It's been nearly half a lifetime since Pete Carroll walked up to
Brian Banks at Long Beach Poly High and said, "Hey, you can do something. You can
be something."
Banks was 15 years old at the time, and to him, that message seemed clear: he had a future playing football.
But two years later, Banks
became ensnared in an ordeal of injustice, anger and heartbreak that
lasted a decade. On his way to possibly playing for Carroll at USC,
Banks was wrongly accused of raping a girl at his high school. Rather
than facing 41 years to life in prison if he fought the charges and
lost, he pleaded guilty and was sent to prison for five years.
"I screamed and yelled and begged for people to help," Banks said Sunday by phone. "And even then no one listened."
Banks, now 29, was cleared and freed in May 2012 after serving five
years of probation (in addition to the five years in prison) when his
accuser recanted her story. He got a tryout from Carroll and the
Seahawks, and then another from the Falcons. But it was too late for his
original dream to come true.
It was not, however, too late
for Carroll to be right in his prediction. This year, Banks has found a
place where important people are listening: he is working for the NFL in
New York City. And even though he just started his first real job, the
league might need him even more than he ever needed the league.
– – – – – – – – –
The question Banks gets first
and most often from everyone who wants to hear about his story is: "Have
you forgiven her?" Isn't he still upset at Wanetta Gibson, who falsely
accused him of raping her in a stairwell, then stood by as Banks was
sent to prison, only to admit she fabricated the story after winning a
$1.5 million lawsuit from the Long Beach school district?
"I often think about what I've been through," Banks said. "I've
removed my emotion from what this girl did to me. It already happened.
It's, 'What am I doing now? How am I dealing with it?'"
A lot of how he's dealing with it comes from the months he spent in
juvenile hall, awaiting his legal fate in California. It was there that
Banks met a man named Jerome Johnson, who became a mentor to him.
"He opened my eyes," Banks said. "He challenged my mind in a way that
had never been challenged before. I had a good upbringing. But these
were things that were foreign to me. All it took was that person to
introduce me to thinking who 'the real you' is."
Banks had never really thought about his identity. He was a football
player, and that was enough – just like it is for most star high school
athletes. Then football was taken away, and he was sent to a place where
he had no real control over his future or even his safety.
"Unless you're a killer yourself, it's frightening," he said. "It's not a place where everything is gonna be all right."
So the challenge became about separating himself from his plight, and finding power over it.
"One day I woke up and it dawned on me I had no control over what's
going on in my life," Banks said. "I have control over how it affects
me. I started to better myself as a person rather than let my situation
be the end-all. I practiced it and I practiced it and it became a little
easier."
At first, that was a process for survival. It would soon become a foundation for a career.
– – – – – – – – –
When he got out of prison, he
craved juice. Orange juice. Apple juice. Any kind of fruit juice. Banks
drank as much of it as he could find, using that and all the time lost
as fuel to try to make his lost football dream come true. Carroll gave
him a shot in Seattle. He went to some other camps when that didn't work
out. Somewhere along the way, he got a call from New York. It was Roger
Goodell.
"I am calling to wish you the best," the commissioner told him. "I really want you to make it."
They stayed in touch. And a
short time before the 2014 NFL draft, Goodell texted him to ask a favor.
He wanted Banks to speak at the rookie symposium.
Banks, who was already in demand
as a motivational speaker, accepted. Over the phone on Sunday, he
reprised what he said to the rookies over the summer – a group he
imagined himself being a part of for so long:
"The biggest thing you must remember is the mindset you have – what
were the initial things you said to yourself as a young kid? Everything
you said, that's who you are. That's the foundation, the essence of
football. Why did you want to play? How did it make you feel? When the
hands start coming out, you have to remember what it is you came here to
do, why you initially wanted to do it. You have it, take pride in it.
There are millions of people who went for the same opportunity and you
made it. It's a blessing. It's a gift. Don't ruin this by bad
decision-making."
Banks got a strong response, not only from players, but from the
commissioner. Only a few weeks after the speech, the NFL hired him.
– – – – – – – – –
Football Sundays over the last few months have been different for
Banks than he ever expected. He watched games in a control room in New
York, as a member of the NFL's department of operations. If Banks saw a
potentially controversial play, he summoned head of officiating Dean
Blandino and asked him to take a second or third look. If Blandino
needed to reach out to the officials on site, he made the call. Banks
served as the eyes and ears of the league's eyes and ears.
"It's awesome," he said. "I guess I would say it's new and something
I've been doing. It's the game of football. It's the love of football.
It's the knowledge and understanding of it. This is my first look at
corporate America."
And it came during a very
distinct and disturbing year. The league's domestic violence crisis
escalated almost as soon as Banks entered the door. He is a 29-year-old
man wrongfully accused and then cleared of sexual assault, working for a
league that is struggling to deal with an epidemic of sexual assault.
"I know what it's like to walk that path," he said. "It's something I hope to begin talking to players about."
It's difficult for Banks to speak on the subject, both because of his
personal odyssey and because of whom he works for. He stressed that his
thoughts are his own, rather than on behalf of bosses who are paid to
address the crisis every day.
"Personally how I feel is if the crime is a serious crime, that
person should not be able to play. If somebody has been accused of
something, it may be best for the person to sit down until the truth is
discovered, so as not to draw any more attention."
More important to him, though, is his desire to help build a better
infrastructure for players so they don't get into trouble in the first
place. Banks thinks outreach should start at the Pop Warner level, with
kids getting the kind of mentorship at age 8 that he began to get in his
late teens.
"If the NFL is going to be
responsible for what someone is doing in their personal life, there may
need to be preventative work early against the incidents that are
happening," Banks said. "Start from contact football. Part of these
programs should be one day a week where a life coach will do group
sessions. He can teach critical thinking to young kids about life.
You're going to learn your fundamentals in school. But there is not a
category in school called 'life preparation.' How do we make sure the
kids who don't have as good of a household can still receive that
message? Let's make sure they receive it while playing football."
This is part of Banks' mission now – to be an "ambassador" for the
NFL. Because of his past, his words have weight for kids and adults. He
truly understands what it is to be a victim, and what it is to be
accused.
"What is the definition of
manhood?" Banks asked. "How do you obtain it? What is womanhood? Define
that as well. Let's talk about respect. What is the foundation of
respect? That opens the door to discussions about harassment and
assault."
– – – – – – – – –
Banks will not be at the Super
Bowl this week. Because there's only one game, he won't be needed to
help out Blandino. Instead he'll be home in New York working on his
department's social media strategy. He'll also be preparing for his
wedding. Banks is newly engaged to a woman named Emmy who he has been
dating for two years. He calls the relationship "genuine and
supportive."
"People ask, 'Do I have trust issues?'" Banks said. "I wouldn't say I
have trust issues. I have trust concerns. It's valuable for me to trust
a person in particular.
"I've only been free for two years. I'm still always reminded by the
trust that was lost when I was younger. All of that is restored by what
you do now."
The NFL can only hope it can
restore the public's trust after a season full of missteps and inaction.
But Banks knows this is more than public relations. Somewhere this
week, a college coach is telling a star high school football player that
he can do something, that he can be something. Banks' journey to that
goal was diverted but not destroyed. He turned out to be something very
valuable for the football community: a daily reminder that the NFL can
teach more than just football.
A hitchhiker was caught off-guard when a world leader offered to give him a lift. 
Residents
had already called firefighters to alert them to the leak minutes
before the gas ignited, and the hospital had already begun evacuating.
But the exposition hit them in the middle of it.
Sitting at the front of class four in her school uniform, Priscilla
Sitienei listens intently while she writes the English names of animals
in her notebook.
