of the injured men were pressing charges and the rest were willing to forget the incident. He served four and a half years of a nine year sentence.
Allen calls prison at that time “college for criminals.” He says that the same things that were going on in the streets were going on in the prisons and that inmates were able to continue with the life they were living on the street. When he returned home, his mother had passed away and people were messing with his nieces, nephews and sister so he took over 15th Street and set up shop as a method of protecting his family. As a result of Allen and his sister selling the same product his sister and her boyfriend turned him in with product that wasn’t his.
This time when Allen returned home he had no fight left. He was discouraged but he couldn’t be mad at his sister because it was a part of the life he lived. A feeling of hopelessness set in and when the police, having nothing against him but knowing his history asked him to trade himself for someone bigger he was returned to prison on a possession charge. Allen fought this injustice for two years but in the end had to return to prison for seven months.
After spending so much time in prison Allen began to feel a sense of hopelessness for a life that had been spent mainly within prison walls. His frustration served as a source of motivation for Allen. He found employment and began to feel secure and comfortable with his new life but then he was laid off and stayed on unemployment for awhile. The feeling of helplessness in obtaining a job soon returned and Allen felt that without connections to employers and support from employment networks he was at a dead end. At this point in his life the fear of the unknown set in. The temptation of the street provided a sense of security.
Reflecting on his life now, Allen is amazed at the large period of his life that has passed while he was in prison. He knows the value of education and he is regretful of the fact that he didn’t complete the educational programs he started in sociology, computers and the arts that were offered while he was in-carcerated.
After completing the U-Turn Permitted (UTP) program Allen was placed at Accuslab. Allen’s performance and positive attitude has been noticed and has served as an example of the graduates from UTP. His supervisor was so impressed by Allen that he gave him a key to the store within the first month of employment. His conduct has also impressed his supervisor to the extent that he requested another UTP graduate and has now hired a second UTP graduate.
Allen is grateful for the support and guidance that NLEN, especially Client Service Manager Elaine Austin and the rest of the staff, have given him and he is happy with the progress his life is making, but he is also aware of the fact that for him this is a continual process. He says that NLEN and programs like it have saved his life but that it is also up to the individual to persist on the never-ending journey toward making a U-Turn in life. Allen encourages anyone who is at the end of their rope to embrace programs like NLEN as a positive force in their life and move forward on a positive path toward progress and personal development.
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